EDM challenge #38--Halloween

What's it called when you make letters out of themed images? Anyway, here's my answer to the challenge, quickly thrown on the paper so I wouldn't miss the whole holiday idea.

I didn't plan, got through the Hallo and couldn't think of what to do for the e's and n. Finally came up with something. Thank goodness for the versatility of spider webs!

W/c pencil and paint on 90# paper.

image loading problems

Thanks for the advice from the EDM group. I've made some quick fixes and things are looking better. It's constant, learning the software side of art, and I appreciate all the help!

Sun swirl

Keri Smith recently posted about Bruno Maneri's book and his exercise of painting suns. So I had to do one, too.

The motion of swirling glowing colors round and round is soothing and energizing at the same time. Bruno is onto something here!

Gouache on 90# w/c paper.

The sour cat

This represents our other cat, who is NOT sweet. She had an unhappy childhood and it colored her life sour. She is suspicious, cranky, and lashes out easily. But we try to please her.

I made her purple to show how she wears a blend of her background experiences.

Soluble pen and w/c on 90#.

EDM challenge #35--bicycle

My first multi-gear bike was a 10-speed orange Schwinn. Though I never rode it on a beach.

The sketch looks more orange than this scan, which looks like a pink bike. And come to think of it, mine had a girl's frame. Drawing from imagination changed things.

Process: Pilot permaball (a new permanent ballpoint) and gouache on 90# w/c paper.

What IS that?!

An image appears in the tar pit. Something is surfacing.

One of the many random sketch/wash things that make me feel productive, but it was fun to see an unplanned element show up when the paint dried.

Soluble pen and w/c on 90# paper, roughly 2.5 x 4.5 inches.

A new Winsor & Newton pocket sketchbook

Maria asked about seeing this item, so I looked for a link to send her. Can't find one anywhere, not even on the Winsor & Newton site. There's a number on a tiny sticker inside that says: 07/17 5100/4021. No clue what that means.

It's 4x6 inches outside with paper that's 4 x 5 3/4 inches. Nice weight paper, maybe 75 or 80# (like Aquabee sketchpaper but less sizing), with a pocket in the back and ribbon bookmark. The middle picture shows the endpaper, which is slick and not as white as the inside pages. They have a nice tooth.

I bought mine last week at the Sharon Arts Gallery in Peterborough, NH. The leather is stamped on the center back with the W/N name and logo. It cost $13.75, as I recall.

I've just started using it. A little bulkier than a pocket Moleskine because of the leather cover but much, much better paper for water media. Has anyone else ever seen these before?

Rainbow witch

Penelope Dullaghn (see Draw a Witch ) is running a fun contest for drawing witches.

This is mine, Helga Hag. She's pasty white from living in her cave, but she wears rainbow colors to dazzle the occasional intruder.

Process: pen, pencil and w/c pencil on Canson drawing paper.

Aqua and brown

I love these colors together. A glass with textured glass and blended colors is hard to capture. Starting with white paper helps in this case, though it looks gray in the scan.

Colored pencil in a Paperchase blank book.

The blog tag game

I've been tagged by Diong to play the "List 20 Random Things About Yourself" game.

To illustrate this unexpected invitation and execution, I purposely picked a drawing of random items out of my small Moleskine sketchbook.

The list:
1. I was born in Kansas.
2. I've noticed that 95% of people who hear that fact react with a comment related to the Wizard of Oz movie.
3. As a child I was forced to sit through too many classical music and ballet performances among packed crowds of over-perfumed, blue-haired old women wearing fur.
4. I know a wonderful flat to rent on Balcomb Street in Marylebone, London.
5. I can (slowly) touch type on the Dvorak keyboard in addition to the Qwerty one.

6. My heritage is half-Swedish and half-Czech.
7. I have hundreds of pairs of earrings.
8. The furthest I've ever run was six and 3/4 miles, while we lived in high-altitude Albuquerque.
9. I would always rather have salty snacks than sweet ones.
10. I broke my little finger three years ago while on a hike.

11. I'm a strong National Public Radio fan and contributor.
12. I enjoyed dyeing the hair of my daughter and her friends blue, purple, and other colors during their teen years.
13. At age 14 I had a near-death experience when I almost drowned.
14. I didn't learn to ride a bike until I was 12.
15. I teach journal writing for a local hospital to women coping with breast cancer.

16. I've published poetry, essays, feature articles, book reviews, a software manual, and short fiction.
17. I love participating in kirtans.
18. I am an only child who never wanted siblings.
19. Writing Gregg shorthand is one of my seldom-used skills.
20. I once had a job offer to work at the Pentagon and turned it down.

Now I'm supposed to tag others. Diong said to tag as many people as minutes it took me to write this, but that's a rule I never noticed in other players' posts, so I'm picking these (did I say I was a rebel?).

Forgive me if you've been caught in the web before! I pick:
Danny
Trevor
The Pencil Guy
Persephone
KG
Malinda by popular demand :-)

Paris icons

Evy asked how I did the stamped background in the "tiny type" drawing below. I used a standard rubber stamp (from the craft store), stamping the design twice to create the background.

In this one it's a large world map stamped in golden brown ink. (Any stamp can also be colored with markers.)

I drew the icons with brown Koh-I-Noor tech pen--a loose rendition of what I found on some old Parisian posters. Apologies to Notre Dame for this questionable depiction.

In green

The same world map stamp in dark green, and to show how it fits on the small Moleskine sketchbook. I like it unadorned for now.

Green guy

Just filling in my small Moleskine.
I never know who I'll find inside!

Gouache again, doesn't bead up like transparent w/c. This brand feels strangely chalky to the touch.

Random ribbons

A friend asked me to write about process. In this one I just wanted to play with gouache complements in a small Moleskine sketchbook. I drew a ribbon, then pondered each space division before I added another. I focused on negative spaces.

After adding red around the edge, I almost quit, but then examined those negative spaces again and added red ribbons. I felt the work was still unfinished but decided to keep it linear, not filling spaces with flat color (and no other color called me).

I decided that linear verticals of inked lines would bring the ribbons forward, adding them until they felt right. Then I quit while I still liked it.

Enough process, LS? Thanks for asking!

For the pigment people

I've been lured into pure pigment fascination by a friend, so here's one experiment with complements. I found that with transparent w/c I couldn't layer the colors at all or the purples got very gray.

Separation makes the colors shout louder. Is this a metaphor for people?

Process: the painting is slightly too large for my scanner, but this is most of it. Daniel Smith tube paint on 140# paper.