So Many Shoes

I used my shoe illustrations to make my first repeating pattern! It's a pretty simple one, but it works!

Janna and the World of Wonderful Shoes

My second Maps assignment was to make an entry to submit to Adam Hayes Make Maps blog. For the project artists have to respond to the task of making a map of somewhere that they feel they belong. Here is the description I submitted along with my piece:

It is hard for me to be sure at this time in my life where I belong geographically and/or emotionally, but one thing I can be certain of is the fact that I belong in wonderful shoes! With an 11 wide shoe size, thick calves, a tiny budget, and a penchant for the bright and unusually obnoxious, I have a lot of difficulty finding agreeable footwear. Everything is either too tight or too loose or too boring or too sporty! In my dreams, however, I walk in forests of De Stijl flats, breakfast-themed high tops, and kitten heels (adorned with actual kittens!) and every shoe fits me better than Cinderella’s glass slipper.

[All of the shoes included in this piece are based on real shoes from various designers who are not me. You can see the real ones here, in a collection I’ve compiled on the fashion site Polyvore]

Hopefully Adam will like my piece enough to put it up on the blog! I suppose I should hear back in a few days. At any rate, it was a fun project and I'm happy with the way it turned out!

Getting Where You're Going

A couple of sketchbook assignments for my Maps class!

A compass rose:

And some hand lettering/hierarchy of type practice!

SHOES...Let's Get Some SHOES

These shoes are going to be a part of a piece I'm doing for my Maps class this week. All the drawings are based on real footwear I have found on Polyvore (AKA my favorite site EVER). For more information on the shoes and/or to see more of my favorites, go here!

"Let's get some shoes!"

SEEMYSTUFFBUYMYSTUFF

Hey guys! I just found out that the reception for "Out into the World" - an exhibition I'm a part of - is TOMORROW night! So if you can make it you should definitely stop by! A selection of my Italy work will be on view.

There will probably be snacks!

ALSO, I made 25 new Bird Barrettes for the Raw Art Sale this weekend, in an array of new, Spring-y colors and patterns. Here I am modeling a few of them!

Bird Barrettes are great for those who fear their look is lacking a certain edge.

Buy a barrette and you too may look super tough while chillin' with your homies!

Purchase your own ticket to cool THIS WEEKEND at:

MICA's Raw Art Sale

In the BBOX
Sunday, February 13th
12pm-4pm
OR
Monday, February 14th
10am-4pm

Alright, all plugging done for now! Have a great weekend!

Aminal Peoples

Yay! I just bought acrylic gouache! It's so much fun! To celebrate I made some little creatures to put in my Maps sketchbook.

Also, Julianna wanted me to post some silly portraits I did of her and Kathleen. I think I really captured their essence.

Bird Barrettes

I can't believe it's already time for me to go back to school! Classes start Tuesday and I can't exactly say I'm looking forward to it. Don't get me wrong, I am looking forward to seeing friends again and starting some new classes and even - gulp! - starting a new thesis. The problem is that I know that as soon as the semester starts it's going to be one crazy, obstacle-ridden, downhill race to the end. And when I get to the end where will I be?

In need of a job! And out of school, most likely forever!

These are scary prospects.
Ah well. At least I'm not the only one...right? Right??
Right.

Sadly, I haven't been incredibly productive this break. I've had many distractions, some for which I'm sure you'd pardon me, others for which I'm sure you would not. One thing I have managed to work on, though, is producing more Bird Barrettes, a product I quickly put together for MICA's annual Art Market this past December. Since it was around finals time I only got around to making six, but all six sold! Here's a photo of them in my studio:

Thanks so much to the people who bought them!

When I made these first six I also made little placards to hold each bird along with some ridiculous commentary. They looked like this:

Making the placards was fun and I think I might do something similar for the batch of 25 birds I'm working on now. However, when I do the next ones I'll probably come up with maybe 5 designs and then print them in multiples rather than design a new card for every bird.

At the Art Market I also sold large prints of my first Secret Garden piece (big thanks to those of you who purchased them!!!). I didn't have the means to get business cards printed before the event so I put together some handmade ones to go with each print. I think they turned out kind of cute so I thought I'd share them, too!

Thanks for reading! If you're interested in purchasing one (or a dozen!) of my Bird Barrettes please come to:

MICA's Raw Art Sale
In the BBOX
Sunday, February 13th
12pm-4pm
OR
Monday, February 14th
10am-4pm

Remember, a Bird Barrette makes an excellent Valentine's Day gift!

All Together Now

Welcome to the first blog entry of the new year! Happy 2011, everybody!

I just thought it would be nice to show you how my Secret Garden work looked on the wall during my final thesis critique.

Like I said in my The Animal Charmer post, I'd like to add a cover to the series before Commencement, and maybe another spot. But as it is, I think it looks good!

The Animal Charmer

Behold, my final large piece for my senior thesis, illustrating Francis Hodgson Burnett's The Secret Garden! Here we see Mary's new friend Dickon in his natural state, entertaining two rabbits, a cock pheasant, and a squirrel while resting in his beloved moor on a late winter's day.

My thesis has been a lot of fun but it has also been very challenging. This medium can be tricky and very time-consuming, and as a result this past semester has been one of my hardest at MICA. Still, I believe that I've learned a lot from this process and next time I start a similar project I will be smarter. In the future I hope to experiment with loosening up my technique and maybe incorporating some painting and drawing to add even more texture and to hopefully make things move a little faster. For now, though, I'm very proud of the work I've done and I look forward to showing it at commencement in May. I plan on making a book jacket for this project over this break and maybe adding in a few more spot-type things in my spare time to round out the series. It's actually quite nice to carry a bit of sewing around with you when you don't feel like your life's blood is on the line.

Meatball Head

For my Narrative Color final we had to choose a hero's journey to illustrate. For my hero I chose 1990s anime superhero sensation, Sailor Moon, and her journey is the show's first episode. Each piece is keyed to a different color. It was a fairly open-ended assignment so I decided to use it as an excuse to practice hand-lettering.

Oh, Darien!