IF: Propagate

6"x8" Micron Pen with Watercolor

Smartest sounding WOW ever. The word basically means to increase, so I had the idea of an artist increasing the space his art takes. The artist basically a good friend of mine, although you can't see his face, but he is well known for his fashion sense. The design is based on a poster he co-created with another cool person. The other definition means to reproduce naturally, so I'm interested to see what other people come up with.

Last Weekend...

I went to the opening of "Deva Loka" by Yoshitaka Amano at LaBasse Projects, with Yoskay Yamamato's work, "Tell me a Story" in the little gallery. Both shows were wonderful, but I have to say that I favored Yamamoto's work a little more, I just prefered the style of his sculptures.


]\Amano's work yes was amazing and both nostalgic for me, but I just felt a little bit like I had grown out of being an anime nerd. Well, not ALL THE WAY, of course, I can't forget what inspired me, DUH, but seeing all of those kids cosplaying at the event, (the costumes were quite inventive and cute I must say) just made me think, "eeeh, this is cool, I'm just not that excited about it anymore...". Plus, I like Amano's past work A LOT better, all the concept art he's done for Vampire Hunter D and Final Fantasy campared to his newest work, was less...campy I wanna say. Maybe that was the point, I'm not sure, but it was still lovely.

Favorite costume that night

Yamamoto's work was quite adorable and very well made, though, I actually met him and I could tell he cared about his work. Especially when I complimented him on his pin, and then kind of shouted at me about where to buy one, I think he was just nervous. I actually thought he was an intern due to his young age, which we both laughed at, then he told me that Nate Fizzel was his roomie (I was holding Fizzel postcard in my hand). But I did get an Amano pin, yay me.

Best picture I got all night, lol

Cuute!

I have to start going to other galleries, like the ones at the Bergamont, at least monthly like I've been doing with LaBasse. The Corpo gallery for example was especially great, there next show in March seems especially amazing. I hope I get to intern at any of these galleries over the summer.

LA Weekly Assignment Sketches

For our next assignment in Communication Studio, we are doing illustrations for the "LA Life" section in LA Weekly, which has featured illustrations from JT Steiny, JAW Cooper, and Julian Callos. My main theme in these sketches are the bus systems that you can take all over LA. And I mean ALL OVER. I just think they fit LA because I've lived here all of my life, and since I was 12, I've had to bus at least 1 bus somewhere every other day. The buses are not only cheap transportation but to me represent LA's diversity, because if you want to see a Beverly Hills skank and a Hobo, at the same place, ride the bus. I'll be doing more skteches and posting them up soon. I'm expanding on the flying buses as well.

If: "Muddy" and "Adrift"

5"x3" Watercolor and Sepia Pen

3"x5" Watercolor, Sepia Pen

I'm putting these two together because I did them in a kind of series. They're both portraits of my cousins, "Muddy" is my cousin Brody and "Adrift" is his older sister, Emma. My favorite WOWs so far.

EVERYTHING BUT THE KITSCH N'SYNC Submissions

Solace in Numbers

"5x6"

Watercolor, Sepia Pen

Tadaaah! I'll for sure work on the background (I have ideas for them already). Everyone's turned out AMAZIING! So happy for those that got into the show and also a little jealous, but they deserved it. Trying not to feel bad about myself, but still bummed, at least people have only said good things about these. And Nathan said he wanted to hang them at the school, so my frames will actually be put into good use. I love these paintings and I'm glad I kept working on them, I'll definitly keep working with these mediums.

IF: Focused

A little late, I know, but here is my word of the week submission for last week's word, "focused". The man shaded is so focused on his reading he doesn't realized that he's about to walk into a pole. Recently gotten a little more comfortable with graphite rendering, now if I can get my hand to do that with ink, I think I'll be set.

4"x6" pen and ink and graphite

Country Western Block

For our first assignment in Alternative Materials class, we had to produce two lino block prints based on the TITLE of a country song. I choose to do "Lonely Blue Boy" by Conway Twitty. It's actually a pretty decent song. For the final two pieces I'm showing in this post, I will draw in faces with graphite. This assignment has been the most fun in the semester so far:

Sketch

One of the blocks on the letterpress

Eight of the best prints

The two prints I will draw on
Chipboard and BFK Paper, 8"x10"

Final Block
(Only decided to draw on one, the other one maybe later)