Rán the Goddess of the Sea

I did this piece of years ago. Inspired by the stories of Rán.

Rán is a Norse Goddess (sea)... Rán also means "Robbery". The story of Rán is that she'd capture men as they sailed out to sea. She (by the story) had nine daughters... but for the piece I want to make her more terrifying. Since she isn't out there to be a sincere merfolk.

Well that was YEARS ago (I mean about 4-6 years ago). I wasn't happy with the end results but I liked the concept so this time I made her both beautiful and terrifying. So yes she is threatening and has FAR more than 9 children; but there is an aspect of beauty about her.

*yes I know blue spotted octopi or yellow bellied sea snakes aren't from that region of water but it's fantasy here...

Illustration Friday: Safari

Every child likes to explore and has a great imagination!!!

Animals

So... that wonderland project is almost complete. Actually the cards themselves are complete... just need to finish putting it together. Since Tory's not familiar with the template program, I've been doing it for her. Buttt these are a the other cards I did for the deck. Now I'm not a furry... so I think I did alright for someone who isn't one. Let just home the buyers like it.

Japan Relief Effort Art Auction

Some of the Montserrat Alumni are putting an art auction to raise money to donate to the Redcross Japan Earthquake Relief Effort. We are donating art pieces which we will then have a show and auction off pieces that night. A company has offered to match what we can raise so I'm hoping that we have a good turn out. I know that we are all really excited to do this. And a few of use have strong ties to Japan (remember I went in 2004 and was apart of the club when I was in school). This is my larger piece that I will be donating. I'll have two small pieces to donate as well (which will be a break down of this one... one will be a geisha and the other will be of the koi). I wanted to play on the the Japanese flag and notable images that people think of when they think of traditional Japan. So I wanted it to look grainy like parchment. I applied the single red dot in the three images. I may add some text characters but if not it shall remain as this. Along with this I'll be making 5 dozen apple pastries. Sooo I've planned to take a half a day then to get to work and help.

Get well little Zoe

Also since January, one of my little cousins were sent to the hospital with a staff infection that infected her leg and foot. Her mother is well... a step from a complete failure (and I'm not being snotty... it's one of those cases of where she only wants custody for the child support). But anyways... she's only 10... she may be a mature 10 but still 10 none the less. So I wanted to draw her something that would make her smile and let her know that there are people out there hoping that she gets well.

Lost in Wonderland (art updating)

Wow it's been a while since I've posted... I guess it's time I play catch up. Since we last spoke I've been working on a series of project. I wrote another children's book (forlittle kids). I worked on a collaborative project with my best friend, John. I worked and still am working on a collaborative project with Tory (a wonderland themed deck of playing cards for furries). And I made a piece to donate to a charity fund raiser. I've probably done more but I can't remember everything at the moment. So I guess I should post my work and then see where things go from there.

The first four pieces are of commissions I did for the wonderland deck. We have an engineer, a royal court's man, a hunter, and a soldier for hire. The wonderland deck is made up of major Alice in Wonderland characters and just general characters to go with the world or era. We asked people for references of their characters and a chosen role in which they want to play. Roles ranged from labor worker to court royal.

New business cards, new mailers, and the start of my theme show entry!

Even though I still have mailers and cards, I needed to make new ones because my work and style has taken a MAJOR jump in the past year. As you can tell I even had to change my blogger header and avatar >.<. So this weekend that was one of the goals and I also did things that I didn't do for my last two runs.

For my mailers I decided to make it with a teaser of pieces rather than one piece of a portrait. Also added some of the funny faces so that it ties into the site and my business cards. For my business card I decided to go with a silly self portrait (the monkey face since I'm known for making it) but did it in a vertical format which my past ones have been horizontal. I know it's more common to hold them horizontal and that's how they sit in holders and everything. It's not particularly standard but my intentions were to be a little out of the ordinary. I usually hand them out vertically (by habit) and if someone sticks it in a book or a folder, I thought it would be a good calling card to have my face peering at them. I hope that this is as effective as I planned.

Then for the theme show, which is wild west, I chose to do an Alice in Wonderland theme. I'm not really into the wild west but we all get themes and projects we aren't happy with, so your job is to make it enjoyable. My first thought was to do a katamari tumbleweed piece with a jackalope; but then I thought about sharp shooter Annie Oakley and thought I could do something fun with her and the jackalope as white rabbit. It may have come from listening to too much anime or anticipating for the movie "Sucker Punch" but this is what I came up with. But I chose to use the common modern pose for her, the parallel of the game, and will add text on the buildings that should help make it even more themed to alice (the train is "The Dodo", the Saloon will be "The Rabbit Hole"). Annie Oakley was a sharp shooter performer who dress fairly conservatively, but what's the wild west without saloon girls. So it will be battle among the old bar maid (the queen) versus the noob starlet (alice/annie).