Day 31 - 365/2014

Day Thirty-One

I got to spend a good chunk of the day with Andi today -- on her birthday day!  We had a great time, went out to lunch, watched some wacky YouTube videos, laughed, entertained Bootsy, talked...it was great.

This evening I came up with these two early sketches for a young wombat and a young kangaroo for possible inclusion in an upcoming Penciled In edition.

But that's it for tonight...I've got some other stuff to do...and then back to house cleaning...well, at least house tidying.

365 Day 108

it seemed like a good idea at the time...

I usually check my email and Facebook before I go to bed. Well, last night/early this morning I saw a call for art from the Northville Arthouse for their show called West of Center. (And yes, they are "west" of Center St.) I have wanted to submit something there for a while but I haven't been able to fit anything I already had in progress OR make something specific that I was happy with.

I went to bed and I naturally started thinking about what I could do for Left of Center. Then the ideas wouldn't quit and after an hour I eventually had to give in and just get up because there was no way I was going to fall asleep. I was thinking of several things I had in the basement that could have been bases for a plaster cloth creature. I brought some of them up to the studio and I couldn't quite get things to gel.

Then it came to me to try and use a couple of things that I had in progress but had "set aside for later". I made these when I was first trying out plaster cloth and they were pretty misshapen and wonky. I worked with them for a bit and things started coming together.

I like both of them a lot but they are both in the very very very beginning stages and most likely will end up looking quite a bit different than their basic shapes.

The canine-ish head was already a fairly substantial clump of plaster cloth. The only thing I knew about it for sure was the tilting ears looking like he hears something. Actually, that cracks me up...even when I've had enough sleep. I think this piece will be a take off on one of my drawings/characters called "Wolfy". When I started out the head was more of a rectangle and had sort of flat (but very bumpy and crater-y) surfaces. I added the nose and tried to get a rounder shape for the head. I also added a thick neck...it originally had a wrapping paper tube neck. It is sitting on top of an upside down tomato cage. (I have a number of the cages that I bought specifically to make papier mache things with -- big creatures...I am still working my way up to that and I have switched from papier mache to plaster cloth.) This guy is about 48 inches tall.







harsh early-morning-it's-snowing light is not great for lighting objects for photos




























































The catlike guy started out tonight as just an aluminum foil covered balloon on a wrapping paper tube neck. When I started playing with it I found that the balloon was not as inflated as it once was. I compressed it a bit and shaped it a little and made the markers for ears. I added stuff around it to give it more of a body shape and this is where I am so far. The arms are just lightly taped so I could see how they might work. This guy is about 21 inches tall.