Illustration Friday - Round

the moon is full and round

Illustration Friday - Swarm

I haven't done Illustration Friday in ages and it's a little late in the week but thought i'd throw this up...For the word of the week "Swarm" because her face is swarmed by stuff... the actual name will be Flora i think...not sure...

I think this needs a little more work and will probably work on it tomorrow...

Illustration Friday - Dessert

nothing like a yummy skyscraper for dessert

Illustration Friday word is "Artificial"

The IF word is artificial but i call this "Coppelia" after the ballet of the same name.

The ballet Coppelia was written tongue-in-cheek about a crazy man that made a doll so life-like that the town heartthrob fell inlove with her and wanted to marry her. Naturally this made the crazy man even crazier and trouble ensued. This story always creeped me out, which of course made me obsessed with it.

Note: My blog's fourth year, or is it fifth year anniversary is coming up...can someone please explain to me...if it started in Aug 2006, am i celebrating the year coming up or how many years it's been alive, and...wouldn't that just mean it's my blog's 5th birthday instead of anniversary? Am i going a little crazy from this? Maybe i should make a doll and see where that goes...Anywayz, i'll be having a prizes and stuff so keep checking back if you can!

Immortal Alice - (Early for Illustration Friday)

ok. this is probably more like "too late" than it is "early" since Alice seems to have been bitten by the vampire rabbit or someone equally undead-like...sigh...i will soon get out of this vampire mode i SWEAR!!

i've been writing a whole lot lately (did i mention that's killing me?!!) so i haven't been able to post on IF as much as i'd like but thought this fit the IF word just a teensy bit...

this is available on etsy HERE...

Thanks for looking and have a great day...i for one am preparing for the 18-hour LOST marathon that starts tonight at 7:00...

Illustration Friday - Focused

I used to do a lot of different interpretations of Botticelli's Venus - and then i sort of went away from it...but a glance at the famous painting made me want to start it all up again. And why not with Steampunk since it is a theme that is threading it's way in everything i'm thinking about. I was focused when i drew this but also she is focused because of her robotic eye...

Her arm was inspired by the incredible Boilerplate - i'm thinking she could potentially be Boilerplate's lady friend...

Illustration Friday - Wilderness

So this week's word for Illustration Friday is "wilderness". First thought that came to mind was "the wild", then nature, then high winds, tsunamis, hurricanes, and earthquakes...all catastrophies which of course led me to the think about the devastation in Haiti. Seems like everything is leading thoughts to that... i want to help so i donate to charity (my charity of choice is Wyclef Jean's charity Yele.org) and am now collecting shoes that Soles4Souls will ship to Haiti. You can do these things to. It's so easy. And desperately needed. And there are so many other charities that are reputable - such as Oxfam and Doctors Without Borders...so many more... Wish i was in a position to put on some workboots and fly down there, but i'm still not comfortable leaving my girls for long stretches... Give if you can...every little bit will help them...

Illustration Friday - Confined or...

Alice in the House!

i can't imagine feeling any more confined than eating so much cake and cookies that you can't fit through the front door, although i have certainly tried to find out...

My 9-year-old posed for this...one of the few times she did so willingly

Illustration Friday - Pioneer

"Have Raygun, will Travel"

i set out to make a pioneer woman and this happened. It's subtle but i think it's there...

The raygun was inspired by a group of Steampunk enthusiasts called the League of Victorian Imagineers (article here) - they have extremely cool props and costumes...check 'em out... also, the set of Sherlock Holmes was very inspiring too...go see that ASAP!

Illustration Friday - Undone

well this egg is definitely undone - it's just beginning to be done

How Awesome is This???!!

i designed a patch for urbanthreads.com and this is what it looks like...


from this art:


"Winter"
i am artist of the month for December at their website and absolutely love all the cool, edgy, snarky and beautiful designs they make over there - please check them out!

i also had to add this amazing song...can't download this yet in the US - RATS!!
(thanks to the amazing artist Danielle Barlow who had it on her blog...)

Illustration Friday - Entangled

there are many ways we can become entangled - and many of us are in one way or another...

Illustration Friday - Music

this was a quick sketch - i love the music that comes from such small things..it's available on etsy...click here

Illustration Friday - Unbalanced

wow. it's soooo nice to be pulling the watercolors back out...so nice to just have this pan with the paint squeezed right on every few months or so, not worrying about it drying out, not cleaning up much and so forth... instead of acrylic which i've been working on the past few weeks for a show...continually squeezing the paints out, cleaning the brushes, squeezing more paint out, cleaning more brushes... can you imagine?? where is my assistant to do this stuff?? yeah, go ahead...call me the Queen of sloth...i can take it.

ok back to Illustration Friday's word of the week - Unbalanced. I had started this painting for my Oracle card deck a little while ago to represent Fertility but i thought it also went well with unbalanced. And since i'm constantly doing the OPPOSITE of Illustration Friday words, i'm sticking to that theme. At first glance a pregnant woman looks all sorts of unbalanced...but the body is an amazing thing. It adapts. Frankly i felt like a swan when i was pregnant - magestic, plump, important. Balanced. i was definitely one of those crazies that loved being preg.

Illustration Friday - Blur

this is a take off of one of my earlier illustrations called "Breezy" - it's designed to be an embroidery patch for the very cool Urban Threads - please take a look at some of their designs... - this image represents Winter and i will hopefully be making the other seasons to go along with it (spring is already in the makings - think "cherry blossoms"!)...i'm thinking the hair blowing around her lends itself to the word "blur"...

Illustration Friday - Skinny

Mucha's woman were not skinny...they were what we now call plump in many instances - greek sculptors, DaVinci, on up to Rueben, Klimt, and Manet and so forth...all were inspired by plump models...when did it change? why did it change? Men's ideal bodies have pretty much stayed the same over time...You can look at male movie stars' and at male models' bodies and most resemble Michaelangelo's the David (which Michaelangelo modeled after the perfect male form in his mind - which i must confess is hard to argue with - but why do i think that???)...how do we figure out what is attractive and what is not? these things fascinate me...and i don't know why.

Anyway, this girl is not skinny. But i think she's beautiful in her way.

Illustration Friday - Fast

this is an older illustration but, since i am WAY behind in what i must get done (art-wise AND life-wise) i thought it wouldn't be TOO terrible to re-use it for Illustration Friday's word today - FAST. i think her hair and hood is moving fast in the sharp wind. Yep, and i'm sticking with it. i'm going to try to work on something else for this because it is a great word to illustrate. And anyone who actually follows this blog knows that's a load of crap since i say that a lot and don't think i've ever come through...oh well...i try...for realz i do...

speaking in code now: if you're here from LTR, Hi - and thanks for stopping! Now hurry back to fanfic!

Illustration Friday - not quite FLYING but soon

i haven't done a peacock tree in ages so this felt good to do. i wanted to design something for the Oracle card deck i'm making for the back of each card. I couldn't imagine anything else but this tree and so painted away...

as for how it pertains to Illustration Friday (word this week is Flying) - i think it should really be called "Pre-flying" - or "Potential" or "Hope"...i guess this illo could actually mean many things...any thoughts? i'd love to know what you think...

Illustration Friday - Strong

this girl is not just strong. she will kick your ass.

So here's how the conversation between me and my 12-year-old went yesterday...

me: i need to get a reference of that popular war poster...you know, it has a lady on it and she's rolling up her sleeves and...i want to modernize her...i can't seem to find it anywhere online - i don't know what the heck to call it...

12-year-old: (look of incredulity on face) oh you mean the "we can do it" poster with Rosie the Riveter on it?

So i look up "we can do it" and like 8,000 of said poster shows up.

i have been in denial about this but it's official - my 12-year-old is cooler and smarter than me.

On another note: tomorrow is Labor Day here in the States and i want to say i hope you like your country (whichever it might be) as much as i like mine - because even though there are a few morons running around spewing vitriol, it's still a very cool place to be.

Illustration Friday - Magnify

mermaid's allure magnified underwater...hmmmmm....i was thinking of the delirious and dehydrated sailors that would "see" the mermaids when i made this...

Contest Winner! Thank you so much for all your comments last week and congrats to Loni Edwards who's name was picked from a baseball cap by my daughter - you've won the Queen of Hearts print - please contact me with an address and i'll mail it out this week...(i'll have pics soon of the actual name picking process - i'm just a little behind due to a minor but painful injury - and no i was not bitten by a horse like my friend she-who-must-not-be-named)