Hope

"Hope is the thing with feathers
That perches in the soul,
And sings the tune without the words,
And never stops at all..."
Emily Dickinson

So it's two am and I can't sleep. I have to get up in three and a half hours. I was lying in bed thinking of this poem i read the other day, and had the idea for this doodle/sketch. I don't think I really did it justice, so maybe I'll try again another day, not in the middle of the night. But for now, here's this.

Oh, Owl.

So, at Avalanche, some days we do exercise/challenge to "warm-up" for 30/40 minutes (Yes, as you do in sports. But more... sedentary). This week one of the exercise was to choose a piece of provided reference and design a character based on that animal. I chose and the barn owl.



P.S. In case you were wondering, I'm loving my internship. I still can't really believe they let me go in and work there everyday.

For Great Star

In the 90's the YMCA had a Daddy-Daughter program known as "Indian Princesses" (later discontinued for its umm... questionable political correctness). Every couple weeks, the Dads and daughters would meet together in their local chapters to participate in various activities. And every few months you'd get together with other groups for big camp outs. You also got and indian name and a special leather necklace that you decorated with your symbol and worked towards earning beads to string on it.

My dad, a die-hard Dallas Cowboys fan, was Great Star. I was Bright Star. We had corresponding necklaces decorated with puff paint, and every few weeks we'd go to the meeting with the other girls and dads from my neighborhood. When it was our turn to host, he'd help me make and deliver themed invitations. We camped. We earned beads. We designed the most aerodynamic, hot-pink pinewood derby car to ever hit the track. It was a great time.

I don't remember a lot of the specific activities, what I do remember is doing them with him.

Thank you Dad, for that. To me you will always be more than great.

Happy Father's Day, all you fathers.

Hurrah for Israel!

This summer I'm privileged to be part of a group of artist going to Nazareth to paint a mural in a children's hospital there with the service organization forPEACE. The trip actual trip will take place in August, but we've been working together for the past month on the planning stages. I thought I'd post for you our sketch for the mural, still very rough line work and pieced together from bits we all worked on, but it will give us the basics for what we need to get started.


And some rough color studies:



We wanted to do something with a sense of fantasy about it, and we liked the idea of glowing lantern like elements. And of course, you know what a huge fan I ma of fish.

The other artists in the group are Bethanne Andersen, Boston Madsen, Adam Borgia, and Jake Wyatt. It's been wonderful to work with such talented artists and excellent friends. And I can't wait to see how the mural turns out come August.