Anna Karenina...

...started to get REALLY good around chapter 17 or 18 of Part I, and now I am 300 pages in and becoming a little obsessed with it. Its been a little while since I was so engrossed in a book that I stayed up too late at night under the covers, forcing my eyes to stay on the sentence I was reading instead of scrolling down to catch a glimpse of what was going to happen next. Anyways, I write all of this because I (thankfully!) find myself slowly shifting into a more inspired mood now that I am reading such a vivid account of someone's fictitious life. I have been toying around with this idea for a fictional comic that I want to start for a while now, but I am nervous about inventing a complete world and personalities and emotions in such a way. Every story I have ever told came directly from my memories of my own experiences, so fiction is borderline frightening for me. Well, thats not true- the writing and drawing part will be fun- the sharing part is what is scary.

In an attempt to get myself amped up for some fall and winter drawing, I started going through some old artwork of mine and came across the photos we took of this mural I painted a couple years ago for Green Chimneys in the Bronx (fyi: GC is an organization for homeless LGBTQ youth in NYC). I am not a painter by any stretch of the imagination, but this was a fun piece to do because it just needed to be huge to cover the wall and bold to stand out and make a statement- beautiful painterly details were completely unnecessary.

I think I shall upload some pages I ripped out of my sketchbooks from set from seasons 1 and 2. I dont guess the gallery on my site is a good place to put them, but at least it will be proof that my knitting hands have not taken over complete precedence over my life in Vancouver.

freaks.

i did some new artwork for "The Soup Show" which is performing throughout the month of march and which i will unfortunately be missing because i wont be leaving vancouver til april. i love that i spent hours and hours working on this project, and enjoyed every second of it, yet i dont really know what the show is about. it has something to do with three women contemplating their historical contribution to society and art versus their literal contribution. and stirring up a pot with their naked bodies. and circus freaks. are you as entranced as i was when i first heard about it?

each woman in the poster is drawn in the likeness of a woman in the show. desiree is in the first two pictures, the other women in the last Mind Reader poster are cara and erica. go see the show if you can. Too Much Light Makes the Baby Go Blind is an awesome show and all the projects that they work on in tandem have been pretty excellent. you wont be sorry!

here is another project that i spent a lot of time on a couple months ago, when my good friends jessie and meredith, who are getting married in july, asked me to create some artwork that they could use for their correspondence/save-the-dates/invitations, etc. we came up with the idea that i would draw a comic of the "popping of question" and they could send their save the dates out on valentines day and have them folded up like a love note, the kind you used to send in high school (cause they are both teachers and they met teaching at the same high school in the bronx! so sweet right?)

here is the comic:

and here is the emblem with their initials: