Happy Eighth Birthday Tofu!

Moses and the Burning Bush

I suppose there are a lot of ways of depicting fire in a line drawing.  I looked at many photographs of fire, and of course not only is it evanescent, but it is ever-changing, and has a different appearance depending on the wind, on what is burning, and on circumstances that it would take someone more knowledgeable in physics than I to explain.  My aim was for the fire to be beautiful and flowing.  I looked for some inspiration to Aubrey Beardsley's gorgeous forms in black and white, those Art Nouveau shapes wherein Reality takes a back seat to pure line, but in the end Mood predominates.  I didn't want to make a moody image, but I did want the fire to have that elegance of line that is so much a part of Art Nouveau. 

Working things out

I have a series of stories to illustrate about a group of kids who live in Texas in the 1950's.  Nice, kind of slow moving stories, with conflicts, but not the kind of dire conflicts kids today face.  Their conflicts are more about simple getting along with one another.  One of these stories concerns the summer pleasures of floating down a stream on inner tubes.  After deciding on the general look of the picture, I started drawing it.
Here is the drawing:

I liked it pretty well, except that each of the people in it was as though they were in their own box--no overlapping, except for the two at the right, and the two of them were sort of in their own box.  Besides, the boy at the front, falling off his tube, looks not quite right.  And then, the deciding factor was that I reread the story and found that according to the words they are all supposed to be wearing shoes. 

It is always good training to be willing to do the drawing over and over again; it's something I learned from Seth.  Don't let it go out unless it is as good as you can do

So here is the second one:

Shoes on, some overlap, much better. 
Although the boy on the left, with the tube under his arm, has a left arm that is far too long...
And the boy splashing in the water still looks a bit disjointed.

Then I spoke with the author, who said that he had decided to give each of the drawings a full page in the book.  That means a vertical, rather than a horizontal layout. 
OK, no problem.  I'll draw it again. 


This time, for the vertical layout, I thought I'd better do a little more research on rivers, how they look, how water looks when it is flowing.  Doing it all from the imagination is fine, but it may be better to get some real feel for the landscape. 
Here is the third drawing:

OK.  I like the scenery much better.  It looks like a real place.  The little patch of reeds and grasses in the front right corner brings the viewer into the setting some more, all the kids have arms and legs in proportion. 
But there is a different problem: it's dull.  Nothing is happening.  Something is GOING to happen, as the boy with his back toward us is just about to hit the rapids, but everyone else is just floating.  Besides all the kids except one are in a vertical line.  Accuracy in drawing can NOT take the place of interest--either interesting composition, or interesting emotional action.  Accuracy is good, but for an illustration it has to take a back seat to emotion and vibrant composition.
Then I reread the story one more time, and found that there was some action in it that I had ignored.  In the girl in the plaid shirt teases the boy ahead of her by splashing him as they float along.




So below is what I think is the final:
It has action, accuracy, rhythm, and, I hope, interest.  I may find something else it needs, and if so, I'll change it again.  Or if anyone who sees this is bothered by something, I would be glad to hear about it.  I learn something every try. 

Moses and Pharoah's daughter

Continuing to illustrate the handouts for my sixth grade Sunday school classes.  The subject matter is always available, the kids like the drawings, and I have an ongoing, low-pressure commission.  If I decide later that my skills have increased so that I can depict the story better, I'll redo it for next year.     

You just gotta fight

I found this quotation today on Muddy Colors, a blog that is a collaboration among several top-level illustrators.  It gives me hope and a kick in the pants.  

Seth's gravesite

This is the grave of my son Seth.
It is at the Benedictine monastery, St. Andrew's Abbey, on the top of a hill, in the high desert where the air is clear and dry, and the colors are soft ochre, grey, yellow green with highlights of sienna.  (My scan made the green bushes way too green, but I couldn't fix it without ruining something else.)
The only bright colors were the rocks that we painted that are sitting on the arms and top of the cross.
I forgot to take a camera, but did have my little watercolor moleskine notebook and tiny paintbox, so I could get the desert colors plus the bright colored rocks on the cross. 

Scenery is always hard; I usually try to put in too much detail.  This site however, is pretty simple.  Rocks, joshua trees, dry weather plants, and those concrete crosses. 

While I was going through some documents in my files today, I came across this, in a letter from Seth to someone he mentored (who very generously shared his letters with me).  Among other pieces of advice, Seth said this:
"Make every single panel better than the last. You must raise the bar for yourself with each and every line that you draw.  In this way you will progress very quickly."
Well, that gives me a clear way to look at my work.  What am I learning?  What have I done here that I haven't done before?  Let's make this painting better than the last one. 

Jacob the Trickster meets his match in Uncle Laban

Genesis 25 begins the story of Jacob and his twin brother Esau.  Though they are twins, Esau is older, and thus stands to inherit everything from his father Isaac, including the covenant with God.  Jacob tricks his father into giving him the inheritance instead and then runs for his life to his mother's brother Laban, a man whose ability and willingness to deceive are even greater than his own.  It's a colorful and fascinating story about a man who would do ANYTHING to be blessed.  He is wrong-headed, and God teaches him a hard lesson, but his goals are in the right place. 

This is the first drawing that I have for this story for my class.  Laban's sons are behind him, and his daughters are under Jacob's outstretched arm.