Couch

A pinup I started in October and unearthed earlier this week to finish. I've also attached my process images just for show. The images are in 15 minute increments, roughly. There are 20 overall so the whole thing should have taken around 5 hours, but I think it was a little longer because sometimes I miss the timer. You can see pretty blatantly when I started back into painting because I was very suddenly dissatisfied with the color saturation in the image.

eth.

Neon and lace

These are roughly what some actual Koss headphones look like that I would like to own very much. So I put them in a painting. I think she's listening to some really classy music like Stan Getz or something.

eth.

pinup wip

Still a work in progress, but I've been needing to start a new painting more than I realized. Lots of weird problems to solve in this one, I'm excited! 

about 40 min. into things.

eth.

090613_pinup procedures

I had done this doodle I liked, abandoned it because it was going really poorly (evidence in sketch no. 2) and then revisited it when I figured out a solution. I've been spending a lot of time with Bob Peak and Coby Whitmore lately. Love their stuff. I also recently watched My Fair Lady. :) I'm trying to force myself to take some chances with solid colors whenever possible and let things be empty, more graphic. 

eth.

Morning pinup

So this one has been sitting in my pictures folder unfinished for a while, and I'm not sure this is actually finished, but it's enough to be called resolved. 

There were a handful of conditions that I had set up to decide whether or not this would be successful in my eyes. One was just to capture how that halo of light in hair feels in a backlit figure, another was just painting a  completely backlit figure in general, which is always hard. And finally, try and set up a cacophonous palette of acid pinks and purples, and figure out how to reconcile them.

The result is this. It's got its' rough patches, but I got some things right. And I was also more value conscious than I normally am, and that's a step in the right direction. I've included a black and white version as...proof?

 eth.

Thoughts about stuff and space.

I'm still fighting to get out of my rustiness, but this is some really self-indulgent work that I did. 

It's also worth noting that a lot of the work I've been doing lately would be completely impossible without some good influences:

My girlfriend Rachel, whose work can be seen here: http://www.rachelgregor.com/
Because she's always encouraging me to do more self-indulgent art and not worry about my professional life quite so much.

And my friend David, whose work can be seen here: http://everybodysalone.com/
Because I'm constantly exchanging emails and images with him about our work and with whom I have been collaborating with for the past few months. He also has been very encouraging as well as challenging me in my work, especially with regard for the digital medium.

I'm also going to leave a note for myself here, with hopes that I check back and find comfort, perhaps it can do the same for you.

Usually once a month and definitely once a quarter I have a week where I feel like a fraud and that my work is terrible and I'm not progressing and that I'm a poor wretch of an artist. This is normal. It happens. It will continue to happen. If it happens it means that you are none of these things. If it does not happen, re-evaluate yourself because maybe you aren't experimenting enough, or you've fallen into a procedure for creating your work instead of a process.
For some reason, this phase always feels like the first time I've felt like this and I forget that it has happened, and will happen again, and it will all be okay. So here's to worrying a little bit less next time it rolls around.

eth.

tangerine

I'm back a whole two days in a row! I impress myself sometimes. I worked on this tonight. 

2-3hrs. Painter 12.

eth

082812_late night sketch

I've been way too busy these past few weeks between my internship at MK12 and my part time job which means I get no time to do my own stuff. I've been drawing a lot in my sketchbook but rarely do I get to touch color.

     This is a 30 minute sketch I stayed up late to do while listening to the Escape From Illustration Island podcast.

     I'm really interested in caustic color right now, I'm particularly in love with the work of Robert McGinnis because he's incredibly brave and bold with his pinups. The way he paints flesh is usually not in such a way that it's believable, or even has blood pumping through it, but the women become chameleons in their environments, fusing with the color compositions or fighting against it.

      I really admire this boldness because I feel it flies in the face of a lot of what I see more commonly practiced today in illustration which gravitates toward the perfect peach flesh tone in pinups of white women. I don't say that necessarily disparagingly, because I adore Gil Elvgren, who I feel is the supreme master of that Coca-Cola babe complexion, but it is really refreshing to see a figure become almost sickly looking because of the color relationships within the image.

   Sooo what am I trying to say? I guess in the exploration of my own work there are some things that I need to define for myself, one of them is how I'd ideally like to use color. I have undying respect for the way some of these artists use graphic shapes and since I've become obsessed with the Mod aesthetic recently, it's natural that I would gravitate more toward graphic color and shape. I don't quite know how graphic I will get but I feel myself being pulled. Thanks for reading.

eth.