Time Wastes Too Fast by Maira Kalman

Time Wastes Too Fast by Maira Kalman

NOTES TO SELF:

• Stop forgetting to sign my name on finished art pieces!
• Fix right eye on self-portrait on bio page of my website. It looks crazy!

Self Portrait 3

Self Portrait 2 REVISED

Original Image:


1st Attempt:


2nd Attempt/Final Image:

Self-Portrait 3 In Progress

Self-Portrait 3 In Progress:

I'm not sure how I feel about this as a self-portrait. I think I should define the lines more. Even out the scarf more? Outline the hand better? I dunno. I'm not satisfied. But it's a good try, eh? I think I'll try to work on it some more tomorrow.

Jules Adolphe Breton's "The Song of the Lark"

Jules Adolphe Breton
French, 1827-1906
The Song of the Lark, 1884
(oil on canvas)

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Notes to self:

• Check out Breton's "The Song of the Lark" painting at AIC in July, when checking out The New Modern Wing.
• Check out Jen's sculptures in Lincoln Park on Lincoln and Clark when visiting Chicago in July.
• Borrow Willa Cather's "The Song of the Lark" from the library.

Note to self: Check out the new modern wing at AIC when visiting Chicago in July.

New Illustrations for DIY 2009 Calendar

MAY:


Broadway Grill & Pizza on Broadway & Lawrence.

My favorite place for greasy food right next door to my former place of employment (Asian Human Services.)

JUNE:



"Your Sunday's Best" Sunday open mic at Schuba's Tavern on Belmont & Southport.

At the bar.

HAPPENED: Sunday, June 1/Monday, June 2/The midnight of Kristy "K-Rock" Mangel's 30th Birthday.

In this drawing: Sean Flannery, James Fritz, Brendan McGowan

(photoshopped: playing with brightness/contrast)


(original/not photoshopped)


This is my first attempt in drawing a self-portrait since my freshman year in college. I haven't used colored pencils in a long time. Unless you count the time I worked with grade school kids, but I don' t think that counts. Does it?

I'm not satisfied with this attempt (and I will be hard on myself.) Need to fix up the eyes and the corners of my mouth. Also, I think I need to make create a self-portrait where I am wearing my eyeglasses; since that is pretty signature of me.

I'm going to draw a couple of more tomorrow.

Although I am not satisfied with these to use for my business cards, homepage, and/or bio section of my website. I am quite happy for this being my first self-portrait in 10 1/2 years.

Work-In-Progress: Self Portait

I haven't worked on a self-portrait in a long time. I am drawing a couple self-portraits this week and choosing which ones to use for new business cards, the homepage, and bio section of my website.

Here is one of the self-portraits in progress. Drawn so far in ballpoint pen, scanned, put into grayscale mode, while messing with the contrasting on photoshop:



I'm going to add color with colored pencils and possibly go over the lines again with black pen and ink or just maybe go over again with ballpoint pen to define everything. I need to fix the right eye. It's totally messed up.

Notes: Monday, 20 April 09

TO DO:

• one man show illustrations
• research for possible commission piece
• lupus documentary
• self portrait

• start checking out the metro detroit art scene/arts community
• create contact list (also keep track of who has bought/commissioned/taken interest in my artwork)
• newsletter/mailing list
  
• hand held art portfolio
• gather together press clippings, comic reviews, exhibit postcards, brochures, etc. to document in portfolio
  
• create artwork inventory
• create master resume/cv
• create template for invoices for commissioned work
• start keeping track of budget
• create folder for receipts
• research and start applying for grants, scholarships

UPDATE:

• New business cards (Draw new self-portrait to be used for new business cards and replace image on homepage of website with self portrait.)
• CV/Resume (add afterschool matters, awards, etc.)
• website (makeover-----> focus on illustration work; make commissioned work separate category)
• artist statement
• artist bio

Brainstorming Notes/To Do List for Lupus Journal/Video Documentary

TO DO LIST:

Write/Create:

• title
• synopsis------> personal story/documentary of an artist with lupus, entering her 30's, undergoing yet another joint replacement... Struggles with change in her life, in her relationships, and with what control she has and does not have because of lupus, dealing with moving from chicago and unexpectedly back into her childhood home. ------> extension of her comic, Morning Star #3.----->shows healing process from joint replacement surgery.
  
• influences/related artwork experience: persepolis, american splendor, jeffrey brown, flying: confessions...I have worked with a lot of video editing (esp. sound) during my time in art school & consider myself an illustrator and comic book artist--this will be my first time turning my comic illustrations into an animation to be worked into a video format and/or moving image.
  
• statement of purpose:
• interview questions: friends, doctors, family
• letters of permission to record-----> research this, write proposals---> can some of my surgery be filmed?
• (loose) storyboard: comic portion, etc.
• timeline (date of right knee replacement surgery: tuesday, july 28, 2009.)
  
• budget create list of needs ( i.e. frames for exhibition, more dv tapes, editing program, tripod, pen and ink, drawing paper)
• in-kind donations, grants (doctors?, saic alumni, LFI, AAOS?)

other thoughts:

• premiere screening of video/gallery exhibition opening/reception featuring comics/animation (framed) that are featured in film. (Look for gallery to exhibit.)

needed camera shots:

• document how I walk (pre-surgery, surgery, post surgery)--show how it differs daily (depending on weather, fatigue, going up and downstairs, inability to bike, etc.) during the pre-surgery stage.
  
• chicago, detroit scenic shots

Where The Wild Things Are Trailer (HD)

Just like everyone else, I am looking forward to this:

New Illustrations for DIY 2009 Calendar

New illustrations for DIY 2009 Calendar.

MARCH:


Illustration of bus and it's passengers in San Francisco.

This image was taken at night, when I was walking from the AAOS's eMotions Pictures art reception at the Moscone Center all the way to my hotel room at the Dragon Gate entrance in Chinatown.

I had drank at least several glasses of wine and had absolutely no problem finding my way back to the hotel.

Happened: Fri., March. 7, 2008.

APRIL:


Illustration of an elementary student planting flowers in Chase Park on Ashland & Clark.

For Global Youth Service Day, AmeriCorps members from Asian Human Services teamed up with Passages Charter School students to plant flowers and clean both Chase & Welles Park.

Happened: April 25, 2008

___________________________

3 image down, 9 more to go. Touch up with pen and ink/brush. Then add 12 captions to go under each illustration. Glue illustrations and captions to calendar. Bind together & hang.

Re-Reading Rilke Again

"...seek those which your own everyday life offers you; describe your sorrows and desires, passing thoughts and the belief in some sort of beauty--describe all these with loving, quiet, humble sincerity and use, to express yourself, the things in your environment, the images from your dreams, and the objects of your memory. If your daily life seems poor, do not blame it; blame yourself, tell yourself that you are not poet enough to call forth its riches; for to the creator there is no poverty and no poor indifferent place."

--Rainer Maria Rilke, "Letters to a Young Poet."


__________________________

current projects:

• lupus documentary
• illustrations for a one man show

Matter of Time

Corkboard Notes (Inspiration, Encouragement, & Influences)

(click on image for a larger view)

1. A postcard of one of Emily's paintings.
   
2. A postcard I found an exhibit I went to. I don't know much about the artist or piece, but I fell in love with the colors.
3. My friend Adam sends me a lot of good mail. This is a postcard he sent to me. I just love this image of the man smelling the fresh peaches. There is something about this image that gives you a sense of joy being alive.
4. A picture of Static Films (Mark, Kevin, Doug, Evan, & Beth) in Maine, by Alyce.
5. Fliers of some of my first bluesanct/drekka performances.
6. Another picture of Maine taken by Alyce.
7. An illustration by my friend Joel, who I met at SAIC's Campus Crusade. I picked this postcard up from his BFA show.
8. Another postcard I picked up from an SAIC BFA show. I love this one because I liked the image of an artist sitting in his studio.
9. Another postcard of one of Emily's paintings.
10. A letter Emily sent to me at the end of last year, in which she wrote: "Keep drawing and making comics! You are awesome and talented. I want to see your work published in an anthology. I want to see an exhibit at the MCA of A. Busque!"
11. A card that my favorite artist, Makoto Fujimura, sent to me (with one of his paintings on it) along with a check buying some of my comics for the International Arts Movement.
12. A postcard of a painting created by Heidy Chaung. I met her in NYC in March of 2001. She and I corresponded for a while sending letters to and from Chicago and Boston. She had a very, quiet, gentle, yet brave and strong soul.
13. I found this image last week of Simon Reilly's "Mind's Eye." while flipping through a back issue of Art in America. I don't know much about this piece. But when I saw it, I couldn't help but to think about all of the goals I want to accomplish this year and the struggles I have been going through since I moved back to Michigan.
14. A postcard for Philip Von Zweck's radio show "Something Else" on WLUW. It's funny how my experimental radio class in 2000 went to his show to present some sound pieces. Michael was there visiting Philip. Both of us not knowing we would see each other. He and I started talking that night. This is, after the first time we "met" where he stared at me for an hour or so at Earwax Cafe. Then as I was leaving, he chased me out the door and embarrassingly gave me his e-mail address. I later found out that Michael designed this postcard.
15. James quoting Shakespeare's "Hamlet" when he was drunk; written on a back of a slip for some contest drawing Latitude was holding.
16. A postcard of a photo by Steve.
17. Another postcard Adam sent me, telling me to "take care of my knees."
18. A card that the Brice Family sent to me after Pat's funeral. I cannot even begin to know how to explain who Pat is to me and so many other people; The amazing energy he brought into a room, by just being there...
19. A card sent to me by Community Legal Resources thanking me for my volunteer work for them and the artwork I created for their 10 year anniversary event.
20. "Nothing matters when you love someone." Jeremy wrote this on a napkin, when he was drunk. I love it.
21. When I was working on issue #3 of my comic in 2004, I spent many, many hours at the Starbucks on Lincoln and Wilson. There was another person there who was always painting with watercolors. Eventually he and I introduced ourselves to one another and talked a lot about art. His name is Curtiss. He painted mandalas. This one he painted for me and e-mailed the image to me.
22. A postcard Emily sent to me in 2003. She writes to me: "My 'aloneness' is a choice... and although my single, soul desire is to find a companion... I just can't compromise the responsibility I have to myself and achieving my goals."
23. A postcard of a photo by Andrew.
24. Postcards I picked up during the Van Gogh and Gauguin exhibit at the Art Institute of Chicago in 2002. I went to that show at least three times. It was AMAZING.
25. My favorite picture of Lynda Barry, drawing in her studio.

In spring, he returned to the vicarage of Etten and spoke again about going to London, "If he really wants to, I shall help him go," wrote his father. But finally he went back to the Borinage, and that summer of 1880 he lived in the house of the miner Charles Decrucq at Cuesmes. There he wrote in July the wonderfully touching letter which tells what is going on in his innermost self, "...my only anxiety is, how can I be of use?... Can't I serve some purpose and be of any good?" It is the old wish, the old longing to serve and comfort humanity, which made him write later, when he had found his calling, "And in a picture I want to say something comforting as music is comforting." Now, in the days of deepest discouragement and darkness, at last the light began to dawn. Not in books would he find satisfaction, not find his work in literature, as his letters sometimes suggested; he turned back to his old love, "I said to myself... I will take up my pencil... I will go on with my drawing. From that moment everything has seemed transformed for me..." It sounds like a cry of deliverance, and once more, "...do not fear for me. If I can only continue to work... it will set me right again." At last he had found his work, and his mental equilibrium was restored; he no longer doubted himself, and however difficult or hard his life became, the inner serenity, the conviction of having found his own calling. never deserted him again.

- from The Complete Letters of Vincent van Gogh, Volume I