Article in the Observer :)

It made my day to get the mail today and see that I had received the Observer magazine from the University of Hartford. I was lucky to have an article about my visit printed on page 4!! Not to be repetitive, but the experience I had speaking to the students was very fulfilling. I know I don't have a lot of experience. But I was happy to answer questions and share with them what I had learned through my pursuit of a career in illustration.

This is a self promotional piece that I did a little while ago that I never quite finished. It was based on an idea of a little porcupine named Spike. His look of uneasiness is due to the fact that on his birthday he can't enjoy his own birthday balloons. A silly idea that I wish I developed a little more before painting, but we live and we learn. And perhaps one day I will work on it some more. I always liked the idea of contrast, and having unlikely characters in certain situations. I think most of the time it makes for an interesting image. I posted below some stages of drawing that I went through before beginning to paint this piece. Looking at the sketches I notice how much more personality he had before I forced myself to tighten up while painting. I notice this happens a lot in my characters and it's something I am trying to work on more. Making my characters more believable and relatable.

~ The journey is the reward. ~

I haven't done a good job keeping up with posting and of course with the same excuse of being too busy with work. I had a deadline to meet this past month and a lot of work on my plate. At times I felt that I wouldn't be able to finish it all. Mostly it was a lot of work because I had not managed my time wisely. After finishing all the paintings, I was happy with the feeling that no matter how tough it was to get through..I would gladly do it all over again. :)
There is a Chinese proverb saying that, "The journey is the reward." I found myself realizing that only at the end of the project. I guess while I was doing the work I completely allowed the feeling of stress and worry overwhelm me. Don't get me wrong, the feeling of accomplishment in the end feels pretty good too, but only for a little, and then I start picking apart the work and wishing I had done a better job.
I have now sent out all my work with some suggestions of layouts so I hope that all is well and the book will be out by Spring of 2010. Still a while to wait, but I'm looking forward to having a published book and hopefully more work to come. Here are a couple paintings from the book as well as the cover.