I dragged you back a sleepyhead

So my last regular post for the year. After this I'll be posting my usual best 6 albums of the year.


I've been drawing with no clear goal lately and just doing doodles in general. It's not really accomplishing much but it's so enjoyable. Sometimes it's good to get back to the basics.

As for reflecting on this year it's been pretty busy yet fulfilling. I finally have a set date for graduating next spring, I passed Illustration portfolio review, I've been in an art show and I've been working at Altgeld Art Museum for a year now. I feel like I've accomplished a lot for getting where I want to be as an artist but at the same time I have fallen short in a few areas. I wanted to finally finish a small comic/zine to sell at Quimby's and have still put it off a year later. This has to be the year I do that or I might just explode!

As for reflecting on personal things, well, it's a lot! I've come to enjoy where I am with friends and family and just enjoy being myself. I've made a strive to be less lazy and do more constructive things like making music, creating things and posting on this blog more often. I think my biggest hurtle is still apathy and laziness but I am slowly getting through it. There's so much we can do to improve ourselves and others around us I'd hate to look back in another decade and feel like I've been living a wasted life. Something to think about in '10.

Closing the last usual post of the year with some more Passion Pit. Definitely going to be one of the albums in the top 6 for the year.


Keep it surreal in '10!

Is this the way I'll always be? Oh no, Oh no.

So my semester has been over for the last week and I've just been lazy getting around to posting here but damn, am I enjoying the break. Not much to say other than how much I love sleeping in till 1pm again :3

Some end of the semester art:

My final set of plates for my intaglio class on a split fountain woodcut. I like how it turned out but I wish I had more time to do bigger, individual plates for each one on its own split fountain. Maybe next semester. The title is "Scientist studies" off a deathcab for cutie song I quite like, capturing that familiar feeling of self realization and distance. A rearrangement of tarot cards to represent myself.

And the colored version of this guy

SO PIMP

The end of the year is drawing close and I feel myself on a weird edge, realizing it's almost the end of decade again. I guess I am trying to formulate that all into more cohesive thoughts but until then, this song captures some odd combination of emotions I am feeling:

I was in love with this song by Passion Pit but the music video as well captures this cool, energetic atmosphere. I love when pairings turn out so nicely.

Also in review of reading all this text, I'M SO GAAAAAAAY.

Whatevs.

You're dealing with a kid that doesn't have a clue

Well November was a wonderful month. Kind of sad how fast fall goes, it's my favorite season and I never feel like I get to enjoy it and it's already freezing and just waiting to snow. My brother came up to visit most of the month and he heads back tomorrow, kind of bummed to see him heading out. All the more reason for me to hurry my ass up, graduate and get out to Austin.

Anyways, the art!

Finished intaglio plate set. Really happy how it turned out and it's a nice, big size of 30" by 15", I think. My printmaker teacher wants to put it in the school's archives so I am happy but at the same time that means I need to do another edition of it, during finals.


Also been drawing Scott, my little imp guy. I need to get back to working on my comics which is a possibility with break a week away.


And most of all, Crunkodile

As for music, enjoy a cute ass, catchy music video from +/-

See you later fall, you were always my favorite~<3

They go we go, I want you to know, what I did I did

Finally got a working scanner again. Basically I got a new computer and my last scanner was so old they don't even make software compatible for it with anything Windows vista and up. So uh, it's a little later than I wanted to post for November but I still got that chance to make 2 more post. At least one more.

First off, AAAAAAAAAAART!:

Intaglio plate series I am working on. The less said about it, the better, until it is completed :3


A gouache painting for my illustration class. We had to pick a company or business to illustrate so I went with Anti- records. I noticed that most of the artist on their label, Tom Waits, Nick Cave, Tabacco and Man Man, all seem to have themes of drug use so I had this idea of a baby and mama robo pill.

Second off, Seeeeeeeeeeeelf looooooooathing! I've been kind of mad at myself for getting all psyched up and starting a new comic again and not getting further into it. I have been good this semester at drawing regularly and struggling to get better but I really want to get back to doing a comic a week. I am busy; I have school full time and work two jobs but fuck, that's an excuse. No matter how busy I do get, my art should be a high priority and I want to do comics and graphic novels one day as well as illustration.

Third off, Grizzzzzzzzzly Beaaaaaaaaaaaaar!:

My love for them, their music videos and their new album only continue to grow like some beautiful melodic tumor :3

Halloween post whoo!

I have this tradition that every Halloween I listen to the Cure's album Denigration. So I'll cut to the usual music link right away:

A good song, still a bit cheesy but it's got that potent power of nostalgia for me.

Anyways, here's some recent art as well:

This Illustration was on the subject of identity and that can be a little rough for me. I know myself well but when I present myself to others, it can get a bit depressing when I explain. Basically I wanted to capture my fixation on mortality, self worth and just constant recurrence of being trapped in the past by throwing in a lot of personal symbols from my life. I don't know how I feel about the poorly rendered smog but I feel it was successful otherwise. This was done in goauche on a 16" by 20" board and the title is from a Man Man song called Doo-little.


And a recent intaglio plate, 9" by 12", about a strange dream I had a few weeks ago about this weird, shrouded druid like figure. This one doesn't need as much explanation but I feel like continuing this idea for my next series of plates.

Whoo, two post for October. Next month, three, and all with better art and music, FOR REALZIES!

What did you want to see

This month I swear I am going to make two post and then next month, three! I am so tired of doing these large updates and basically having to rush everything into a few paragraphs and pics. Also the large blocks remind me how much I haven't gotten done. I am hoping for a little more diligence caused from more updates.

Here's a woodblock I finished. This was done on multiple blocks, about 4 in total:

It's a bit more abstract and blurry in form but I like the murky colors and feel. I've just kind of been in a similar mindset lately, muddy with no clear path. It's reflecting in a lot of my work lately which could be good or bad.

and heres a finished ilio for my illustration class. I did it based off a short story I really liked about a tengu. The poor guy gets struck by a bolt of divine lightning sent down from the buddha himself at the end of the story due to a forgetful monk. Basically the best way I can sum that up in one sentence since it's 4 in the morning here.


Typing too much, this image doesn't even need to be explained:

POKE LIFE TILL I DIE

As for the usual update on new music I've been listening to let's go with Atlas Sound's new album Logos

This is a fantastic track off of it. At first I just really liked the tune but the lyrics made me fall in love with it. Especially the lines "You find yourself lost again, The better things you left behind, But looking back you may go blind." Something I remind myself of every day now.

See? If I had more updates this post wouldn't be so wordy and shitty. I'm setting a good example of a bad example for myself. GENIUS!

I'm caught up in a storm that I don't need no shelter from

The new semester has been going pretty well. I just got back from a trip out to Austin to go to the GDC since I've been doing concept art for my bros company, Red Fly Studios. Each time I visit Austin I seem to find something new I love about it. I am crossing my fingers when that grad school application goes through in January.

As for my mental state, it's been in a weird state between melancholy and content. I'm getting work done, drawing a lot and enjoying myself but I feel like somethings a bit vacant about myself lately. Maybe it's just adjusting to the usual work load again but I just find myself thinking back to stupid things that don't matter. Maybe one day my brain will start working together as a cognitive whole.

Here's that suicide woodblock I finally finished. It's a nice 20" and 16" and took FOREVER.

I was trying to capture that state of mind I've been in for the last year or two but put a positive twist on it with a nice little Posada style theme and colors. I could go deeper into the piece but I really like leaving it up to the viewer to decide the meaning. It's title is "Something bad inside me went away (those to come)" after a delightful Shins song I thought inspired/captured the mood.

and some doodles, the last one being a prelim sketch for a bigger water color painting I am going to do for an illustration project.




and some music of course.

Finally got around to listening to this new Dirty Projectors album and it's fantastic as everyone has been saying. It's a good balance of weird, sensiable and catchy with gorgeously deep lyrics. The odd cheerful tone mixed with a sense of depression in this song is definitely appealing to me lately.

Yup, back in school still means huge blog post for me. Oh well, better than nothing.