notes from underground

So I’ve done a few more paintings, including some I’m reasonably satisfied with. Success! A major plus was switching to working primarily with a painting knife for doing anything more complicated than washes, I feel like I’ve got a lot more control than with a brush, especially with lines.

First off, here’s my “studio”, or “cubicle” on a bad day:

Here’s the painting I did in response to the prompt “Patriotism” (I’ll go through my thought process on this one in another post, it’s the first painting I really planned so far this term):

Then one done in response to “Camouflage” (Don’t you love these vague assignments?)… How many faces can you find?

Then, finally, some plein-air studies we did down by the river. I think I like these even more than the camouflage one, they were a lot of fun to paint.

Those last two will be some of the building-blocks for a later project, I’ll rant about that soon too. For now, goodnight!

So I just got back from Connecticon, and it was AWESOME. Met a ton of really cool people, saw some incredible art, and generally had a blast for the three days I was there. I’ll find somewhere to upload the photos a bit later… I got to meet a bunch of amazing artists and have the snapshots to prove it, not to mention the fantastic cosplay I saw!

A few of the people I met really impressed me, both by being really open and friendly about their work, and also by being fantastically talented and skilled. I have a helluvalot of business cards from different artists, comics and companies, it’ll take a while to visit all the links and remember who they all are, but these were the webcomics and artists that I liked talking to the most:

• Shelli Paroline was an artist I met in the Artist’s Colony who flagged me down when she saw that my badge said I was from Providence. I’d passed her table a few times but she’d never been there, there was a really interesting poster right at the front of her table that I really liked but I didn’t get a chance to actually meet the artist herself until Sunday. In addition to doing some great fanart for shows like One Piece, she is working on a comic (or several, from the looks of her website) called The Trouble Is that features some truly spectacular characters and artwork. I ended up picking up two prints, and she gave me the teaser booklet for The Trouble Is. It’s kind of sad at the beginning, but I’m very interested in finding more of her stuff, it looks like a really cool world she’s creating! (Plus it can’t hurt that she’s from the Boston/RI circuit, so comparatively local… we joked about restaurants on Thayer, among other things!)
• Stan from Wasteland (Parasomniac.com) is the other kickass person I met at Artist’s Colony. Again, didn’t meet the artist until after I’d seen her work, but it looked so cool and graphic that I spent a long time talking to her friends and flipping through the work she had on display anyway. Met Stan herself a bit later… her art has major FLCL style influences, both anime and manga, but given that I love FLCL this is entirely a good thing, and she’s done really interesting work with it. I wish I could draw like she can! Of all the doodles I got from artists at the Con, INCLUDING people like Hawk and Ananth, I think hers was my favorite. So cute! May try to post a picture later, have no scanner at the moment.
• Scott Wegener absolutely deserves a mention. He was sharing Brian Clevinger’s table in the Dealer’s Room, and if I recall correctly he said his book ought to be available on the nuklearpower website later this year. Amazing comic art, check out this badass-ery, and a nice guy on top of that! He showed me some of his work from his project Killer of Demons, a cool project with an interesting premise.
• Last but Not Least, a HUGE amount of love to spread for CHUGWORTH ACADEMY! I’d never really read their comic online before, although I’d definately noticed Dave Cheung’s art… I started talking Dave and his writer Jamal in the dealer’s room, and before I’d left I’d talked myself into buying their book, essentially sight unseen. Oh man, was it funny! Not for the young or faint of morals, it’s a bit risqué at times, but… soooo funny! At the Iron Webcomic event (which I shall rant about AFTER painting tonight) I started reading it while drawings were being judged, and couldn’t stop laughing. The art’s good, the characters are absolutely nuts, and the writing is really random and entertaining. I have no idea why I didn’t read it sooner!

I have a ton more cards to go through, and a ton of fun panels and events to describe, but for now I need to sprint to the art building… I’m on the verge of falling asleep here, if I don’t get to work soon I’ll have shot my night of work all to hell. Not ideal. G’night for now, more to follow later!

Today– well, yesterday, to be fair, but the past 24 hours, give or take– has been an interestingly back-and-fourth kind of day. I woke up Friday and spent a few hours futzing around with my computer, setting up my new harddrive, moving files around, that kind of thing. Around lunchtime I gave a friend a call, and we went out for lunch at Roba Dolce on Thayer street. The service was veeeery slow, but when we finally did get our paninis they were quite tasty. Additionally, it was Free Gelato Friday, so once we bought the sandwiches we got small scoops of gelato or sorbet. We walked around for a few hours in the sun, then once I got back to my room I crashed and slept for another few hours. Bright sunlight always makes me sleepy if I stay out in it too long.

Once I woke up I went back to messing around on the computer, then wandered over to Katie’s to hang out for a bit. It was fun, but it’s still vaguely awkward trying to figure out exactly what my place is there, now that we’ve broken up. Wasn’t too awkward, though, and before I left I showed Suzanne Bunny and borrowed a weird Japanese zombies-with-guns movie from Simon. Anyone interested in watching it later this week? [he asked, as if anyone reads this ^_^]

Got a call from Jason Lee a bit later on, asking if I wanted to go see the midnight movie at the Avon on Thayer. Frankly I kind of didn’t, I was still tired, but it was by Chan-wook Park, the same Korean director who filmed Oldboy. I watched that film over winter break with Rachel and Megan, and it was the most disturbing and violent piece of beautiful cinematography I think I’ve ever seen, so the chance to see another movie from the same director’s “revenge trilogy” was exciting. Sympathy for Lady Vengeance had a VERY different feeling from Oldboy, more resolved and deliberate and less chaotic. I think I liked Oldboy more, after having a night to think on it, but there was one scene in Lady Vengeance that really tore something out inside of you. Less visceral, though, and the camerawork wasn’t quite as deleriously perfect as in Oldboy, at least to my untrained eye. Very fun movie anyway.

When we got out of the movie I walked back towards Young Orchard with Jason, Aleks and Patrick, before bidding them goodnight as they carried on to their apartments. It was already past two, but I couldn’t help working some more on my computer, then I watched The Beatles’ Yellow Submarine while I backed up my harddrive.

THAT was a fun contrast: From Lady Vengeance, to Yellow Submarine. I’d never seen it, so it was really fun– weird animation, but it worked for what it was.

After all that, computer work, lunch with a friend, napping, hanging out, bloody revenge drama, and Beatles madness, I finally managed to sleep. Entertaining day, in the extreme.