darkroom

From my sketchbook. When I was in high school, my family was numerous, loud, and chaotic. The darkroom was the only place in the house (besides the toilet!) I didn’t have to let the little kids into. I’d put on music and feel sly and enjoy being by myself.

sometimes all honey, and sometimes all turd

A Valentine’s Day card for my Sweetie Poo. I think many of you in longterm relationships can relate, even if you’re not familiar with the Diary of Samuel Pepys.

plainsong

A sketch about listening to the Cure’s Plainsong when I was 16. Sometimes you hear a song and it overcomes you and you have to hang on while the earth spins.

personal effects and other quotidian things

day-to-day objects that remind me most of myself.

l-r, top to bottom: purple & amber glasses, 1972 olympus OM-2n film camera, travel watercolors, hair clip, satchel, sketchbook, hawk quill speedball nib pen, mechanical pencil, pentel brush pen, pentel water brush, winsor newton series 7 size 5 brush (bought on first day of art school in 1996!), enamel tray palette, most wonderful boots ever–lucky buffalo exchange find, burt’s bees plum lip color, rumply frye oxfords on their last legs, winsor newton inks, chinese black ink in a higgins bottle, dr. Ph Martin watercolor, painting board, marks & spencer coat, levi’s black jeans, fantastic watch with italic numbers, amber necklace with bugs in the beads, rings (one made by a very talented jeweler friend), winsor newton white gouache, lactaid (of course!), green tea in a 25-year-old cup (made by my oldest friend’s mother), arches hot pressed watercolor paper in a block (fantastic!!).

my camera

my film camera, a 1972 olympus OM-2n. i will never ever ever give it up!

my 90s frocks

i attended high school with great sartorial exuberance. i’ve been working on this here and there for the past few months when i got stuck on other things (fantastic wacom tablet practice! i’m not afraid of it anymore). now what will i do to procrastinate?

mother’s day

today i present all the dresses my mother sewed for me in high school. thanks mama!

instruments

all the instruments in our (one bedroom) apartment as of yesterday:

note: in the last couple years, we have given away/sold/fostered out 1) another acoustic guitar, 2) a heavy metal electric purple axe, 3) a bass guitar, 4) a keyboard, 5) a set of enormous outdoor-type speakers. we use 2 amps for nightstands. there are three. it’s like the polyphonic spree up in here. this is clearly a cry for help. steve needs to start a band, stat.

reading list

my favorite books from the last couple years. they are! moab is my washpot by stephen fry, burma chronicles by guy delisle, relish by lucy knisley, birds of a lesser paradise by megan mayhew bergman, wide-eyed by trinie dalton, farm city by novella carpenter, and magic for beginners by kelly link. (i might have to make another painting, there were a bunch of runners-up)

london & paris drorings

i recently returned from a delightful trip to london and paris. i brought a moleskine sketchbook and a pentel brush pen with me:

quilt

my mama made me this book quilt for my birthday:

i am so lucky!

tintyped

my dearest wish was to get tintype portraits at photobooth done for my birthday. et voilà!

here’s the studio setup (i have achieved this unnatural good posture by leaning against the hidden noggin propper-upper):

i am a sculpture!

my friend david is afraid of the internet. i made a little website for him and he is making a sculpture portrait of me in return!

david is one of the coolest people i know. look at his shelves of little dudes.

take a gander at his website, http://davidlubin.blogspot.com. besides sculpture, he does amazing watercolor landscapes and can spin an excellent yarn.

gnomes

happy holidays, everybody! at my place pretty recently, we had a tree-dressing get together (i.e., an ornament factory in which elves are paid in nog) featuring a gnome-making station. now my tree is full of gnooomes!

 
classic gnome & a jolly old elf.

 
starry gnome & saint lucia gnome.

you can make your own gnomes too. shrink or enlarge this template to fit your gnome heads (cedar moth balls, large bells, etc.):

my studio

my studio this weekend. i have a couple tea paintings in the works.

my uncle & his pygmy chickens

it seems like people are talking about chickens, chickens, chickens lately. urban chickens. building a coop, gathering eggs for the best omelets. it made me think of a weird photograph i took last time i was in malaysia. i rooted it out from my photograph boxes and made a little painting of it.

when i went to visit nenek’s house one afternoon about ten years ago, my uncle udin was there, tending to his pygmy chickens. i asked if i could take a picture of him with the chickens, and he agreed. i assumed we would be taking the picture outside by the chicken coop, but he brought a pair of the tiny little chickens inside and sat on one of nenek’s chairs for a real portrait.

fascinating!

my sister gave me a birthday fascinator!