Nupastels, 15 min.

Nupastels, 25 min. Wider than the model actually is, I have such a bad habit with making people wider, something I'm going to have to overcome...

Nupastels, 18 min.

Still a work in progress, I'm not happy enough with the text on it yet...

TAD and The Academy, mostly works in progress.

TAD figure drawing, took maybe 15 minutes.


Composition and Color Theory class, still not done with this.


Plein Air painting in Kansas City, I think it took 45 min to an hour, I can't remember now.


Shape assignment.


Book cover of Stargirl by Jerry Spinelli, but totally bombed it, I mistook illustration board for matte board, gonna totally redo this.


Academy figure drawing.


A conversation assignment, not finished.


Quick oil painting of Rendez from the Academy.

GOING TO THE ART DEPARTMENT

I'm going to The Art Department!! I'm so excited!! Classes start tomorrow!


But I have much more to say, I've been doing so much within the past 6 weeks.


First, I went to The Illustration Academy for 4 weeks, and I must say, it completely changed my life and career. I am excited and a little upset that I learned more in 4 weeks than in 3 years of university. I was surrounded by so many great teachers and students, made some great new friends, networked, and learned sooooo much. The teachers that were there were Sterling Hundley, Josh George, Doug Chakya, Anita Kunz, Jon Foster, Jason Manley, and CF Payne!!


Then, the day after the academy, Colin Boyer, Charles Valsechi (two good friends I made at the academy), and I drove out to Kansas City, MO to catch the last week of a three week workshop of TAD. That was also amazing. I made my friendships stronger, met even more teachers and students, and got to see a beautiful city. Kansas City is so vibrant and very similar to Richmond...but better! We got to see Mark English's studio too and see some paintings he's working on, it was so inspiring! We got to meet both John and Mark English, George Pratt, Marshall Vandruff, and Andrew Jones.


Then, we made our way to Philadelphia to meet with our academy friend Sarah Alfarhan, and we celebrated the 4th. The next day we went to Chads Ford and saw all the amazing works at The Brandywine Museum. All the greats are there, I saw all three Wyeths, Charles Dana Gibson, Rockwell, Parrish, so many great illustrators and painters works! I had to cut the Brandywine short, I had to make it down to South Carolina for a family emergency, so I took an Amtrak down and I'm still here.


The great thing about TAD though, is that the classes are online, and I'm so lucky to live near a POD. The first class is actually in a few hours!! I'll post some images soon, got to get some sleep! I'll also write more in depth about the adventure I just had, there are so many details. TAD is the most exciting thing to happen to the art world, I'm so excited to be a part of it!

Another Newsletter Down

Been sick, more to come soon.

The Country Club at the Highlands April Newsletter

The April Newsletter at the Country Club at the Highlands, I'm working on the May one now. Here's just the cover, the inside is the same as the first newsletter, just different images and some tweeking here and there. I'm enjoying taking photos more than I thought, even though it's just digital and convenient. I do want to do some film stuff too, I need to bust out my old camera.


I'm so excited to be going to The Illustration Academy! I've been wanting to go since I found out about it three years ago. I can't wait!!

The Country Club at the Highlands First Newletter

I recently started my new job at The Country Club at the Highlands in Chesterfield. I had worked with my boss at my previous job at Richmond Country Club since 2008, so we have known each other for a while. He really helped me out with employing me with my new job, so I returned the favor of making him a newsletter for CCH. It was actually my idea, because this club did not already have one, so I had some freedom over what I could do. I did do the first one as a favor (though I did get a free dinner out of it), but I will be compensated for the next one. I did do some of the photography in there, though for the golf course images were already taken by a professional. I took my boss's photo, the chef's photo, the desert, the couple with the blonde hair and the couple with the teal shirt, I set up a photo shoot for the wine image, and I took the Sunday Brunch photo, and these were taken while multitasking serving (I just whipped out my camera and asked to take a photo). The only photo I took the time to set up was the wine photo. My boss took the other photos of the patrons and food with his camera phone, and I made the levels and colors better in Photoshop with them.

So, this was kind of a rush job, so it's not as polished as it should be, but it had to be rushed out to meet the March deadline and I didn't know I would really be doing the March issue till three days before it was to be sent out. I intentially made parts sans serif (because that's not something you really see in Country Club writing) and other things really cursive (because that's what you do regularly see in Country Club lingo). Next time, I'm going to make things a bit more organized and straighter and more grid like when it comes to the This Week and Next Week sections. Overall, for the really short time I had to do this, I'm pleased, though I would LOVE some critique to make the April Newsletter better.

I'm going to work on my photography more and actually setting up better photo shoots, and now that I have a studio, I don't have to set things up in my cramped bedroom.

So Much To Do

Just some quick things. I've been really busy just trying to make ends meet. I am doing some design work for the country club where I work, and I've got a lot of other things keeping me busy, but I don't want to say much until I actually have something to show. They include a painting going to be hung in a restaurant and a comic I'm collaborating on with a friend.


I've been rereading Art and Fear, it's always a very comforting and supporting read about art careers. I'm also reading Art Theory: An Historical Introduction, I decided I need more art theory in my life, so far it's a little boring, like reading a text book...