DRAGON SQUIRREL

http://privateerpressforums.com/showthread.php?133599-Proxy-models&p=1771462#post1771462

Here is a link to a post that my friend put up after I made this for him. murahahahahahahahahha!

The Book of Clow

This was the book cover I made and painted to frame my daughter's birthday cake for her Card Captor Sakura birthday party. I have since removed the canvas cover from the frame and will flatten out, maybe frame it for her and now I can reuse the frame I build for the cover for something else. I'm really excited.

Face Painting Fun

 Because Unicorns ROCK!

Ready to Race

 Wind and Water

 Cute little fire

 It's all Roses

 Splash

 That's right! Argyle

 Moon and Stars, for serious

 Messy music note, need a smaller brush for this one

My only sunshine

Mother's Love

What you are seeing above is about an 8 x 10 " copper plate that has had a layer of hardground set on it. With an etching needle I carved out bits of hardground to expose the copper underneath. This image is of a mother embracing her infant child. I used simple lines to illustrate this and then started the process of filling in the spaces between with ornamentation and symbolism that ties into the patterns, letters, and numbers, I'm created in my other works for the show.

Here are some images of the completed carving. The top image shows it oriented correctly and the bottom image shows it sideways. I have yet to etch this plate yet, but will include more images as soon as I have printed a few of these.

The Beast

Ignore the small paintings to the left. The large 8 x 4.5 foot canvas you are seeing shot at really bad angles was started during my sophomore year at Cornish and has since morphed. The images above are of this painting in progress with only one set of element pattern on it and without my daughter's influence on it. The object on the painting is an abstraction of a leaf sculpture I made with my daughter in the fall of 2010.

I could not fathom how to move forward on this painting until I could see where I my daughter would take it. I set out a tray for her with paints and drawing tools within my color pallet for the show and asked her have fun and put what she wanted on there. The last image was the final result of what she put on there. My little element of chaos, my inspiration, and my most wonderful gift. It couldn't be finished without her.

After that the rest was all intuition and I knew if anything else happened the pattern had to go on their first. So without obstructing the additions my daughter made I laid out the other patterns for wind, fire, and water. The experience was intense because the way was so clear and the work came together more satisfying that I ever imagined. I had thought that after the pattern was complete there would be more to the work, but when I looked it I was filled with a sense of serenity and I will be hard to convince that, besides treating the edges of the canvas, there is any other work left to be done on this. 

My Four Tables

These are photos of the tops of three of the four tables. Using double sided matt mylar I take rubbings off my wood block to create these patterns that each of the four elements. The ones in these photos above are fire, earth, and wind.

After I complete the rubbings on the mylar they are adhered to MDF. Using a circle I capture a portion of the pattern in the middle of the table and fill the area around it with a grid of 2x2 inch imperfect squares. Inside the squares I draw line around the pattern pieces using ink.

For the edge of the table I apply sheet music that wraps down around the cradle of the table and underneath to frame the underside of the table.

The underside of the table is drawn on by my daughter Emily. I gave her a set of drawing tools that fit my color pallet for the show and asked her to draw what came to her mind when she thought about wind, water, fire, and earth depending on which table top she was working on. She got to draw whatever she wanted to add her own special touch to the work. The idea refers to the domestic theme in my work based on the tendency for children to draw on the underside of furniture.

This is the almost completed stage of the table. I have sensed coated the legs in translucent gesso to push the wood grain back and make it match the wood tone on the table top.

This was a presentation idea of the table that includes the display of the letter blocks I created. I used a mirror on the underside to reflect my daughter's drawing underneath. The idea for the presentation of this table has changed. This table and the others that are still being built are to be hung from the ceiling from the narrow side facing each other from all directions. They would be hanging above a fifth larger table.

More pictures on this project to come when future stages of these tables are completed.

My Amazing Assistant

In the process of putting the first table top together for the show I cut a tile of translucent mylar too small for the table. I was in the process of laying in down on the PVA adhesive when I found this out and in thinking fast I laid the too small tile on a smaller square of MDF as to not waste it. I then finished laying the surface of the table. I took the small tile home with the intention of experimenting on it the next day after work. While I was at work my daughter drew a lovely picture on it using the drawing tools I left out. In response to her drawing I painted around it and treated the surface with my own pattern and embellishments. I edges the piece in sheet music and put a french cleat on the back for hanging.  This piece then informed a huge part of my process for the rest of my BFA show. An element that I had been missing was the presence of my daughter in my work. So for each of my work in the show Emily will be apart of adding to the content with creative license to draw whatever she wants. I will only provide her with the tools and materials that reflect my color pallet to use and let her make the content choices. It's been great fun.