Art Week #2

. . . 

I'm late.
But that's not too important.
Granted, it is only two hours past midnight, so I very much am still in the fingerlaces of Sunday's night.
For all intents and purposes--and intended purposes--I am quite on time.
Sublime.

As far as my art is concerned, this week was slow getting started due to a lot of work. I've never read so much Franco-Algerian history in my life. (Never read any before, actually. Is this a problem with our World History education in America? Who knows, but the answer is clearly yes.) Lately I've had in mind a collection of word scrawling and pen illustrations that sit in a big black book back in Boston. (Nice.) Here is one of them. It is called, "The Alice Tree".

"The Alice Tree"

Here it is sliced up because I used it as the cover of a short story I submitted to a contest at school and mysteriously never heard back from them-- not with with the winner, a thank you, a disappointing remark on the scattered nature (beauty) of my submission, nothing. Thanks Harvard, for being sketchy. Anyway, I figured out how to pick up where I left off with the plot. It involves poor Alice (she is always the unfortunate, she has to be) happening upon three enchanted sisters, named Haze (L'Obscurité), Mist (La Brume), and Gloom (La Mélancolie). 

In class I managed to sketch out a rather tame picture. Here are the Fog Sisters (Les Sœurs du Voile):

Rendition 1

Like I said, pretty tame. I do like the tarot-card centralization of this sketch, though. Something about this length-to-width proportion just makes me giddy. 

So, the week goes on, I'm learning how France dominated Algeria in the 18th and 19th centuries with crazy effectiveness, and, in Google Image searching for inspiration regarding what exactly constitutes "melancholy," I find this guy: Ryohei Hase, digital illustrator based in Tokyo, Japan. Go to his website. I'm very impressed with his very skilled and patient use of the "digital brush" as one of my closer buddies called it. Using a little intuition, you will find his series of eight pieces done with this theme. For fun, guess which piece was my favorite. Hint: there are two. 

Ryohei keeps notes, which I looked through a little bit. In them, I found a technique that I've seen used also by Esao Andrews. I said to myself, "Well, there you have it. If two professional illustrator-artists use it, then you should use it, for at least try it for the benefits." And I did. Or at least I have started:

By the end of this new week, all 18 will be filled. I will be thrilled.

ciaociao,

rossi