Gollum - my ultimate achievement

This is my favorite and what I believe to be my best work of art. I made it in high school, working on it everyday for a month and a half. When my dad moved this down to Portland it got a little wrinkled at the bottom and Gollum now has a small hole on the tip of his nose, but I still love this piece. It's in charcoal.

Flashback - Oasis

A charcoal oasis in the desert. I made this my sophomore year of high school.

Flashback - Escher-alike

I love this Escher piece, so I was going to do it in charcoal. This is a very light outline of it in graphite that has been waiting years for me to do something with it.

Flashback - oil pastel

Just a disclaimer: this image is a reworking of a classic piece by a famous dead artist. It was an assignment during high school to pick a famous artist and one of their pieces and try to recreate it. Unfortunately, I can't remember who it was.

Clean - 2/26/08

The counterpart to Messy. I spent more time on the chair frame this time, and like how it came out although I would add a bit more consistency (ie. make it more of a line) to the dark spots on the frame on the right side. I spent less time on the cushion this time, and it shows. It was about 3 a.m. so I was really tired, and just wanted to go to bed. It was more of a 12 minute sketch than a 20 minute one, so I'm creating a separate category for those. Hopefully, when I get better at sketching I can do most of my sketches in 10 minutes as I would love to do some plein air drawings.

Messy - 2/25/08

My messy papasan chair. This was one of my 2o minute sketches, very minimal shading. I like how the chair frame came out, but I don't like the corner of the blanket seemingly floating in midair, nor how when I tried to minimize a bit of the back it only made it stand out more. It detracts from the front and erases nearly all the depth. I definitely need to sharpen my charcoal skills. Get back to where I was when I made Gollum (which I will get a picture of sometime when I'm in Seattle)

Work sketches (prt 2)

Another chair, this time in ink. This was the first drawing I did using Micron pens, or any pens at all. It definitely illustrated how different pens were in comparison to pencils and charcoal, which I'm a bit more comfortable using. However, I love the end effect that pens have, especially in combination with watercolor, so my sketchbook will have lots of pen and ink drawings. My crosshatching and everything definitely has room for improvement, but I think I captured the essence of the chair nonetheless. With many of my drawings, especially ones I struggled with, I often write a bit of commentary about what I learned to do/not to do. It may be a bit cheesy, but I figure that my sketchbook is for me and is for me to learn so it doesn't have to all be archival quality. I really agree with the idea that your sketchbook should be somewhere you feel safe to experiment, to go crazy, and try and fail without feelings of shame.