lullafly illustration

Steadily working away at pieces for my upcoming senior thesis show. Here’s a WIP of the first two pages, which merge together seamlessly for a full spread. Just imagine the book’s dividing line down the middle for the time being.

Sketch shot and work-in-progress linework for an editorial piece about stockholm syndrome.

And because she’s such a goofball… a photo of Jinni’s latest exploits. She discovered she can jump down behind our stacked washer/dryer unit. At first she need to be rescued because there wasn’t enough room for her to jump back out, so after wiggling the huge thing back and forth to give her some space, I snapped this photo of her below. She was waiting so patiently and quietly for me to move it out for her.

Apparently the abyss is loads of fun, because she keeps jumping down there. Silly kitty.

In Loving Memory of Crow

April 2008 – August 11, 2009

Quite a lot has happened since my last update, which most likely explains why I haven’t updated sooner.

On August 11, I unexpectedly lost my beloved feline companion, Crow, to wet FIP. Until that day I had no idea what FIP was, and when I had taken Crow to the vet a few days earlier because he had no appetite and was grossly underweight, I hadn’t a clue he wouldn’t be coming home. I miss him terribly. To add insult to further injury, I have to wait several months before I can bring a new kitten home because the virus that causes FIP is highly infectious, and so I’d be putting a new kitten at risk. In the mean time, Jinni has been bonding with me. She’s not as enamored with me as Crow was and tends to do her own thing more often, but she’s becoming more and more affectionate with me.

I’ll forever miss you, my little Crowface. We only had a year together, but it was a helluva time that I will always cherish.

On a more upbeat note, I finished all of the design and patterns I had been working on over the summer. I’m going to try and sell some of these companies that sell bedsheets, greeting cards, etc. Hopefully someone will find one of my patterns beneficial! I had a ton of fun making them, and I can definitely see myself pursuing this field of illustration in addition to children’s books.

Catty cats in cattails was so much fun to do, and is a design for a greeting card or stationary. The others are repeating patterns that can be used on stationary, gift wrap, fabrics, etc.

Also, I have a strawberry Marble Pop that I am so excited to drink! Unfortunately, I promised my boyfriend, Nik, that I’d wait until he was present to open it. Why is it so great, you ask? Because there’s a glass marble inside that seals it, and you have to “pop” it down to open the bottle! Its fun. Trust me.

Life’s been pretty busy, and I find myself wishing I had more time. This summer I’ve been working on completing several editorial illustrations as well as design-oriented patterns for my portfolio. I’m finding that I absolutely love looking at and dreaming up patterns and designs for anythinng ranging between stationary and wall decor. However, I’m feeling rather stressed and pressured between my steady job and my summer assignments, and I’m afraid my creative spirit is feeling rather suffocated. I need to remedy this soon.

Anyway, here are some unfinished pieces as well as a finished illo.

It’s a tapir! I’m not satisfied with this spot illustration yet, and I think it’s because I was trying a different color technique that clashed with my natural tendencies.

Some outlines that are going to be turned into a pattern. Hurrah for hooved baby animals! Finished freelance work featuring the Grand River and Grand Rapids city of Western Michigan. It will be displayed on 8.5? x 11? presentation folders, and I can’t wait to get my own copy. It’s so exciting to be able to see one’s work in actual application. I’ll be sure to post photos when I receive mine! I have several more in-progress works and another nearly finished piece, but nothing else scanned at the moment. I’ve never had so many in-progress works before, and it’s certainly not helping with how scattered my mind feels.

And because I love them so….

It’s a rare moment of peace between Crow and Jinni.

Jinni has such beautiful markings, and her face is so cool. Half is orange tabby and half is dark tabby.

So I just finished stuffing packing envelopes for my portfolio mailing to various children’s book publishers:

Each package will have four of seven illustrations, a cover letter on my own letterhead, and a SASE response card for them to send back to me. I’ll be sending these out within the next week, so wish me luck!

And though it’s unrelated, I just rediscovered this photo on my camera from this year’s sprign break trip to Florida. Liz and I went to SeaWorld, where we fed the dolphins. Twice. Happiest moment ever.

Oh, and here’s a mediocre and slightly warped shot of a 16-hour painting I did for figure painting class. I was lucky to find a girl who volunteered to pose for me, and she was so happy with the finished product that she’s going to purchase it.

oil on press board

I learned about a very cool website today: YourFonts.com. You can create your very own fonts based on your unique handwriting, or even a font you designed, by downloading a template, writing out each character, and then uploading it. The program will transform your written characters in a complete font set for you to download and use, all for free!

I’m definitely going to have to try this out when I have some spare time.

Crit-O-Rama was this past week, and I have to say I enjoyed it immensely. Here’s an excerpt from Grand Valley State University briefing just exactly what the event is:

“Crit-O-Rama is a big critical open house hosted by the Department of Art and Design each spring. Faculty and students invite artists from around the country to come to town and meet for a day of art feedback with art students from GVSU and area colleges and universities. Students display their artwork for a week at the Urban Institute for Contemporary Arts, where the events are held. On the day of Crit O Rama, they solicit feedback from any of the visiting artists or faculty they want to meet with. In addition to that day of critiques, the visiting artists also spend an additional day or two with us, and give public lectures on their artwork. Some teach workshops, give demonstrations, or team teach studio courses with faculty at GVSU and the other participating schools.”

Visiting artists here for the events include speakers, Loren Schwerd, a sculptor from the Louisiana State University, and artist lecturers Christine Carr, a photo and video artist who teaches at Hollins University in Roanoke, VA.; Endi Poskovic, a printmaker of large-scale woodcuts who teaches at The University of Michigan; Tim Berg, a ceramic artist who teaches at Pitzer College in Claremont, Calif.; Lora Fosberg, a Chicago printmaker, and Gabriel Akagawa, an environmental sculptor who teaches part time at The Art Institute of Chicago.

On Tuesday I had the opportunity to listen to Endi Poskovic speak about his work and philosophies when he visited my printmaking class. His woodcuts are absolutely amazing. Such bright and vivid colors! Really, you have to see these in person to appreciate just how sharp and impressive his work is.

Yesterday was the big event, the free for all critique. I arrived rather early and was able to stay the entire duration, so I was able to talk to a lot of people. It was so much fun to see other people’s works, and then have the chance to chat to students from various universities about my work as well as their work. I thought I might be a bit shy, but it was really easy to trot over whenever I saw someone looking at my work and ask them what their thoughts were.

My only complaint is that we needed more visiting artists! They were always in high-demand and had lines of people following them. We were literally stalking them around the UICA, ready to pounce as soon as they finished their current critique. I managed to nab Lora Fosberg fairly early and had a great discussion with her about my illustrations. She’s so spunky and fun to talk to!

After asking a few visiting professors to critique my work, Endi was able to come and talk to me. We had a lengthy and provoking discussion about where I was with my art and where I should go next. He adored my technique and style, so we mainly discussed subject matter and narratives. He gave me some invaluable ideas and challenges that I’m definitely going to have to ponder over.

I completely forgot to take photos of my work displayed on the wall. Go me. I know my professor, Ed, was wandering around with a camera so I’ll have to see if he managed to take any with my work in it.

dinosauria by endi poscovic

lora fosberg's new book

'new living' by lora fosberg

I have successfully launched my new and improved website!

www.lullafly.com

Everything should be in working order, but if you happen to see something not working please let me know so I can fix it! I added a preloader script to make the images in my galleries load as fast as possible, so if you’re experiencing slow loading times please let me know. I’ve tested it on two different connections without trouble, and I’m hoping slower connections will load things smoothly as well.

Now that my website is complete I must turn my attentions to re-designing some business cards and mailer samples to send out.

I figured it’s high time for me to start an art blog,  so here we are! I intend on sharing my thoughts, drawings and illustrations, and general news regarding both my life and my art. Don’t worry, though, this blog will focus mainly on my art-related life. Nevertheless, I can’t promise that I won’t include occasional random tidbits or photos of my kitten, Crow.

In addition to creating this blog, I’m currently in the process of reconstructing my website, www.lullafly.com using HTML/CSS and Flash, so stay tuned for updates!