On January 1, 2017 I started drawing in a Moleskine Japanese accordion fold sketchbook with the intention of drawing in it every day for the entire year. When I filled one sketchbook I continued the drawing into the next one and so far I have one drawing that is over 600 inches long by 5.5 inches high. I managed to keep up the habit almost every single day of 2017. I missed a few, but made up for it with some crazy long days of drawing. In 2019 I entered the series of sketchbooks into the Yeiser Art Center Annual Members Exhibition and won Best of...
I was approached by Director of the McCracken County Library to design a logo for their new bookmobile. She came to me with the following brief: “We’re calling the bookmobile the Brary Bus, because Brary Bear is our storytime mascot. I’ve attached a photo of our Brary Bike – the logo was inspired by a design from a 6th grader. I had this concept of the logo involving a bear driving a bookmobile, holding a book out the window or something. The image of Brary for the bookmobile doesn’t need to be an exact match to the bear on the bike, but it shouldn’t be a complete departure either. We need a logo that we can use on future promotional materials, and we will need a vehicle wrap designed as well.” My approved design is shown above and they were very happy with it. I believe it kept just enough of the intent of the original bear while satisfying the new concept. I used the shape of the actual van and kept similar colors and shapes from the bike design. Sadly, I didn’t get the opportunity to design the vehicle wrap, but I’m quite pleased with the logo...
I was approached by the Katie Axt, Director of Main Street and Principal Planner for the City of Paducah, to design and license some of my flower and insect drawings to be used for her Broadway Mural Project. The concept was to fill vacant buildings on Broadway in downtown Paducah with pollinators to attract attention to buildings that are available for sale or lease, to beautify downtown Paducah, and to illustrate Main Street’s motto, “Local Grows Here.” The first step was mocking up what a few different vacant buildings would look like with the art in the windows. We decided on three to begin with and I provided mockups to get buy-in from the appropriate people. I remembered seeing some windows with photos in them in the Paducah Innovation Hub (another one of my website clients) and found out how they were done and who to contact. The perforated vinyl window film was printed and installed by Petter Supply Co. I contacted them and got them working on a quote and they came to an agreement with the Katie. The city decided to go with one building to begin with and worked with the owner of 315 Broadway to make it happen. Petter measured the windows and I did the production design to turn the chosen design into print-ready files scaled and cropped to fit the measurements. I also designed a “poster” area in the bottom right for some information about the project and about me and my work, with QR codes linking to the Paducah Main Street website and my own site. The feedback on the mural has...
illustrated portraits My fine art drawings generally have no faces (more about that here), but I actually enjoy drawing faces, too! Here are just a few recent examples. This illustration was done for a PopSugar article about a website/app called AllGo, which is described as “…a review site where fat people rate the comfort and accessibility of places so others can know what it’s like.” I was asked to illustrate some of the app’s high profile supporters. Interested in a custom portrait or avatar? get in...
REPEAT PATTERN DESIGN When I was in grad school at the Savannah College of Art & Design in the 1990s, I studied fiber arts and did quite a bit of surface design. Mostly block and screen printing, but I learned how to design repeat patterns – using drawings, photocopies, scissors and tape. I only did a couple, and although I worked for an apparel company after grad school, I never really did any more repeat patterns. In the late 90s I did a few very simple repeat patterns as backgrounds for web pages, when that was the hottest trend, but nothing very complex. In 2018, as part of the 100 Day Project, I decided to design a pattern a day. I took a few courses on Skillshare to learn the basics of how to create patterns in Illustrator. So starting in April of 2018, I made a pattern a day. Here is a selection of those patterns. Next up, working on creating...
A line of necklaces and earrings in progress. Ink drawings on little slices of tree branches, sealed with encaustic medium (beeswax and damar resin). Available on copper chain, black cord or black wire. ...
