I Have Climbed on the Art of Claes Oldenburg, and He's Probably Okay with That

Swedish-American artist Claes Oldenburg is world-famous, with a long and acclaimed career than has already spanned over 60 years. His work has been featured in world-class museums such as the Whitney, the Guggenheim, the Metropolitan Museum of Art and the National Gallery.

Although he has produced everything from soft sculpture to performance art, he is best-known for his whimsical large-scale public sculptures of commonplace items such as typewriter erasers, lipstick tubes, and rubber stamps. There is a giant clothespin near City Hall in Philadelphia that I used to pass frequently as a college student at Moore, and as an art student, I knew that was an Oldenburg. It was in my art history books, and hey, there it was, right there!

But there is another Claes Oldenburg piece in Philadelphia that was a little less notable and a little less public. On the campus of the University of Pennsylvania, there is another over-sized common object, a sculpture entitled Split Button, pictured at the top. One night, I clambered about on it, as it seemed to be designed for just such a thing. I suspect I have not been the only clamberer, but I will say that if I had known that was an actual Oldenburg, it might have given me pause at the time.

That said, Mr. Oldenburg clearly has a sense of humor, and I doubt he would mind. After all, I'm pretty sure he wants his work to be enjoyed, and it was fun, after all! 

This giant three-way plug in front of the Philadelphia Museum of Art is particularly awesome.

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Step-by-Step Painting: The Fantastic Mr. Fox's Felicity Fox, Part Two

Please refer to Part One (click here) for the first few steps of this painting, a portrait of Felicity Fox from the Wes Anderson film The Fantastic Mr. Fox. At this point, the background has been completed, and it is time to start work on the figure.

4. "Laying in" Color:

This is also referred to as "blocking in" color, or simply "blocking". The predominant color of each area, preferably in a mid-tone shade to which darker and lighter tones will be added, is painted onto each area. This basically blocks out each area's distinctive coloration for further development. Since acrylics dry very quickly, by the time you have a few areas blocked in, your first area should be dry and ready for further development, should you wish to work straight through.

5. Modelling:

Building up lights and darks to create a sense of three--dimensional form is referred to as "modelling" the figure. Note how the buildup of the paint in layers makes a three-dimensional effect, creating a sense of depth by using contrast to highlight the planes of the figure. At this point, colors must be more accurately mixed to create the desired tonal range and correct hues.

6. Refining the details:

The last few grace notes of the painting, from making sure the likeness is tweaked to perfection to fun stuff like adding highlights to the eyes to give them a sparkle. Note Felicity's brooch (click on any picture to view larger). The finishing touch is, of course, the artist's signature!

Thanks so much for coming along with me on this little journey of creating a fun painting like Felicity Fox's portrait. If you are in the Greensboro area, please feel free to come to the WesFest show on Saturday, September 12th!

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Step-by-Step Painting: The Fantastic Mr. Fox's Felicity Fox, Part One

Howdy, folks! My most recently finished project is a portrait of Felicity Fox, also known as Mrs. Fox from the wonderful animated film The Fantastic Mr. Fox. Felicity's character is voiced by Meryl Streep. I painted this piece as my entry in a local art show at Geeksboro Coffeehouse Cinema, which is hosting "WesFest", featuring the films of director Wes Anderson and a gallery showing of artwork inspired by those films. As a portrait artist, I figured the obvious choice was a portrait, so here is Felicity, step by step:

1. The reference:

I found this cute still of Felicity, which was different from the typical shot of her on the posters or in the doorway, fussing at the boys. Her expression is so sweet and open, and it's a great, detailed head-and-shoulders composition, perfect for a portrait!

2. The sketch: 

I wasn't interested in a slavish reproduction of the still, so I eliminated the apple juice box and the background, concentrating on the figure. I sketch directly on the canvas with a pastel. I never use charcoal or black pastel unless I am actually working in black and white, because the pigment does get picked up and mixes in with the paint a bit. To cut down on this, I smudge the sketch with a paintbrush, but I also choose a color that coordinates with and unifies the work. In this case, the obvious choice was a foxy brown. 

3. The background: 

I always start with the background, as I work in acrylic, an opaque medium. That way I just add layers, and I don't have to worry about trying to paint around things, just over them. It can create a nice dimensional effect, as well. Since this is a fantasy subject, I chose to make the background colorful and playful. I laid in a gradation of pink, light green and medium green, and then went into those colors to spatter the pink with dark rose, the light green with the same medium green, and the medium green with a darker green. A lot of spatter got on Felicity, but all can be painted over, so no worries. Please join me for Part Two (click here) to see how it all turned out! 

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September is Coming Soon! Original Pen and Ink Illustration

I drew the above illustration for a calendar printed for Thomas Jefferson University Hospital to give to blood donors. I did the entire calendar, from cover to cover, and I will be featuring different illustrations from it. The Director of the Blood Donor Center told me that it was one of their most popular incentives and that the entire print run of 500 was completely given away during that month! They saved a copy and put it in the hospital archives, and I was stunned and delighted by the honor.

This page is for September, and I tried to capture the spirit of the month by illustrating the traditions of back-to-school (with the books and the paper lunch bag on the right) and also the start of football season, both in schools and on the professional field. I drew this with crowquill pen and ink on smooth-surface bristol board. I hope you enjoy it!

Image my original work. Click to enlarge for detail!

More of my original art:http://www.allsortsartbyali.blogspot.com/2014/12/a-portrait-of-cheetah-wonder-womans.html

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How I Knit without Knowing How to Knit

Ever since my grandma taught me how to knit when I was a little kid, I have always enjoyed knitting. However, since my grandma lived about 3,000 miles away, she only ever taught me the one stitch, and despite having purchased several books on how to knit, I still haven't been able to figure out how to knit for real--I still just kinda do that same stitch, with the sole variation of the "pulled-out" rows (in picture, above), which is actually the SAME stitch--I just do it twice on each loop.

Not only do I not know any other stitches except for the one (and cast on and cast off, of course), I also don't know how to follow patterns or make complicated shapes--I basically just make flat things. They can be long, skinny flat things called scarves, or big wide flat things called afghans.

To avoid having my knitted items be terrifically boring, as an expanse of one stitch can certainly be, I have discovered the wonderful world of specialty yarns. I use special textured yarns, variegated-color yarns, and I even cut yarn into short sections and tie the ends together, letting them hang out for a "fringe" effect. And that's how I can knit without really knowing how!

Above is a scan of one of my knitted pieces. If you look closely, you can see it's all the same stitch, but the different yarns make it look way more interesting!

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I Make People Cry, and I Like It

I have made probably three dozen people cry in my lifetime and felt really good about it. Felt proud, as a matter of fact. Most of them were total strangers, but some of them were even people in my own family. I've made my sisters cry, my dad cry, and even my brother-in-law. Made 'em all cry, and it was wonderful.

What am I, some kind of sadist? How come I like making people cry?

Well, what I am is actually a portrait artist, and what makes people cry is joy. The joy of seeing a beloved family member or pet who has passed away immortalized in a beautiful piece of art, to live on forever in a way that a photograph can't really capture. I've done many memorial portraits over the years, and I have had the joy of presenting people with them and being there when they get struck by that sweet pain that causes happy tears to cover and soothe the feeling of loss. I consider it a wonderful honor to be able to do this.

So yes, it brings me a lot of joy to make people cry!

Image is my own artwork

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The Evil Pepper

I love Pixabay, because it is a wonderful site just packed full of copyright-free images I can use (with credit, of course--the photographer deserves love!), and it is also the answer to my blogging prayers--whenever I need a topic to write about, I can just pop over to Pixabay and find a great photo or graphic image that inspires me to write. Sometimes I am moved to pen a poem or a short story based on the image; sometimes it makes me want to do a little research and write an informative article; sometimes it inspires me to share a memory or some personal feeling; and sometimes, I just talk about how cool the picture itself is.

This would be one of those times. The reason I think this picture is so great is not just because the colors are so eye-catching, the image is so crisp, and the composition is effective. What really tickles me is how spot-on the metaphor is. The razor blade is being shown slicing the pepper, but it represents the "bite" of pain that the pepper can give you, too, and the water droplets all over make the vegetable look clean and juicy, but they also remind me of the way really hot peppers make you bust out into a sweat--especially the way they are beaded on the razor blade; it's just perfect! Love this picture and just wanted to share it with you. Now did I make you hungry, or scare you? Ha ha!

Image from Pixabay pixabay.com/en/pepperoni-red-sharp-cut-knife-273982/

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Painting Composition 101: Creating a Strong Focal Point

Every representational painting (that is to say, a painting that represents something specific, rather than a purely abstract painting) has a subject or several subjects. Some paintings have a simple composition with one easily defined subject, such as Leonardo da Vinci's portrait of the Mona Lisa, but many other paintings have several characters or objects, and, in general, just a lot of stuff going on. There may be a great deal to look at in a busy picture, but to capture the eye of the viewer, a painting must have a well-defined focal point. Once the eye is arrested by this focal point, the viewer will stay to take in the rest of your artwork.

To determine your focal point, decide what or who should be the star of the show. Pictures of the Assumption, for example, generally put the spotlight on Mary, but you might consider putting the focus on a watching child, to show that the event is being seen from her perspective.

Once you have selected your focal point, you can go about emphasizing it with one or more of the following techniques:

Framing Device. Set off your subject by placing it within a picture element that serves as a natural frame: a doorway or archway, a window, an arching tree branch or spray of flowers, a bonnet or helmet around a face. You can even use an actual frame, such as a mirror's reflection or someone standing in front of a framed picture.

Movement. In Leonardo da Vinci's painting The Last Supper, perspective is used to guide the eye toward the focal point. The lines of the walls and ceiling diminish toward the vanishing point, which happens to be face of Jesus Christ. In addition to the basic movement, Leonardo also has some of the disciples literally pointing at or reaching toward Jesus, which naturally leads the eye back again and again. Leonardo also uses a framing device, in that Jesus is seated in front of a window in the center of the painting.

Color. An effective way to attract attention to your focal point is the use of color. If your painting is full of blues and greens, as is a typical landscape, a red barn or bright yellow sunflower will provide an eye-catching burst of contrasting color (although be aware that a red barn is an extremely cliché subject). The color doesn't have to be bright, though, just different: In Vincent van Gogh's painting, Les Irises, a lone white iris stands out from its colorful bluish-purple peers and the reddish-orange ground because it is so singular.

Contrast. Along the same lines, contrast can be employed to pick out your main subject, as well. Putting something light in a dark area or something dark in a light area will draw the eye like a target. Most creatures, including people, are instinctively drawn to eyes (and Nature exploits this fact by equipping some animals with an "eye spot" pattern that can help them escape or intimidate predators), because there is such contrast in an eye (even fingernails and teeth are not as naturally white as an eyeball, nor is anything on the body as black as a pupil). In The Oath of the Horatii, Jacques-Louis David's picture of Roman soldiers swearing fealty to their captain upon their swords, the swords are shown shining brightly against a dark background. They are further framed by an archway, and if that weren't enough to establish them as the focal point, movement is also used, as both the captain and the group of soldiers stretch their arms out toward the swords as the oath is sworn.

 Definition. The relative amount of definition, or detail, can be used to home in on a focal point, much like one's eye focuses naturally on a subject of interest and lets the other stuff blur out a bit. In Portrait of a Madwoman, Géricault renders the face of his subject with incredible sensitivity to detail, showing the rough, age-spotted skin of her face, her red-rimmed eyes and querulous expression perfectly. Her white cap (a framing device) is shown in slightly lesser detail, and the farther one travels from her face, the less focus there is: Her brown mantle is barely indicated in loose brushstrokes, and the background is featureless black.

Size. Just as with a contrast in color or level of detail, a dramatic difference in size can draw the eye to a focal point. A watermelon among oranges would certainly stand out, but a focal point doesn't have to be the picture's largest item, just the most singularly different in size. An orange among watermelons would command attention just as effectively.

Finally, there is Placement. There is always a "sweet spot" on a typical rectangular page or canvas to which the gaze normally gravitates. On both "landscape" (horizontal) and "portrait" (vertical) orientations, that spot is about one third down the center of the page. The hilts of the swords and the captain's raised hand are in the "sweet spot" in The Oath of the Horatii, above. The portraits of the Mona Lisa and the madwoman, above, have the faces located there. Armed with the knowledge that people will naturally tend to look in that area first, you can plan your composition to put the focal point there. But do not feel locked in to that particular spot; with the use of contrast, framing, movement, or the other techniques I've discussed here, you can direct the eye to your preferred location, and very often an "off-center" focal point makes for a more dynamic composition.

Whatever methods you choose to enhance your painting, always be open to experimentation, and keep making art!

Want more art instruction? Check out the following articles:

 http://allsortsartbyali.blogspot.com/2015/05/figure-drawing-101-so-you-wanna-be.html
 http://allsortsartbyali.blogspot.com/2015/03/figure-drawing-101-wacky-secrets-of.html
 http://allsortsartbyali.blogspot.com/2015/03/i-have-been-professional-portrait.html

 All images are in the public domain and can be found on Wikimedia Commons

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Superman + Batman = SuperBat!

Another entry in my "Hybrid Heroes" line is SuperBat, whom I got from combining the DC superhero favorites Superman and Batman. As you can see, I have combined Superman's red cape (with scalloped "batwing" edge, a la Batman) and blue bodysuit with Batman's black spiky-looking gloves, black undies-on-the-outside (as opposed to Superman's red undies-on-the-outside), yellow utility belt (as opposed to Superman's plain yellow belt) and the famous batsignal. As well as the cape and the chest logo, the boots are a true amalgam, being Batman-black but with the Superman design at the top. Last but not least is the bat-eared mask, which I decided to use instead of the cowl so I could show the distinctive curl-on-the-forehead 'do of Kal-El (although Bruce Wayne has similar hair)!

SuperBat can fly, of course, and can use his super-hearing for echolocation. Not only is he invulnerable to bullets, he is also a skilled martial artist and has amazing powers of deduction. He belongs to the Hybrid League with Bat Canary, who we met earlier: http://allsortsartbyali.blogspot.com/2015/01/batgirl-black-canary-bat-canary.html and with Wonder Bat, a more recent addition: http://allsortsartbyali.blogspot.com/2015/03/batgirl-wonder-woman-wonder-bat.html . Things are pretty batty in the Hybrid League!

Picture is my original artwork; mixed media on bristol board. Superman and Batman are trademarked characters of DC Comics, Inc, but SuperBat is my own invention. Click on the image for more detail!

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Figure Drawing 101: So You Wanna Be a Portrait Artist

So, here's the thing: I am a working portrait artist-have been for quite some time-and yet, in my portraiture course, I devote a class to teaching my students how to become successful portraitists themselves. Why would I teach classfull after classfull of talented people how to compete with me? Am I nuts? Do I not need the business? Um, "No" on both. The world market is not glutted with portrait artists, and is never likely to be, for this particular reason: Everyone wants a portrait.
 
Think about it: Wouldn't you like a portrait? If not of yourself, than of your kids, or of your adorable shih tzu, or your beloved Grandma who passed away last year? And if not for yourself, wouldn't a portrait be a wonderful gift to commemorate an event like a wedding, an anniversary, Mother's Day or Father's Day, retirement, a new baby, or just because a portrait is a unique present that has the potential to become a family heirloom, treasured and passed down for generations?

Well, now, you see? EVERYBODY wants a portrait. I personally cannot produce portraits for everybody, so by all means, feel free to step into the gap. And to get you started, here is my advice on marketing yourself to the portrait-hungry public.

Okay, so now you know the big, secret fact: Everybody wants a portrait. Here's the second part of it: Not everybody knows a portraitist. That's why you have to promote not only your talent, but also your availability as a working portrait artist. You can do this in a number of ways, which I will organize here as People, Places and Things (just think of the definition for 'nouns' to remember).

People: Family; friends; coworkers; customers; classmates; fellow members of clubs/ churches/ organizations/ groups. Think about all the people you know-friends, relatives, people in your book club, members of your church, etc. Maybe you are taking classes or belong to an organization like Rotary, a volunteer group or a social club. Maybe you have coworkers at a job, or your own clients through another business, like interior design or real estate. The point is, you know a lot of people. How well do they know you? Your family and friends probably know you are an artist, but do they know you want to accept portrait commissions? Make sure they know, and that everyone else does, too. You don't need to be pushy; just let people know you are a portrait artist, and they will file the fact away for future reference.

And, hey, don't just say you're thinking about being a portrait artist or trying to become one, say you are. Have some confidence! People will be fascinated, and it will become a self-fulfilling prophecy. Now, think again about all the people on that list that you may know, and think about this: Every one of those people has a list, too. Your friends have coworkers; your relatives belong to churches and clubs; your neighbors have family and friends and clients.

So if your brother's boss or your friend's Sunday School teacher is thinking about getting a portrait done and asks if anyone can recommend an artist, your brother or friend can pipe up, Yes! And you end up getting a commission from someone you may never even have met. And once that commission is filled and hanging proudly in their home, think of all of their friends, family and so on who might see your artwork, compliment it and end up referred to you. So, if you want to end up with an order from your son-in-law's boss's best friend's minister's gardener's neighbor's manicurist, make sure your son-in-law knows about the whole portrait thing in the first place, okay? It might be nice to sweeten the pot by starting to do portraits as gifts for your friends and family; that way they'll have something to rave over and send your name on down the line.

Places: Retail (yours and theirs); public spaces; galleries; shows and expos; the internet. Presuming that you have produced some sample portraits, there are a great number of places you can show them off. If you happen to own a restaurant or store or know someone who does, these can be great places to display your artwork. Include contact information that people can remove from the pieces and take with them (I usually make a little business card holder out of card stock, which can be stuck to the glass on the portrait itself). If you don't have your own store but you're feeling intrepid, ask around. Many local restaurants hang art for sale, and you might get stores interested by matching your subject matter to their clientele: Put wedding portraits in bridal shops, pet portraits at pet-supply stores and veterinarian's offices. You could overcome some resistance by offering a small percentage of the proceeds on commissions resulting from the displayed work.

Shows and expos offer similar opportunities. You can rent a booth or table at a bridal expo or at a cat, dog or horse show, displaying your portraits and even having one in progress to work on while you man your booth. One caution: People do not come to these events armed with photos and ready to place an order, so these shows should be viewed more as a networking opportunity than anything else. If your want to make your booth rent back, you should take some small things you can sell off the table, such as note cards or magnets featuring your artwork.

Working in public spaces is a great way to get exposure. People cannot resist the magnetic pull of an artist at work, so take a sketch pad to the zoo, park, mall, or even a museum, and get ready to chat with admirers. Have some finished samples of your art to show (I usually have some nice finished drawings in my sketch pad that I can flip to), and have your business cards ready to hand out.
Obviously, the internet is another powerful marketing tool. If you don't feel ready to invest in your own website, you can get your work seen on other websites at very low rates, or even free!

Check out Etsy (click here to see my shop!) or other art-sales websites, your local Craigslist, or make an artist page o Facebook Click here to see mine. Your ISP (internet service provider, like AOL or Time Warner Cable) may give you a free home page you can use to advertise your services, as well. At the very least, you should create an email address to use solely for your portrait business. You can email samples to interested folks without ever having to bother with a website.

Things: Business cards; "leave behinds"; direct mail (flyers and postcards), magazine or newspaper ads. Business cards are indispensable, a must-have. They can lead to many opportunities, and are a relatively inexpensive investment-these days, you can make them on your own printer at home. But be careful about what kind of information you put on them, because they might end up in the hands of a scammer or a creepy person. Your business card should have your name and/or your business name, a phone number and an email address, at the very least; maybe a website and a mailing address, but none of these things should be your personal information.

Get a PO box or private mailbox and use that instead of your home address. It's nobody's business where you live! I never meet clients at my house or theirs, and nobody has ever had a problem with that. Along the same lines, never put your home phone, only your cell phone. Even if you have been careful not to use your home address, it can be easily found out by entering your home phone in a search engine like Google or Superpages. So, name; cell number; PO box, and your business, not your personal, email.

Another handy tool is the "leave behind", a kind of 'super business card' for artists. It gets its name from being what commercial artists leave behind with an art director to keep on file after they have shown off their portfolios. This usually consists of a card in a standard size, usually 4"x 6" or 5" x 7". One side features a sample of the artist's work (one image or several), plus the artist's name and contact information, just as on a business card. The reverse side can be set up as a postcard, with spaces for address, message, and stamp, so your piece can serve double duty as a mailer as well as a handout.

If you try to secure commissions using direct mail or print ads, try to keep it local-shipping photos and artwork back and forth can get expensive, and loss or damage can occur. Some of my portraits have ended up in France, Mexico and Ireland, but they all started from local contacts.
As you can see, there are many ways you can get your artwork in front of potential customers. The best part is when your portraits start to sell themselves. I personally do not spend a penny on advertising at this point in my career; all my clients or either repeat business, acquaintances, or referrals, and they all contact me. It's a pretty nice setup, really. Well, now that you know how, go out and drum up some business!

If you'd like to read my other Figure Drawing 101 articles, click here:

Figure Drawing 101: Is the Human Figure Really Harder to Draw? 

Figure Drawing 101: Wacky Secrets of Proportion

Image is my original artwork, soft pastel on Canson pastel paper. Click to enlarge! 

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Sugar Glider Diet

This is a poster that I did for a Triad-area presenter who visits schools, churches and other groups to give a lesson about exotic creatures--accompanied by a series of illustrated posters--and then presents the actual animal to the children. The illustration is whimsical, but informative. This one illustrates examples of the typical diet of a sugar glider, a small marsupial mammal native to Australia and Indonesia.

The sugar glider resembles a flying squirrel in that it has extra skin stretching between the arms and legs that fan out to act as gliding "wings" as it leaps from tree to tree, hence the "glider" part of the name. However, sugar gilders are not squirrels but are actually small opossums, of all things!

And like opossums, they are omnivores. They feed on tree sap in their native habitat, but some people keep sugar gliders as pets, much like hamsters. If you are caring for a captive sugar glider, there are a variety of things you can feed your pet, and a varied diet is always best. Sugar gliders can eat fresh fruit and vegetables (raisins are a particular treat for hand-feeding) or prepared foods, such as parrot chow or even cat food. They do not need to be given meat, but be sure they get their protein by feeding them some cooked egg, nuts and seeds, or some yummy crickets or mealworms from the pet store.

Illustration is mine. Click to enlarge!

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Figure Drawing 101: Wacky Secrets of Proportion

Most of us have probably heard about the whole right brain, left brain thing. You know: the left brain is the coldly analytical, number-crunching, science-and-math whiz, and the right brain is your spacey, boho flower child, full of creativity, emotion, and bright colors; good with language, drama and art. And when most of us conjure up a visual for the term 'artist', this flower child, or maybe an angst-ridden, black-garbed nihilist, pops up. Not to say these stereotypes aren't out there walking the art community (I legit roomed with one in art school), but what do you do if you'd really like to learn to draw, but you are, oh, a rocket scientist, or an accountant? Are you slap out of luck?

Why no, of course not. One of the most famous artists in history, Leonardo da Vinci, was very much in touch with his left brain, designing extremely advanced technological gizmos, like tanks, and even a helicopter! Leonardo was no slouch in the art department, obviously, but one of the strengths of his draftsmanship (drawing skill) was his rather scientific observation of his subjects, most specifically the human figure.

See, Leonardo figured out that human beings, while varying greatly in size, shape, appearance and character, still adhere to some very standard rues of proportion, and he left us a famous drawing, "Vitruvian Man", to illustrate clearly what he'd hit upon. Take a look at Vitruvian Man: an adult male figure is shown standing with arms extended in different positions, and with legs similarly shown in different positions. He is shown inside two basic geometric shapes, a circle and a square, and his major joints are indicated with bisecting lines. This illustration depicts what I like to call "wacky secrets of proportion", which your formula-following left brain will appreciate, as you can apply these mathematical principles to all of your drawings of people.

Why did Leonardo draw Vitruvian Man inside a circle? This one is pretty easy; as you may note from the different arm and leg positions shown in the drawing, the rotation of our limbs describe a perfect arc (I call this the "Snow Angel Principle"). This is interesting, but might not help so much with the drawing, so let's move along to the next question: Why did Leonardo draw our friend inside a square? Well, now, here's an interesting fact: Notice that Vitruvian Man's head and feet touch the top and bottom of the square, and that his fingertips touch each side. Remember, a square is an equilateral shape: all sides measure the same. That means, kids, that the distance from fingertip to fingertip is the same as from head to foot. Yeah, that's right: your wingspan is the same as your height, you big square, you!

There are other equal proportions on the human body, as well. Look at the major joints of the arm-shoulder, elbow, wrist. The elbow falls exactly between the shoulder and the wrist, which means that the upper arm is the same length as the lower arm (don't count the hand). Same thing goes for your lower limbs: with the knee at the exact midpoint, the upper and lower legs (don't count the feet) are the same length. Wacky, huh? Another interesting fact is that when your arms are hanging loosely at your sides, your elbows hit exactly at your natural waist. Many people draw the elbows too high. Furthermore, you can check the proportion of the head to the rest of body using the knowledge that the average adult is 7 ½ heads tall (including the head itself). Children, whose heads are proportionately larger, are fewer heads tall, varying with age. If you think your drawing of a child looks too old to be your subject, check to make sure you didn't make the head too small in proportion to the body.

One more thing about body proportions: Hands and feet are bigger than you think. Your hand can pretty much cover your entire face, and your feet have to hold your whole body up, so you'd better be happy about your big ol' gunboats, because they're keeping you from doing a face-plant. Here's a wacky secret of proportion that might win you some bar bets: Your foot is the same length as your arm from wrist to elbow (and hence, from elbow to shoulder, but it's a lot easier to check against your lower arm). Seriously! Go ahead and check for yourself; I'll wait.

See?

And wacky secrets of proportion aren't just for the body; there are plenty of things going on in your face and head, too! For example, on a person who is looking forward with his head straight up and down, you can divide the face evenly with a vertical midline and a horizontal midline; a plus sign, more or less, except the head is taller than it is wide, of course. The typical (unbroken) nose will run right down the vertical midline, which will evenly bisect eyes, brows, nose, mouth and chin. The eyes will sit right on, not above, the horizontal midline. That's right: your eyes are exactly halfway up your head. It's a very typical mistake to draw the eyes too far up. Don't forget, you need a lot of skull space to hold your big ol' brain! For kids, the cranium (brain case) is even bigger in proportion to the face (their eyes are bigger, too).

For adults, the eyes are exactly one eye-width apart, the pupils when looking straight ahead generally line up right over the corners of the mouth, the inner corners of the eyes tend to be right above the nostrils, and even your ears get a wacky rule: They are the exact length, from tip to lobe, as your nose, from brow to tip.

So, left-brainers, never fear; even though you should try to tap into your right hemisphere when you cozy up to your drawing board (to do this, try stimulating other senses besides the visual: burn a nice-smelling candle, sip some fragrant tea, listen to some music you like), you can still rest knowing that even a complicated subject like the human body still has to fit a set of guidelines that's actually pretty easy to learn. So go ahead, you doctors, lawyers, and IRS agents! You, too, can have art in your lives! Get to sketchin'!

Here is another article you may enjoy on figure drawing:  http://allsortsartbyali.blogspot.com/2015/03/i-have-been-professional-portrait.html

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Figure Drawing 101: Is the Human Figure Really Harder to Draw?

I have been a professional portrait artist for over 20 years (click here for samples of portraits and other artwork), and I have been teaching art, including portraiture, for a while, too. Most of my incoming students echo a belief that I have heard stated many times over the years: "People are the hardest thing to draw."

Well, yes and no. I personally think trees are awfully hard to draw, what with all those parts sticking out every which way, but if your tree rendering is not spot-on, people might not even notice, whereas they will instinctively know that something is not quite right with a problematic rendering of a person, since we are so intimately acquainted with, well, ourselves. Portraits are even more challenging, as they not only have to look like a convincing human being, but like the specific person you are drawing.

On the other hand, we do have that head start of being so acquainted with the human figure. We see it in the mirror, and we see it around us in all its various shapes and sizes. Part of the drawing process is getting to know your subject, and with figure drawing, it's a subject we understand, as compared with, say, technical drawing. Which would you rather draw, a girl in a pink dress, or an exploded view of a toaster? Frankly, I consider anything I have to use a ruler for a challenge.

And yet, it is this seeming familiarity with the subject that can be our undoing: We may be so sure that we know what a person looks like that we have a kind of "person template" in our heads. For those of us who haven't had much training or experience, this might be a very stylized or simplified version of a person: round head, block torso, two rectangle arms, two longer rectangle legs, some sort of attempt at hands and feet. Even people who are trained artists may stick to some form of stylization. Think of ancient Egyptian art: With very few exceptions, Egyptian art followed strict rules when it came to representing people. Paintings and reliefs always showed the human figure with the head in profile, although the eyes appeared as they would from the front. Shoulders and chests faced front, but hips and legs were turned to the side. Try standing that way. Okay, now try walking that way. Uh-huh, I thought so. It's not as easy as the song makes it sound.

But that was thousands of years ago, you say. Yup. Now look at the manga (that's Japanese comic book art) and anime (same thing, animated) style of today. You have to draw everything just so, right? There are plenty of books that will teach you the rules of the style: Those large, swimming eyes; tiny mouths; nearly nonexistent noses; standard bodies. You can tell the characters apart by hairstyles and clothing, but not much else, and it's often hard even to tell gender if you don't already know the characters. And as with the ancient Egyptians, it's hard to distinguish one artist from another by their work.

If you are trying to render the human figure in a realistic style, you will have to overcome your preconception of what a person is supposed to look like. Look at drawings of people that you have done from your imagination. Do they all look like they could be the same person? I'm betting the person looks a lot like you, or at the very least is the same race and gender; maybe the same age. To counteract this, you need to stretch your boundaries: draw people of other races and ethnic backgrounds, different ages and genders. You don't have to hunt down all of these folks on some kind of weird human scavenger hunt and make them pose for you; just get some magazines that have a lot of good pictures of people (National Geographic springs immediately to mind; photography magazines will have some nice shots, as well). Draw from these photos or from live models if you can; the most important part is to use reference, not your imagination.

If you give yourself a wide assortment of people to draw, you will start to become more familiar with racial and ethnic traits, the difference in the facial and body proportions of children at different ages, and the effect of gravity on the features of the elderly. It's fascinating to see the immense range of possible faces nature makes from just two eyes, a nose and mouth, especially when you factor in differing bone structure and face shape.

So, does that mean that people are harder to draw? Actually, I would say no. We have those mental templates of everything-from cats to bicycles to hot air balloons-and we have to get past them. You might think you could draw any of those things on demand, but once you start your picture, you may find there are many questions you can't answer-do a cat's front legs bend forward or backward? Do they have whiskers anywhere other than just on their muzzles? What do the gears on a bicycle really look like? Are the spokes set in any particular pattern? What does the ballast on a hot air balloon look like?

If you get a good, clear reference photo, or if you can get an actual object or person to draw from life ("from life" just means that the thing is there in front of you, whether it's animate or inanimate, hence "still life"), you are forced to observe these details in order to include them in your drawing. To render them accurately, you must note the actual shape, size and color (or tone, if working in black and white) of various components or parts of your subject, and also the shapes, sizes and colors/tones of various components relative to one another. Don't go with what you think a bowl of oranges looks like: draw what you see; you may be surprised at all the variation from orange to orange, as well as within the bowl, the tablecloth, and whatever else you have in the setup.

You have to use this same method of analysis on a human sitter as well as on a bowl of fruit, so technically, it's really just as easy to draw people as to draw anything else accurately. Feel better now?

My original work "In the Flow", charcoal on pastel paper

Here is another article you may enjoy about figure drawing:  http://allsortsartbyali.blogspot.com/2015/03/figure-drawing-101-wacky-secrets-of.html

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Batgirl + Wonder Woman = Wonder Bat

You may recall my last Hybrid Hero, Bat Canary, an amalgam of Batgirl and Black Canary, who was once my avatar and namesake for online writing. If you missed that post, you can see it here http://allsortsartbyali.blogspot.com/2015/01/batgirl-black-canary-bat-canary.html .

Today, we have a new character, shown here from a sketchbook page. I really should get her worked up into finished art as I have with Bat Canary, but the pencil version of her looks pretty good, I think, especially because her outfit has a lot of grey in it, anyway. Click on the picture to enlarge for best detail!

May I present Wonder Bat, a princess of Themiscyra who came to man's world and set up a secret identity as Diana Gordon, the police commissioner's daughter. Her Batplane is invisible and her Batarang is attached to the Golden Lasso of Truth. Her sleek grey bodysuit features a golden belt, stars, and bat-shaped breastplate, and she wears a golden batmask and wristlets.

I will probably make her dark-haired, like Wonder Woman, but if you like, you can also imagine her as a redhead, like Batgirl. In any case, thanks for checking out my work, and I hope you enjoyed it!

For a more traditional version of Wonder Woman, please see my artwork here:
 http://www.personapaper.com/article/8707-wonder-woman-vs-the-rockets---original-comic-art

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Book Cover Design, Part Four: The Finished Product

So, now you know how my comp sketch from Part One http://allsortsartbyali.blogspot.com/2015/03/book-cover-design-part-one-comp-sketch.html ended up as my final art in Part Three http://allsortsartbyali.blogspot.com/2015/03/book-cover-design-part-three-final.html , but how about the jacket design, itself? Did the client approve my font choice, typesetting design and placement of the artwork in the mockup from Part Two http://allsortsartbyali.blogspot.com/2015/03/book-cover-design-part-two-mockup.html ?

The answer is yes. After the one fairly simple change to the format of the illustration mentioned in my last post, the rest of my design for the book cover was approved with no problems, and the picture above is the finished product. Thanks for following along for the multi-step process of designing a book cover. Hope you found it interesting and informative!

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Book Cover Design, Part Three: Final Art...or Not

Continued from Part Two : http://allsortsartbyali.blogspot.com/2015/03/book-cover-design-part-two-mockup.html

The client approved the comprehensive sketch with no changes, so I produced it in the final medium, colored ink with colored pencil accent. Since there were no changes, I was able to use the original pen and ink drawing (from which I made the photocopies in Part One) and add the color to that. However, after the finished artwork was submitted, the client wondered if it wouldn't be too much trouble to change the format of the triptych slightly. Where I'd had diagonal transitions, the client wanted vertical transitions.

It WAS kind of a pain to make changes, especially because the deadline didn't leave me a lot of time to redo the piece from scratch. However, since only a scan of the work was going to submitted and not the physical copy, I knew I could actually cut the board itself to reconfigure the illustration. After a bit of literal cut-and-paste, the final piece was submitted...and approved!

Artwork is my original. To see how it compares to the original sketch, see Part One:http://allsortsartbyali.blogspot.com/2015/03/book-cover-design-part-one-comp-sketch.html

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Book Cover Design, Part Two: The Mockup

After producing my comp sketch http://allsortsartbyali.blogspot.com/2015/03/book-cover-design-part-one-comp-sketch.html , I wanted to show how I would use it as part of the book cover. The client wanted a simple book cover that wouldn't be tricky to print, so I used black type on a plain white background, centering the triptych illustration across the middle and set off with a red border.

A "mockup" helps a client see how the final illustration will look within the finished project. Mockups for book covers will normally involve placement and typesetting, which is of course quite easy now that a computer can be used, with hundreds of different font styles and sizes. It used to be an artist had to use transfer lettering, laboriously applied, and before that, hand-lettering was required!

Do you like the way the comp sketch appears on the cover of the book? Do you think the client liked the illustration itself, and also the design for the cover?

Let's go see what happens in Part Three!  http://allsortsartbyali.blogspot.com/2015/03/book-cover-design-part-three-final.html

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Book Cover Design, Part One: The Comp Sketch

A few years ago, I was contracted to provide a book cover design and several interior illustrations for a book about the dyeing and restoration process for fabrics, leather and suede. The author left the design concept up to me, and once I submitted a sketch, he would approve it or suggest changes. I read the manuscript and decided that since the title was very straightforward, I would make a triptych-style illustration (a triptych is composed of three panels that either fit together to make a larger piece, or that coordinate--if two are used, it is called a diptych). One panel would show the science behind the process, as many dyes are mixed according to a specific recipe or chemical process; one would show examples of materials mentioned in the title--I used a satiny fabric, a shiny black leather, and a muted brown suede for maximum contrast among the three. The final panel would show someone carefully redyeing a piece of clothing.

I produced a "comp sketch" for the client. "Comp" is short for "comprehensive". A comprehensive sketch differs greatly from, say, a thumbnail sketch, which is a small, loose rendering designed only to communicate a simple concept and perhaps to figure out compositional elements. A comp sketch is comprehensive--that is to say, it is done full size, with the final composition and colors and rendered fully. The only difference between the comprehensive sketch and the finished art, other than any changes requested by the client, might be the medium. Usually "quicker" graphic media such as ink, marker and colored pencil are used, whereas finished art is more likely to be painted (this is about art done by hand, not on the computer, obviously). I made a line drawing in ink on board, and then I photocopied the line drawing and colored it with colored pencils. This way, if the client wanted color changes, it would be easy enough to make another photocopy of the original drawing and submit the new color scheme.

Above photo is my first comp sketch. Click to enlarge for detail.
Here's Part Two  http://allsortsartbyali.blogspot.com/2015/03/book-cover-design-part-two-mockup.html

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My Crazy Knitting!

When I was a little kid, my grandmother taught me how to knit. I liked it a lot, but because I was a little kid and could only handle so much information, she only taught me one stitch--the garter stitch. So I practiced that sucker, knitting what I could, which was, basically, flat things. I could cast on and cast off, but I didn't know how to make sleeves or ribbed edges or follow any kind of pattern, so flat things, it was. My results were spotty at first--lots of dropped stitches, lots of holes--but I practiced, and I got better at it, producing a bright red scarf from my dad, which he wore, bless his heart. I'm sure it looked a mess.

I started getting older, like 9 or 10, and lost interest, but when I went to school at Moore College of Art and Design, I made a friend named Lee Bradford, who liked to knit. Lee was an upperclasswoman, and she gave me lots of good advice about knitting and fashion and school. She produced very creative, interesting textiles (that's the fancy, artier word for fabrics), and she inspired me to get back into knitting. Problem is, I still only knew one stitch, along with casting on and casting off, of course. So once again I proceeded to knit scarves, although they were far more creative, and I tried my hand at afghans, because they were way more interesting and useful than scarves, and even though they took longer to make, they were still flat things.

Now why, you may ask, would I, theoretically a fully-formed adult, not seek to learn more stitches? Oh, trust me, my friends, I have. I've bought about a dozen books, but I just can't make sense out of the step-by-step illustrations, as embarrassing as that is. Just can't get the movement. Maybe some day I will YouTube it. But in the mean time, I figured out a secret way to make up for my lameness: specialty yarns. There are yarns out there that are twisted, variegated, fluffy, fuzzy, and even hairy (it's called "eyelash yarn"), and I can make awesome special effects with those, even just using the good ol' garter stitch (I've also taught myself a variation of the garter stitch that pulls out to make long rows, which break things up nicely, but it's still the one stitch. So call me The One-Stitch Wonder, but now I sell my crazy afghans and baby blankets on Etsy, and they are also fairly popular  wedding and shower presents in my extended family, so I guess I have managed to overcome my limitations!

Image is close-up photo (a scan, actually) of an afghan I knitted, exhibiting my signature style of different colors and textures. Click for detail!

For more flat things, click here to see my Etsy shop https://www.etsy.com/shop/AllSortsofArt

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New Portrait Assignment--and a Small Challenge

I received a new portrait commission from one of my favorite clients. Her niece, Madison, is 14 years old and has Down's Syndrome, and she has just been accepted to a special school in Massachusetts. The girl is understandably nervous at the idea of going so far away from home (it's several hundred miles away; not a quick trip down the road), but it's also very exciting, and her family is proud of her and happy that she got this opportunity. To celebrate, they are having me do a portrait of her, and to make it a little more special and personal, I am going to letter her name on it and customize it with things she likes. We talked about it and decided on butterflies, so I am planning on drawing some butterflies around her name and a few flying around her.

Now, I am drawing the portrait in pencil (I have included a portrait I drew of Queen Latifah as an example of my pencil work, above), but I am tempted to put the butterflies in color, because I thought that might be very cool and special. However, I'm concerned that the young lady might wonder why she is not also in color, and I don't want to hurt her feelings. I don't have kids of my own, but for those of you who have daughters, do you think I should put the butterflies in color if the rest of the picture is black and white? I feel like it would be a cool effect, but it would look fine if they were in black and white, also. I just want to make sure Madison feels special, because that's the point!

Image is my own artwork

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Batgirl + Black Canary = Bat Canary

This is an original comic art illustration I did in my line of "Hybrid Heroes", in which I take two different superheroes and mash them together. I am a big fan of DC Comics, and those of you who are also familiar with the characters will recognize the blue, bat-eared cape, gold utility belt, Batarang and distinctive boots of the classic, Barbara-Gordon-era Batgirl, combined with the leather jacket, bustier-topped bodysuit, fishnets and blonde hair of DC's Black Canary, although I made Black Canary's bodysuit "Batgirl grey", and I incorporated Black Canary's choker necklace into Batgirl's cape (it's all about details!). These two superheroes combine to make none other than--Bat Canary!

Bat Canary uses a sonic cry not only to disable opponents, but also for echolocation! She rides a motorcycle, of course, and with both a cape AND a leather jacket, she never gets cold in those fishnets! I liked this character so much, I used my illustration as an avatar and wrote under the name Bat Canary for a while, until I had to get a little more serious and go with a more realistic byline.

For more of my comic art, click here: http://allsortsartbyali.blogspot.com/2014/12/a-portrait-of-cheetah-wonder-womans.html 
and here: http://personapaper.com/article/12530-original-comic-art---silver-age-wonder-woman

Artwork is my original, colored ink and colored pencil on bristol board. Batgirl and Black Canary characters are copyright DC Comics, Inc, but Bat Canary is all me :) Click to enlarge!

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Fun Facts about Rembrandt

In my previous post about Rembrandt http://allsortsartbyali.blogspot.com/2015/01/get-to-know-rembrandt.html , I mentioned his significance as a master of the Dutch Renaissance. But in researching Rembrandt, I found out a couple of things that I didn't know before:

1. "The Nightwatch", one of Rembrandt's most famous paintings, was not originally named "The Nightwatch", nor was it even set at night! Between 1640 - 1642, Rembrandt painted "The Militia Company of Captain Frans Banning Cocq", pictured above. But by the 18th century, the painting had become so caked with grime that people referred to it as "The Nightwatch" because, well, as you can see, it looks like soldiers on patrol in the dark of night. Imagine everyone's surprise after the painting was finally cleaned and revealed that it was set in broad daylight!

2. Rembrandt changed the spelling of his name, which was originally Rembrant. My spell check is displeased by this, but apparently it is true. Actually, many historical texts maintained the original spelling, even after he had been signing the new and improved version to his paintings for quite some time. The pronunciation was not changed, so it looks like Rembrant/Rembrandt was the original Barbara/Barbra Streisand. Just like buttah!

Image from Wikimedia Commons http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Rembrandt_-_The_Nightwatch_-_WGA19147.jpg

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Get to Know Rembrandt

Those of you who only know Rembrandt as a brand of whitening toothpaste should get to know the very talented artist and portraitist Rembrandt van Rijn, after whom the paste was named. As a matter of fact, he was so famous and successful that his name has pretty much become synonymous with being an artist, which is why you might hear someone gushing about their child's painting, "He's quite the little Rembrandt!"

Rembrandt was born on July 15, in 1606. He died in 1669, and during his somewhat short life, he became one of the most renowned artists of the Renaissance in 17th-century Holland. He is widely regarded as the most important Dutch painter of all time, and is one of the most commonly referred-to artists when speaking of "the Old Masters". He has painted many subjects, but is perhaps best known for his portraits, many of which are self-portraits. His portraits make good use of dramatic lighting and brushwork, and they do not usually feature anything other than the sitter (I hate painting backgrounds, too).

I will be back soon with some fun facts about Rembrandt that you may not have known!

 Rembrandt's self-portrait from Wikimedia Commons en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Rembrandt_van_Rijn_-_Self-Portrait_-_Google_Art_Project.jpg

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A Portrait of Tom Cruise

Thomas Cruise Mapother IV, known to us more familiarly as Tom Cruise, is a world-famous actor with dozens of films under his belt. He has been primarily an action star in such movies as Top Gun, War of the Worlds, and the Mission: Impossible franchise, but he has taken more serious roles, as well--he won a Golden Globe for his role in Born on the Fourth of July, in which he portrayed real-life paralyzed Viet Nam veteran Ron Kovic. He has also taken comedic roles, in the movies Tropic Thunder and Rock of Ages.

Tom Cruise's personal life has been fodder for much gossip, from his association with the Church of Scientology to his relationships with wives Mimi Rogers, Nicole Kidman and Katie Holmes, and with other famous actresses such as Penelope Cruz. Despite some odd behaviour, such as the "couch-jumping" incident on the Oprah Winfrey show, Cruise remains a very popular and bankable movie star. I chose him as a portrait subject because--let's face it--the man is drop-dead gorgeous, and he continues to age quite well.

Image is my original artwork, drawn with graphite on Strathmore 400 Series Drawing paper (Strathmore--because if it's not Scottish, it's crap!) Click to enlarge!

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Odilon Redon Uses Color to Make a Monster Gentle in His Painting of Cyclops

French Post-Impressionist Bertrand-Jean "Odilon" Redon (1840-1916) created works that were very fanciful and sometimes a little creepy (look up his bio on Wikipedia for a sampling), but my favorite picture of his is from 1914, just two years before his death, entitled "The Cyclops". We probably know the cyclops best from the Greek tales of Odysseus (The Odyssey, by Homer): he was a horrible, one-eyed giant who lived on an island and ate human flesh. Any sailors unwise enough to sail too close would be devoured!

But the cyclops had a softer side; he was madly in love with the sea nymph Galatea. She did not return his affection, and as can be imagined, that did not go well. But while he was besotted by Galatea, the cyclops became gentle, attempting to groom his wild hair and beard and give up his cannibalistic ways, only waving to passing sailors, rather than trying to snack on them. It is this gentle side that Odilon Redon captures in his painting, in which the cyclops, taller than a mountain, gazes down upon the nymph Galatea, napping among the flowers in the foreground.

How does an artist like Redon convey softness in his portrayal of a giant, one-eyed monster? Simple: he chose the appropriate colors. Notice how the soft pastel shades of the flowers are echoed throughout the whole painting, creating a calming, pretty effect. The loose brushstrokes of the Impressionist style also provide a kind of "soft focus" that downplays any monstrous characteristics, and last but not least, Redon rises above the expression-related challenges of one giant eye and masterfully uses the wistful tilt of the cyclops's head to convey all the feeling that needs to be conveyed. This is truly a masterpiece, and I hope you like this painting and see the appeal, despite the rather strange subject matter.

Image from WikiPaintings.org www.wikipaintings.org/en/odilon-redon/the-cyclops
Click the painting to enlarge for detail!

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My Art Project - The Serbian Box

I made a very special present for my best friend, for an anniversary. Since he is from Serbia, I chose to base my design on the Serbian flag, which features a coat of arms on a background of red, blue and white stripes. I used a box that he actually gave me for my birthday that had chocolates in it. It's a white box with a red stripe around the side, so the colors are already perfect.

In the first picture, you can see that I have already drawn the coat of arms from the flag, and I am in the process of coloring it--the red and blue parts are done, but it still needs the yellow parts. Also in the picture, you can see some red and blue papers, and I am going to use these to make the stripes.

In this photo, you can see that I have taken the red paper and blue paper that I said I was going to use to make the stripes of the Serbian flag on the box. I marked the lid of the box into three equal parts, and then used the decoupage technique, in which I painted a clear liquid glue / lacquer over the paper to adhere it to the box and also to coat it with a clear, shiny finish.

But I didn't want to just make plain stripes. Using paint samples, I selected red colors that were similar to the red that I wanted but slightly different shades. I cut them up with scissors into small pieces of varying shapes, and then I used more glue to stick them down and coat them. As you can see in this picture, the red stripe is complete. It looks like a mosaic, but just using paper and glue instead of using tiles and grout.

For the white stripe, I knew white paper wouldn't be enough of a contrast with a white background, so to make it more of a nod to actual mosaic work, I painted the stripe a light grey color that looks a bit like grout, and then I did the pieces in white. There are slight variations in the tones of white, as well. I wanted the colors to vary a little to make it more like the random broken tiles used in mosaic, but not TOO much, because I also wanted to preserve the integrity of the flag's colors and design.

I really enjoyed working on this, and especially using the "paper mosaic" technique, which I thought up several years ago when I received several books of paint samples and was thinking about how to use them. I only just this past year got around to doing it!

 After I finished the stripes, I went back to the crest and crown that I had drawn and colored in, and I carefully cut them out and placed them on top of the stripes, situated just like it is on the flag of Serbia.

It created a nice three-dimensional effect, with the base color on the surface of the box, and then the paper "tiles" on top of that, and the crest on top of that. I glued the crest and crown in place and sprayed everything with a coating of clear gloss protector. The box had become surprisingly heavier with all those layers, even though they were just paper!

I think the finished product turned out really well, and when I gave it to my friend, he loved it! He just couldn't stop looking at it the whole time, and he showed it to his friends and family, and they like it, too. As a gift, it was very successful, and as an art project, it was wonderfully fun to do and came out as I'd hoped. It was my first time trying this technique, and I'm looking forward to doing more work in this way.

Images are my own photos of my original work. Click to enlarge! 

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