Nemo matte painting/book cover

Here's a bit of an experiment - part digital painting, part photo composite, kind of a book cover, kind of just a pretty picture. To the left is a closeup of the figure that would appear on the cover if it was a cover. I was imagining a Little Nemo in Slumberland-meets-Labyrinth tale about a young woman's adventure in a dream kingdom. Below is the full composition, vaguely planned as a hardcover dust jacket - the sun's on the spine, the two mountains are the flaps.

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Nick Cave album designs

This is a project I really enjoyed - redesigning Nick Cave and the Bad Seeds' album Murder Ballads. It's a fine album but the album art (left) is fairly bizarre. Was Thomas Kinkaide involved? The album redesigns below date back to last autumn, when my now well-worn Intuos tablet was shiny and new. I tried out three different concepts - hit the jump to see two additional designs.

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Heartside

The long-awaited story of my internship: I've been volunteering at Heartside Ministry for coming up on three months. After emailing one day without a clear idea of how I could help, I was first assigned to tutor in the GED center and liaison with the Public Library - a big part of Heartside Ministry is connecting downtown Neighbors to outside resources, which is also the Library's mission: "Connecting people to the transforming power of knowledge."

I was also introduced to the Heartside Gallery, a fabulous gallery and free drop-in studio. There is a generally-2d studio upstairs and woodworking, pottery, and fabric arts downstairs. Some of our artists are homeless, disabled, or have mental health problems, others are just down on their luck or lack another creative environment. More than the Library ever could, the studio helps protect and cultivate self-identity: through creation, our artists demonstrate that they are so much more than a litany of half-met needs. Many of the art supplies are donated and volunteers facilitate and keep things organized. I started out as a studio volunteer and was invited by the art director, Sarah, to upgrade to "Marketing and Design Intern" while still volunteering in the studio and GED center. It's perhaps slightly unusual since I'm not interning through KCAD, just helpin' out as I'm able. (More type and two drawings after the jump.)

Spanish Children's Book

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Four drawings I knocked out very quickly last week for a coworker - she needed illustrations for a Spanish children's book and was considering using Bratz doll clipart. Nothing is more repugnant than Bratz doll clipart, so I quickly sketched, scanned, inked and colored these four drawings in the span of an afternoon in the name of childhood innocence. The story is about a young girl who helps out in her father's restaurant. I tried to shoot for a Bratz doll style while avoiding the Jodie Foster circa 1976 look.

Classic Horror Playing Cards

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Playing cards! Playing cards are a standard Illustration assignment for freshmen students, and mine were very much representative of my grade. I was excited to have another crack at the idea, this time as a fifth-year senior with a way better grasp of digital media. The theme was open, so I chose old-timey horror writers and their creations (Ambrose Bierce is the imaginary King of Diamonds.)

I really enjoyed designing and illustrating these, and really enjoyed having another opportunity to illustrate in my Graphic Design class this semester. Illustration and Graphic Design are a natural combination, and as my design skills develop, it's nice to design or draw circles around classmates on both sides of the fence, respectively. Foolish suckas! (Eagle vs Shark quote aside, plenty of my classmates are far better in their particular fields, and I am very grateful for their advice and assistance.) On to the rest of the cards!

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A little aside about these: Photoshop actions are the best! The cards were designed for print, so they needed several changes to display properly online. I recorded a little action so they would all turn out the same, and IT WAS SO FAST AND EASY. I am thrilled. Photoshop actions: use em'.

The Mighty Boosh

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Quick post tonight - the semester is nearly over and there is still plenty to do. Here is a finished version of the sketch from last month; for those who missed it, it is a vector portrait of Howard and Vince from The Mighty Boosh circa Series 1. Love those Boosh boys. This isn't the last you'll see of the Booshiverse on this blog, as I'm a very big fan. Graphic designer/b-boy/photographer/DJ/professional ape Dave Brown is a particular idol of mine, even more so since I bought my copy of The Mighty Book of Boosh this summer, which he designed and which features plenty of his photography. To close, here's a closeup of Vince's pretty face and gnarly teeth.

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Stretching Diagram

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Here's a helpful little chart of some very valuable exercises. I've been doing the Ryutai Undo, solo and with partners, for about seven years - you'd think I could put my feet behind my head by now, but like anything else you get a bit rusty when you take a week off. I usually try to do these daily, particularly when my workload is heavy (as it has been this last month!) - a healthy spine and hips are literally the foundation of my life.

Making this chart was an interesting exercise. I learned a lot more about drawing with vector, but also carefully considered my reasons for recording the Ryutai Undo in visual form. In the past I've been rather protective of this practice, and my asking someone to stretch with me is still a sign of great affection. Now the trend reverses - these exercises are so simple and so healthy that I want to share them! Ask me to stretch sometime, let's all have healthy hips.

Mighty Boosh sketches and prelim

I am a huge Mighty Boosh fan, and really idolize Noel and Julian. They're an amazing creative team: Noel creates the imagery and Julian writes the music and they write the show together. They also both have really interesting, but very different faces: below is a page from my sketchbook featuring a few studies of Noel and some other random things.

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Here's a bigger view of the same scan - I'm not much for caricature, but I was trying to make a sort of cartoon style by simplifying the shapes of his face.

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And here's a snapshot of a work in progress - a dual portrait of Julian and Noel as their main characters from the show, Howard Moon (jazz maverick) and Vince Noir (electro ponce) in their costumes from the first series. It's vector and designed to be a large print - I plan on incorporating some graphic elements from the show as well.

EDIT 11/29/10 - check out the finished version

Mother of Compassion

I'm immensely fond of this piece, which I created for a class with the incomparable Deborah Rockman. It's a large mixed-media drawing on paper, and if I had the skill I'd make it into a stained glass window and install it in my shower. (Just as well since I rent so it'd have to be hanging, and that's just dangerous.)

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It was a fine art class, so we were required to write up a little artist's statement for every drawing. I entitled this Guan Shi Yin (Mother of Compassion), and quoted the Four Noble Truths on the statement, under which I wrote:

The phrase “tree of knowledge of all good and evil” is potentially a merism: a figure of speech utilizing two extremes to indicate an all-encompassing range. Thus, the tree’s knowledge was complete, perfect, Godlike. Through her desire for the fruit of all knowledge, Eve brought about the fall of mankind and the birth of suffering. However, in the same moment she won for mankind the means to escape suffering, through self awareness and the will to follow the Eightfold Path.

Gyan and Varada mudra indicate the root of knowledge and limitless, welcoming compassion. Through the attainment of perfect knowledge and awakening, Eve embodies Guan Shi Yin, bodhisattva called Mother of Compassion.

Yow, that's good reading. Asked today, I would say that this piece is a reaction to the typically negative interpretation of women in Abrahamic scripture. I appropriated the iconography of Guan Yin, the bodhisattva of compassion who is often portrayed as a woman, in an attempt to temper the image of Eve as a shamed sinner. Eve is mother to us all, and we should treat her with a little more respect.

Watercolors

Heyo, new blog time. Welcome to MV Illustration, the new home of the art of Misha VanVaerenbergh. Bear with me, as these first few posts are just to get caught up. Here are some older pieces that I still think are halfway decent.

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This is a large watercolor (about 20x30) that took many hours to complete. Look at that pile of paper by the sawhorse. That is the business right there.

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This is a smaller watercolor, one of my earliest forays into children's illustration.