I'll open this post with the obligatory apology for my absence. I have not posted anything for over a month and I'm not super happy with myself over the fact. If nothing else, it nags at me that the entire month of August will be unrepresented in my blog archive.
June, July...September. Fail.
I also apologize in advance for the amorphous nature of this post and it's total uselessness. If anything, it exists purely to assure anyone curious enough that I am, in fact, still quite alive, and have not given up on the blog.
Still, in my defense, a lot has happened since July 29th, and I thought I'd take the opportunity to give you all a bit of a rundown to bring you all up to current events.
First, we completed the move from New Jersey to Seattle. This involved two stays at two different temporary housing facilities, two stays at two different hotels, and finally an apartment. It also required a tractor trailer with a driver called Virgil, and about six weeks of time total to get us and our stuff out of the Garden State and deposit it in the Evergreen State (which over the summer took on a brownish color in Seattle).
Second, we managed to completely unpack. Normally, this would have been a slightly more leisurely event, but I kind of needed to get my stuff squared away before the 19th of August for reasons I will get to in a moment. I also had painting to do and apparently have an inability to think clearly when all our worldly possessions are crammed into boxes. Rather than painting, I felt the need to help our stuff escape its respective corrugated prisons so that I might create chaos from order only to enstate a new order, which allowed me to finally start painting on a "Blue Monday" with a clear mind.
See what I did there?
The short version is that we got moved in and settled. We even managed to take the time to clean the mystery stains out of the basement carpet.
Mmmmm... mystery stains.
Third, as mentioned above, on August 19th, I started a two week stint as a concept artist. It was a short burst and it was intense. But it was also awesome. During that two weeks, I did lots of stuff I can't talk about. Some of the stuff I did was with a pencil. Some other stuff was digital. And when I was finished doing stuff I can't tell you about during the daytime, I would come home each night and paint more stuff I can't talk about.
Funny how secretive I must be about what it is that I supposedly do all day. I mean, I'm not exactly starting coups and unseating dictators. Not exactly. Steve Belledin: art spy.
Anyway, with those three big events, time became a very precious commodity. I was busy. Really busy. Too busy, even, to get stressed about any of it. I had so much on my plate that all I could do was focus on one small thing at a time and ignore the bigger picture. I just had to trust that the bigger stuff would fall into place while I slowly completed things on a checklist. Fortunately, my faith in things working out was well founded because they did, in fact, work out. Plus I got all the things done I needed to do.
Except write anything for this blog, of course.
Now, I do have some false starts of posts begun over the last month that I'll be looking over again — mostly to do with moving one's studio and the kind of people you deal with when you move (people who tell you you're wrong for liking cities you like and such). If they're worth something, I'll try and bang them into shape. They just won't be particularly timely anymore. But, there might at least be enough useful information or entertainment value to excuse their existence.
Of course, all this depends on how the coming months go. I've got a few art posts that need writing and IlluxCon to prepare for. Then there's the painting that I need to turn in before the con. And then it's off to do more concepting once I'm home from the con, plus more painting. I'm sure I could afford to skip a meal or lose a few hours of sleep to make a post or two happen. No one will notice. Right?
How did I get so busy? And why am I so happy about it?
The Work and Musings of Illustrator Steven Belledin
Wednesday, September 4, 2013
Monday, July 29, 2013
Revisiting Reprints: Tome Scour
It may interest some of you reading this that Tome Scour is old. Really old. In fact, I think it may have been around the 5th or 6th painting I ever did for Magic: the Gathering, which would mean that it was painted in 2006. Despite this fact, the piece did not see the light of day until the Magic 2010 core set which was released in 2009.
Why the delay? My suspicion is that whatever the image was originally commissioned for either got dropped, cancelled or kicked down the road. Perhaps the set the card was originally intended for was no longer necessary. Perhaps the card was set aside in order to preserve mechanical balance within its intended set. Or perhaps the designers just couldn't get the original card's mechanic to function properly. Who knows? Such things happen in the wonderful world of games.
And so it was put into the flat files at Wizards of the Coast where it would sit among all the other images that have never been published for three years. Three years, it turns out, that saw a noticeable degree of artistic growth from yours truly. Enough growth, in fact, to come to the realization that I wasn't quite happy with that piece anymore. Well, I would have been unhappy with it had I remembered it existed in the first place.
Don't worry, fate made sure I was reminded upon the arrival of my artist proofs1 for the M10 Core Set in the summer of 2009. There the image was atop a card called Tome Scour. My heart sank. There the image was, exposed for all to see, and one of many that I would end up wishing I could take back. Indeed, had I known that Wizards intended to use the piece in M10, I would have made the time to paint a new piece or go back into the original version. But it was too late.
Sigh.
So let's take a look at the piece in question. It sports a young wizard gleefully pulling the writing from off the pages of a large mystical book, the words and diagrams once formed of ink consumed by magic as they float away in the air. Sounds potentially cool when I write it. But somehow less so when I painted it. But then I'm kind of blind to any charms the piece might still retain.
The finished piece was done on Strathmore illustration board and measured 11" wide by 8" tall.
The painting is one that falls short of being the worst thing I've painted for Magic, but falls far shorter of being the best. What bothered me more than anything is that because it came out with other pieces done more recently that I was actually happy with, it had the appearance of being the ball I'd dropped. There was no way for anyone to tell that it was just an old piece that I'd outgrown.
Sigh. Again.
I wish I could tell you that it got printed and the game moved on — that it was a one-off and didn't see a lot of play. But that wouldn't be accurate. A year later, it was reprinted in the Magic 2011 Core Set. And I grew to dislike it a bit more. Another year had gone by and I'd like to believe I'd progressed a little further. But then time passed, and I saw the card less and less. I became optimistic that I might not see it as often anymore. But alas, it was not to be. The thing has reappeared in the new Magic 2014 Core Set.
Now, reading this, one might get the sense that I'm completely down on this piece. Surprisingly, that's not so. Like I said before, it's not the worst thing I've ever painted for Magic, and it represents a very wonderful thing that I intend to share with you. While I do feel like I've outgrown the image, I can't say I have any true animosity toward it. Instead, I see it as a reminder in some ways of how fortunate I actually am. You see, under most circumstances with gaming art, this piece would have disappeared and passed out of the public consciousness long ago. Why? Because under normal circumstances, the game likely would no longer be in print. Indeed under normal circumstances it might even be considered a miracle if the company that produced the game was still in business.
You see, the nature of the business, I'm sad to say, is that few companies have had any kind of longevity. Of the imprints manufactured by those few companies that have managed to stick around, even fewer games have had anything even resembling a long life. The only reason I even have the opportunity to complain about this less than stellar piece of art still kicking about is that I just happened to have done it for a game that has withstood the test of time and has continued to grow over 20 years — something that is pretty special. If I'm honest, having pieces that I'm not happy with floating out there for all to see is a pretty small price to pay for being a part of the Magic brand and I have to say once again that I'm honored to be a part of the the game and the community that goes along with it.
1 For those not in the know, artist proofs are copies of the artist's cards provided to the artists which have a face — which includes the artwork — but no printed back leaving a white side instead of the usual printed Magic card bacing. These artist proofs are also referred to as "white backs" for this reason, and are considered highly collectible due to the fact that only fifty are made of any given card.↩
Why the delay? My suspicion is that whatever the image was originally commissioned for either got dropped, cancelled or kicked down the road. Perhaps the set the card was originally intended for was no longer necessary. Perhaps the card was set aside in order to preserve mechanical balance within its intended set. Or perhaps the designers just couldn't get the original card's mechanic to function properly. Who knows? Such things happen in the wonderful world of games.
And so it was put into the flat files at Wizards of the Coast where it would sit among all the other images that have never been published for three years. Three years, it turns out, that saw a noticeable degree of artistic growth from yours truly. Enough growth, in fact, to come to the realization that I wasn't quite happy with that piece anymore. Well, I would have been unhappy with it had I remembered it existed in the first place.
Don't worry, fate made sure I was reminded upon the arrival of my artist proofs1 for the M10 Core Set in the summer of 2009. There the image was atop a card called Tome Scour. My heart sank. There the image was, exposed for all to see, and one of many that I would end up wishing I could take back. Indeed, had I known that Wizards intended to use the piece in M10, I would have made the time to paint a new piece or go back into the original version. But it was too late.
Sigh.
So let's take a look at the piece in question. It sports a young wizard gleefully pulling the writing from off the pages of a large mystical book, the words and diagrams once formed of ink consumed by magic as they float away in the air. Sounds potentially cool when I write it. But somehow less so when I painted it. But then I'm kind of blind to any charms the piece might still retain.
 |
| ©Wizards of the Coast |
The painting is one that falls short of being the worst thing I've painted for Magic, but falls far shorter of being the best. What bothered me more than anything is that because it came out with other pieces done more recently that I was actually happy with, it had the appearance of being the ball I'd dropped. There was no way for anyone to tell that it was just an old piece that I'd outgrown.
Sigh. Again.
I wish I could tell you that it got printed and the game moved on — that it was a one-off and didn't see a lot of play. But that wouldn't be accurate. A year later, it was reprinted in the Magic 2011 Core Set. And I grew to dislike it a bit more. Another year had gone by and I'd like to believe I'd progressed a little further. But then time passed, and I saw the card less and less. I became optimistic that I might not see it as often anymore. But alas, it was not to be. The thing has reappeared in the new Magic 2014 Core Set.
Now, reading this, one might get the sense that I'm completely down on this piece. Surprisingly, that's not so. Like I said before, it's not the worst thing I've ever painted for Magic, and it represents a very wonderful thing that I intend to share with you. While I do feel like I've outgrown the image, I can't say I have any true animosity toward it. Instead, I see it as a reminder in some ways of how fortunate I actually am. You see, under most circumstances with gaming art, this piece would have disappeared and passed out of the public consciousness long ago. Why? Because under normal circumstances, the game likely would no longer be in print. Indeed under normal circumstances it might even be considered a miracle if the company that produced the game was still in business.
You see, the nature of the business, I'm sad to say, is that few companies have had any kind of longevity. Of the imprints manufactured by those few companies that have managed to stick around, even fewer games have had anything even resembling a long life. The only reason I even have the opportunity to complain about this less than stellar piece of art still kicking about is that I just happened to have done it for a game that has withstood the test of time and has continued to grow over 20 years — something that is pretty special. If I'm honest, having pieces that I'm not happy with floating out there for all to see is a pretty small price to pay for being a part of the Magic brand and I have to say once again that I'm honored to be a part of the the game and the community that goes along with it.
1 For those not in the know, artist proofs are copies of the artist's cards provided to the artists which have a face — which includes the artwork — but no printed back leaving a white side instead of the usual printed Magic card bacing. These artist proofs are also referred to as "white backs" for this reason, and are considered highly collectible due to the fact that only fifty are made of any given card.↩
Thursday, July 11, 2013
The Fun Stresses of Relocation
Moving across a continent, it turns out, is a difficult thing. Though I've not completed the task as yet, I'm at least deep enough into the process that I can safely tell you that I'd do things differently if I had to do it all again in the future. If there is a next time (and there won't be), I'd likely just pile my worldly belongings in the front yard and set it all on fire. Then I'd be free to move with ease and have the ability to start from scratch at our final destination. Fortunately, despite the inherent stresses of this particular move, Amy and I have somehow managed to keep our cool.
Mostly.
The issues we have had were mostly due to timing. First off, while Amy's new job was the stuff of dreams, it carried with it a need to be in Seattle very shortly after accepting the position. As a result, we were left with just enough time to once more sort through our worldly belongings (which after several previous moves had been thoroughly picked through), make several trips to the local donation bins, and for me to get a couple days of painting done on an assignment that I'd already committed to before the job offer even came along.
What we didn't have time for was the little things like getting our stuff packed up and moved out to Seattle. However, even if we had the time to get all that squared away, we'd have had no address to give the movers as we didn't have a new apartment lined up. And so the moving dates got kicked down the road to relatively arbitrary dates which would hopefully result in our stuff arriving in Seattle on or about August 1st. In the meantime, we would temporarily relocate to Seattle with whatever would fit in two suitcases (mine was mostly art supplies), with the mission to find a new place while Amy began her new job.
Having gone through a couple moves in the last three years, we thought we were pretty prepared — in fact, Amy managed to get most of the ducks in a row. And though it seemed as though we were on top of things, it turned out that what we simply were not prepared for was the rental housing market in Seattle. Previous experiences in shopping for a place to live in the Boston and greater New York Metro areas yielded multiple viable options in very short periods of time. This was not to be so in the Emerald City.
Initially, we did what we'd done before: call some realtors. Unlike in previous cases, realtors turned out not to be particularly helpful. Not only did the realtors rarely get back to us, but it turned out they were actually an obstacle to finding a place to live. Why? Simple. Involving them lost precious time in reacting to opportunities. This is extremely important in the current rental climate because apartments and houses are being snatched up within minutes of being listed. Several times we arrived to see properties that had been listed a mere day before only to be presented with stacks of completed applications from other potential renters. Other times we dealt with the gauntlet of open houses for rental properties where dozens of people were crowded into spaces not fit to hold them as they all vied for a chance to live in the place.
The net result of the extreme competition in the current rental market in Seattle is that the easiest places to get to see were the places that most folks would not want to live in. Places that smelled of cat urine or wet dog. Apartments completely devoid of light. Houses with mother-in-law suites where the mother-in-law just might be stuffed into the crawl space or boarded up behind one of the walls. Places completely wrecked by previous tenants or kept by seemingly indifferent landlords. And then there were the many decent dwellings that were in less than optimal neighborhoods.
For the most part, visiting many of these places was like being thrown into a pit to fight it out with other potential renters. While some of property owners were likely just attempting to ferret out bad candidates, I'm certain that many of the tactics involved were attempts to start bidding wars. Either way, we figured that you could tell a lot about potential landlords by how they treated their potential renters. Folks that created situations that encouraged passive aggressive behavior or open hostility between strangers were not the kind of folks we wanted to write checks to every month. It's no surprise, either, that there turned out to be a correlation between the level of class displayed by landlords when dealing with potential renters and the quality of the dwellings themselves.
To say that our first few days searching here were disheartening would be an understatement. While I attempted to stay optimistic about it all (something that is quite out of character), Amy began to have her doubts and I could tell she was starting to get a little stressed. Nevertheless, each morning we got up early and went through the listings, making phone call after phone call, just hoping for a place to come along that we could snatch up and make our own.
I'm happy to say that after many days of searching, we finally did find a place with promise. Within five minutes of the house being listed, Amy had already sent an email. Not long after, we got a call to come look at the place. A tour was given, an application was filled out, some references were checked, and the place was ours.
There was much rejoicing.
Now, I realize that I've made it sound as though we've done all this ourselves. The truth is that we've had a lot of assistance. Amy's new employer has been incredibly helpful in trying to smooth out the logistics of relocating cross-country. They've answered a lot of questions and have bent over backwards to make the compressed timeline easier to deal with.
Our biggest thanks, however, have to go to Franz and Imelda Vohwinkel who have given generously of their time to help us find a place, advise us on neighborhoods, and send us more listings than we could count. Their aid was key to our finding our new home and I simply cannot thank them enough. A new place to live was easily the biggest variable we had to solve for and was probably the most stressful.
Securing an apartment here in Seattle meant that the remaining big puzzle pieces were finally ready to be put into place, and for the most part we've managed to get everything figured out. Next week, we'll return to New Jersey, pack a few things, close up shop, and supervise the move. Then we'll fly back here and wait for everything to show up. And while waiting in some ways will be the most difficult part of this process, I must confess it'll also somehow be the least stressful. There will be no decisions to make after all, and at least I'll be able to do some prep work at the new place to bide my time.
The end of this journey may not be in sight, but I'm happy to say we've got a pretty good map to help us get there.
Mostly.
The issues we have had were mostly due to timing. First off, while Amy's new job was the stuff of dreams, it carried with it a need to be in Seattle very shortly after accepting the position. As a result, we were left with just enough time to once more sort through our worldly belongings (which after several previous moves had been thoroughly picked through), make several trips to the local donation bins, and for me to get a couple days of painting done on an assignment that I'd already committed to before the job offer even came along.
What we didn't have time for was the little things like getting our stuff packed up and moved out to Seattle. However, even if we had the time to get all that squared away, we'd have had no address to give the movers as we didn't have a new apartment lined up. And so the moving dates got kicked down the road to relatively arbitrary dates which would hopefully result in our stuff arriving in Seattle on or about August 1st. In the meantime, we would temporarily relocate to Seattle with whatever would fit in two suitcases (mine was mostly art supplies), with the mission to find a new place while Amy began her new job.
Having gone through a couple moves in the last three years, we thought we were pretty prepared — in fact, Amy managed to get most of the ducks in a row. And though it seemed as though we were on top of things, it turned out that what we simply were not prepared for was the rental housing market in Seattle. Previous experiences in shopping for a place to live in the Boston and greater New York Metro areas yielded multiple viable options in very short periods of time. This was not to be so in the Emerald City.
Initially, we did what we'd done before: call some realtors. Unlike in previous cases, realtors turned out not to be particularly helpful. Not only did the realtors rarely get back to us, but it turned out they were actually an obstacle to finding a place to live. Why? Simple. Involving them lost precious time in reacting to opportunities. This is extremely important in the current rental climate because apartments and houses are being snatched up within minutes of being listed. Several times we arrived to see properties that had been listed a mere day before only to be presented with stacks of completed applications from other potential renters. Other times we dealt with the gauntlet of open houses for rental properties where dozens of people were crowded into spaces not fit to hold them as they all vied for a chance to live in the place.
The net result of the extreme competition in the current rental market in Seattle is that the easiest places to get to see were the places that most folks would not want to live in. Places that smelled of cat urine or wet dog. Apartments completely devoid of light. Houses with mother-in-law suites where the mother-in-law just might be stuffed into the crawl space or boarded up behind one of the walls. Places completely wrecked by previous tenants or kept by seemingly indifferent landlords. And then there were the many decent dwellings that were in less than optimal neighborhoods.
For the most part, visiting many of these places was like being thrown into a pit to fight it out with other potential renters. While some of property owners were likely just attempting to ferret out bad candidates, I'm certain that many of the tactics involved were attempts to start bidding wars. Either way, we figured that you could tell a lot about potential landlords by how they treated their potential renters. Folks that created situations that encouraged passive aggressive behavior or open hostility between strangers were not the kind of folks we wanted to write checks to every month. It's no surprise, either, that there turned out to be a correlation between the level of class displayed by landlords when dealing with potential renters and the quality of the dwellings themselves.
To say that our first few days searching here were disheartening would be an understatement. While I attempted to stay optimistic about it all (something that is quite out of character), Amy began to have her doubts and I could tell she was starting to get a little stressed. Nevertheless, each morning we got up early and went through the listings, making phone call after phone call, just hoping for a place to come along that we could snatch up and make our own.
I'm happy to say that after many days of searching, we finally did find a place with promise. Within five minutes of the house being listed, Amy had already sent an email. Not long after, we got a call to come look at the place. A tour was given, an application was filled out, some references were checked, and the place was ours.
There was much rejoicing.
Now, I realize that I've made it sound as though we've done all this ourselves. The truth is that we've had a lot of assistance. Amy's new employer has been incredibly helpful in trying to smooth out the logistics of relocating cross-country. They've answered a lot of questions and have bent over backwards to make the compressed timeline easier to deal with.
Our biggest thanks, however, have to go to Franz and Imelda Vohwinkel who have given generously of their time to help us find a place, advise us on neighborhoods, and send us more listings than we could count. Their aid was key to our finding our new home and I simply cannot thank them enough. A new place to live was easily the biggest variable we had to solve for and was probably the most stressful.
Securing an apartment here in Seattle meant that the remaining big puzzle pieces were finally ready to be put into place, and for the most part we've managed to get everything figured out. Next week, we'll return to New Jersey, pack a few things, close up shop, and supervise the move. Then we'll fly back here and wait for everything to show up. And while waiting in some ways will be the most difficult part of this process, I must confess it'll also somehow be the least stressful. There will be no decisions to make after all, and at least I'll be able to do some prep work at the new place to bide my time.
The end of this journey may not be in sight, but I'm happy to say we've got a pretty good map to help us get there.
Monday, June 17, 2013
Breaking Radio Silence
I have not contributed anything to this blog in a long time. Too long, in fact. But I've been doing stuff. Lots of stuff. There's been fretting stuff and logistical stuff. Rummaging stuff and sorting stuff. Just not so much art stuff.
What have I really been up to? Preparation. Finally, after hinting at big changes to come for quite some time now, I can finally reveal the news:
We're moving. Again.
Big deal, you must be saying. You've already moved twice since this blog's inception. This is not interesting!
True. All true. But for us, it is a big deal. Sure we're not strangers to relocating, but this time is a little different. This time we'll be moving far away from our families and the areas we've grown so familiar with. This time we're finally moving out of the Northeast Corridor. This time, we're headed West.
You know, I think if Amy and I could go back in our mutual past and do one thing differently, we would have spent some time traveling the United States after college in order to make a real decision as to where we wanted to live. Instead, we took the safest route and stayed right where we were at the time: New York City. After all, our stuff was there, and I had a job in a public relations firm. What quickly happened, however, was that we got stuck in New York. Like so much quicksand, every bit of struggle just sucked us in deeper. We could never seem to get ahead, and before we knew it we were incapable of comfortably making an exit, and so we put our heads down and continued doing what we were doing, all the while hoping something might come along.
Miraculously, a few years ago something did. We got the opportunity to move to Boston and we were finally able to begin breaking ties with New York City. Not completely, of course, as only fourteen months after leaving for Boston we once again found ourselves in the New York area. However, this go around, we managed to orbit the city from New Jersey, thus keeping us from being totally sucked in all over again. Of course, we were immediately and constantly reminded of why we wanted to leave in the first place, and so we began to hope anew.
As you can tell, we spent a lot of our time together waiting for something to happen to us. We knew we didn't want to live around the city anymore, but we didn't take any action to alter our course. But over the last year, that began to change. We began to talk. And that talk began to evolve into a plan. We made a short list of cities we'd potentially like to move to and started doing some research. We were determined to move, it was just a matter of where.
Coincidentally, as our plan coalesced, the possibility of new work for Amy came out of the city at the top of that short list. The possibility, over time, became a reality. And so we're moving to Seattle.
So what does this all mean?
For the blog? Well, you'll probably get to bear witness to my summer being consumed by all the things that come with moving. Hopefully there'll be some art stuff in here, but I'm sad to say that much of my work will be in boxes for much of the coming months. That being said, there's still a possibility that I'll be able to pull something together, but right now it looks like you'll actually have to read rather than look at the pictures.
For my work? In the short term, it'll mean less work getting done, but some semblance of normalcy once the dust clears. I have, after all, been partially hobbled with the knowledge that much of my situation of late was temporary. That type of thing makes me anxious and I'm less productive when I'm anxious.
But all that's in the short term. As regards the long term, the plan (if it proves viable) is that I'll be taking the time to do more personal work. I will try, once and for all, to find my voice and my passion. It's something I've struggled with for a while now, and it's Amy's biggest wish for me. The heart of that journey, when it finally begins, might just be my ultimate reward for rolling with all the moves as they've come by. I look forward to seeing how this new move plays out and where (aside from Seattle) it takes me.
What have I really been up to? Preparation. Finally, after hinting at big changes to come for quite some time now, I can finally reveal the news:
We're moving. Again.
Big deal, you must be saying. You've already moved twice since this blog's inception. This is not interesting!
True. All true. But for us, it is a big deal. Sure we're not strangers to relocating, but this time is a little different. This time we'll be moving far away from our families and the areas we've grown so familiar with. This time we're finally moving out of the Northeast Corridor. This time, we're headed West.
You know, I think if Amy and I could go back in our mutual past and do one thing differently, we would have spent some time traveling the United States after college in order to make a real decision as to where we wanted to live. Instead, we took the safest route and stayed right where we were at the time: New York City. After all, our stuff was there, and I had a job in a public relations firm. What quickly happened, however, was that we got stuck in New York. Like so much quicksand, every bit of struggle just sucked us in deeper. We could never seem to get ahead, and before we knew it we were incapable of comfortably making an exit, and so we put our heads down and continued doing what we were doing, all the while hoping something might come along.
Miraculously, a few years ago something did. We got the opportunity to move to Boston and we were finally able to begin breaking ties with New York City. Not completely, of course, as only fourteen months after leaving for Boston we once again found ourselves in the New York area. However, this go around, we managed to orbit the city from New Jersey, thus keeping us from being totally sucked in all over again. Of course, we were immediately and constantly reminded of why we wanted to leave in the first place, and so we began to hope anew.
As you can tell, we spent a lot of our time together waiting for something to happen to us. We knew we didn't want to live around the city anymore, but we didn't take any action to alter our course. But over the last year, that began to change. We began to talk. And that talk began to evolve into a plan. We made a short list of cities we'd potentially like to move to and started doing some research. We were determined to move, it was just a matter of where.
Coincidentally, as our plan coalesced, the possibility of new work for Amy came out of the city at the top of that short list. The possibility, over time, became a reality. And so we're moving to Seattle.
So what does this all mean?
For the blog? Well, you'll probably get to bear witness to my summer being consumed by all the things that come with moving. Hopefully there'll be some art stuff in here, but I'm sad to say that much of my work will be in boxes for much of the coming months. That being said, there's still a possibility that I'll be able to pull something together, but right now it looks like you'll actually have to read rather than look at the pictures.
For my work? In the short term, it'll mean less work getting done, but some semblance of normalcy once the dust clears. I have, after all, been partially hobbled with the knowledge that much of my situation of late was temporary. That type of thing makes me anxious and I'm less productive when I'm anxious.
But all that's in the short term. As regards the long term, the plan (if it proves viable) is that I'll be taking the time to do more personal work. I will try, once and for all, to find my voice and my passion. It's something I've struggled with for a while now, and it's Amy's biggest wish for me. The heart of that journey, when it finally begins, might just be my ultimate reward for rolling with all the moves as they've come by. I look forward to seeing how this new move plays out and where (aside from Seattle) it takes me.
Friday, May 24, 2013
Spectrum Fantastic Art Live 2 By the Numbers
Total number of miles traveled round-trip: 2,431
Total days spent driving round-trip: 4
Total number of times we re-filled the fuel tank: 8
Total amount of gas we had in the tank when we returned home: 3/4 of a tank (11.25 gallons)
Approximate miles per gallon (I lost a receipt so I had to estimate one refill): 27.38
Our car's rating for estimated highway miles per gallon: 27
Total number of Cracker Barrel restaurants encountered one way: 24
Number of deer carcasses seen on the way to Kansas City: 16
Number of deer carcasses seen on the way home: 12
Number of billboards advertising something religious on the way to KC: 15
Number of billboards advertising something adult on the way to KC: 18
Number of billboards advertising fireworks on the way to KC: 24
Number of billboards advertising the sale of cowboy or Western-style boots on the way home: 8 (a number seemingly much smaller than that which we might have have gotten had we kept track of them on the way to KC)
Number of billboards advertising the sale of antiques on the way home: 19
Total number of billboards advertising pie round-trip: 4
Total number of pie pieces consumed by both Amy and me: 3
Of those pieces of pie, the total that were lemon meringue: 1
Of those pieces of pie, the total that were cherry: 1
Of those pieces of pie, the total that were blackberry: 1
Total number of billboards advertising the value of using billboards to advertise: unknown, but easily far exceeding any of the other totals
Number of convertibles encountered on the way to KC: 6
Number of convertibles encountered on the way home: 5
Number of those convertibles with their top down: 5
Number of those convertibles seemingly driven by maniacs: 3
Number of drawings done while at SFAL 2: 10
Number of drawings I was happy with: 9
Number of PopTarts consumed by both Amy and me during the entire trip: 14
Number of PopTarts I was permitted to consume before the age of 18: 0
Number of therapy sessions required to deal with the previous number: 0
It was a crazy show, to be sure, and it was fun to share the ride with my wife, Amy. I would have bet that she'd grow irritated by me at some point during the trip (and I'm sure some of you might have thought the same thing), but it turns out her tolerance for any annoyance I might dish out far exceeds expectations. Always fun, though, to have her by my side, and I suspect my fellow artists find me slightly more tolerable when she's around. I'm more than a little partial to her, myself.
Total days spent driving round-trip: 4
Total number of times we re-filled the fuel tank: 8
Total amount of gas we had in the tank when we returned home: 3/4 of a tank (11.25 gallons)
Approximate miles per gallon (I lost a receipt so I had to estimate one refill): 27.38
Our car's rating for estimated highway miles per gallon: 27
Total number of Cracker Barrel restaurants encountered one way: 24
Number of deer carcasses seen on the way to Kansas City: 16
Number of deer carcasses seen on the way home: 12
Number of billboards advertising something religious on the way to KC: 15
Number of billboards advertising something adult on the way to KC: 18
Number of billboards advertising fireworks on the way to KC: 24
Number of billboards advertising the sale of cowboy or Western-style boots on the way home: 8 (a number seemingly much smaller than that which we might have have gotten had we kept track of them on the way to KC)
Number of billboards advertising the sale of antiques on the way home: 19
Total number of billboards advertising pie round-trip: 4
Total number of pie pieces consumed by both Amy and me: 3
Of those pieces of pie, the total that were lemon meringue: 1
Of those pieces of pie, the total that were cherry: 1
Of those pieces of pie, the total that were blackberry: 1
Total number of billboards advertising the value of using billboards to advertise: unknown, but easily far exceeding any of the other totals
Number of convertibles encountered on the way to KC: 6
Number of convertibles encountered on the way home: 5
Number of those convertibles with their top down: 5
Number of those convertibles seemingly driven by maniacs: 3
Number of drawings done while at SFAL 2: 10
Number of drawings I was happy with: 9
Number of PopTarts consumed by both Amy and me during the entire trip: 14
Number of PopTarts I was permitted to consume before the age of 18: 0
Number of therapy sessions required to deal with the previous number: 0
It was a crazy show, to be sure, and it was fun to share the ride with my wife, Amy. I would have bet that she'd grow irritated by me at some point during the trip (and I'm sure some of you might have thought the same thing), but it turns out her tolerance for any annoyance I might dish out far exceeds expectations. Always fun, though, to have her by my side, and I suspect my fellow artists find me slightly more tolerable when she's around. I'm more than a little partial to her, myself.
Thursday, May 23, 2013
Time and SFAL 2
How it was that a year went by so quickly is beyond me. It feels like just yesterday that I was left to recover from the daze that was the first Spectrum Fantastic Art Live, and here I am grabbing at threads of my normal schedule that were abandoned for that show's sequel. The time, it seems, conspired to blow by me and ignore my pleas for a slower pace. And despite my hoping otherwise, the speed of time's passing did not slow for the days of the show either. It was over in a flash, and I sit here wishing I had had just one more day.
Why? Well, on the surface, it was a really good time. For me, another day of laughs and amusement would not have gone unappreciated. Apart from the merriment, however, were the many good conversations I was fortunate enough to have, and I must confess that I could have used even more of those. As is so often the case, there were many conversations about all kinds of books and films. More importantly, though, I was fortunate enough to share several that were very real and heart-felt and about pretty raw subjects. In fact, I had a couple conversations that I suspect I will never forget for the rest of my life. Among the topics discussed were process — but not the physical process of making art. No, these were real deep looks at the heart of where our own truths as artists lie, where our desires are rooted, and how to tap into them.
While such a thing might seem pretty elementary and straightforward, I assure you that it is not always the case. So much of what I do, for example is at the service of a client's needs. For the vast majority of my career, in fact, I've been ignoring my own needs in order to meet those of the various jobs. And it turns out that the result of suppressing my own needs and not satisfying my own artistic desires has resulted in my being horribly out of touch with both. At this point, given the chance to do whatever I want to do, I tend to find nothing. Nothing to tap into, nothing to extrapolate from, nothing to get my juices flowing. At least that's how it always seems.
Still, I have been discovering a lot about myself of late. But much of what I've discovered are the things I do not want. Very little has dawned on me of what I actually do want. After Spectrum Live 2, however, I think I have a better idea of how to figure that out and the encouragement I've gotten from the vast majority of my fellow artists this past weekend was humbling. It is clear that so many of them see things in myself that I, as yet, do not. But I've gotten encouragement to keep looking, and that is invaluable.
It is an amazing thing that I am fortunate enough to have met so many who can talk about and share very raw and powerful things without batting an eyelash. So many of the artists and illustrators I know (myself included) wear their hearts on their sleeves. By extension, publications and shows such as Spectrum and Spectrum Live wear their hearts on their sleeves, as well. The honesty and simplicity of that is beautiful and is something I will forever cherish, for such vehicles help artists find one another, help us reach out to one another, and help us bond as a community. Having the opportunity for that community to convene once or twice a year is very special and I, for one, am so very grateful for that.
In a matter of just a few days, so much is shared. So much is given. So much is there to be taken in. It's no wonder that the days pass so quickly. After spending so much time preparing and agonizing over small details for weeks before the show, we get there and put up our displays hoping for the best. And then it all ends so suddenly. The clock strikes the closing hour and a cheer rings out. Another show is under our collective belts. And then something truly fascinating occurs: the breakdown. The speed at which our work comes off the walls, our boxes are packed up, and our presence is made to disappear is amazing. Perhaps the inertia born from this is what causes the following year to pass by so quickly. Or maybe it's just the anticipation of getting to do it all over again is the machine driving everything forward. Whatever the case, I somehow will not be surprised should I find myself preparing for the next show on the other side of my very next blink. But hopefully I'll be given the time to start acting on what I've learned and figuring out that which still needs figuring.
Thanks to everyone who made it a great show and thanks so much to those of you who shared so much insight. I hope one day to have such insight and be as brave as you all were in sharing it to the next person in line. In the meantime, I hope to make work that puts this year's wall to shame.
Thanks most of all to Arnie and Cathy Fenner. I remember the very first time I saw Spectrum. I spent hours on the floor of Barnes and Noble leafing through the pages filled with inspiration and a deep feeling of inadequacy. It was that latter emotion that drove me in the vain hope that I might one day make an appearance on the publications' pages. That goal was just a dream for a long time, and I had no idea that I would be fortunate enough to see it become a reality several times over. But even after reaching that goal, I did not in my wildest imagination expect to see the work immortalized in those books covering the walls of Society of Illustrators or trekking out to Kansas City to be a humble part of a show bringing so many of my art and illustration heroes under one roof. I have no idea how you managed it all, but I deeply appreciate all you have done.
If there is a Spectrum Live 3, barring any unforeseen circumstances, you can expect to see my name on the list of exhibitors.
Why? Well, on the surface, it was a really good time. For me, another day of laughs and amusement would not have gone unappreciated. Apart from the merriment, however, were the many good conversations I was fortunate enough to have, and I must confess that I could have used even more of those. As is so often the case, there were many conversations about all kinds of books and films. More importantly, though, I was fortunate enough to share several that were very real and heart-felt and about pretty raw subjects. In fact, I had a couple conversations that I suspect I will never forget for the rest of my life. Among the topics discussed were process — but not the physical process of making art. No, these were real deep looks at the heart of where our own truths as artists lie, where our desires are rooted, and how to tap into them.
While such a thing might seem pretty elementary and straightforward, I assure you that it is not always the case. So much of what I do, for example is at the service of a client's needs. For the vast majority of my career, in fact, I've been ignoring my own needs in order to meet those of the various jobs. And it turns out that the result of suppressing my own needs and not satisfying my own artistic desires has resulted in my being horribly out of touch with both. At this point, given the chance to do whatever I want to do, I tend to find nothing. Nothing to tap into, nothing to extrapolate from, nothing to get my juices flowing. At least that's how it always seems.
Still, I have been discovering a lot about myself of late. But much of what I've discovered are the things I do not want. Very little has dawned on me of what I actually do want. After Spectrum Live 2, however, I think I have a better idea of how to figure that out and the encouragement I've gotten from the vast majority of my fellow artists this past weekend was humbling. It is clear that so many of them see things in myself that I, as yet, do not. But I've gotten encouragement to keep looking, and that is invaluable.
It is an amazing thing that I am fortunate enough to have met so many who can talk about and share very raw and powerful things without batting an eyelash. So many of the artists and illustrators I know (myself included) wear their hearts on their sleeves. By extension, publications and shows such as Spectrum and Spectrum Live wear their hearts on their sleeves, as well. The honesty and simplicity of that is beautiful and is something I will forever cherish, for such vehicles help artists find one another, help us reach out to one another, and help us bond as a community. Having the opportunity for that community to convene once or twice a year is very special and I, for one, am so very grateful for that.
In a matter of just a few days, so much is shared. So much is given. So much is there to be taken in. It's no wonder that the days pass so quickly. After spending so much time preparing and agonizing over small details for weeks before the show, we get there and put up our displays hoping for the best. And then it all ends so suddenly. The clock strikes the closing hour and a cheer rings out. Another show is under our collective belts. And then something truly fascinating occurs: the breakdown. The speed at which our work comes off the walls, our boxes are packed up, and our presence is made to disappear is amazing. Perhaps the inertia born from this is what causes the following year to pass by so quickly. Or maybe it's just the anticipation of getting to do it all over again is the machine driving everything forward. Whatever the case, I somehow will not be surprised should I find myself preparing for the next show on the other side of my very next blink. But hopefully I'll be given the time to start acting on what I've learned and figuring out that which still needs figuring.
Thanks to everyone who made it a great show and thanks so much to those of you who shared so much insight. I hope one day to have such insight and be as brave as you all were in sharing it to the next person in line. In the meantime, I hope to make work that puts this year's wall to shame.
Thanks most of all to Arnie and Cathy Fenner. I remember the very first time I saw Spectrum. I spent hours on the floor of Barnes and Noble leafing through the pages filled with inspiration and a deep feeling of inadequacy. It was that latter emotion that drove me in the vain hope that I might one day make an appearance on the publications' pages. That goal was just a dream for a long time, and I had no idea that I would be fortunate enough to see it become a reality several times over. But even after reaching that goal, I did not in my wildest imagination expect to see the work immortalized in those books covering the walls of Society of Illustrators or trekking out to Kansas City to be a humble part of a show bringing so many of my art and illustration heroes under one roof. I have no idea how you managed it all, but I deeply appreciate all you have done.
If there is a Spectrum Live 3, barring any unforeseen circumstances, you can expect to see my name on the list of exhibitors.
Thursday, May 9, 2013
Reap Intellect
This is an image I am unhappy with. That's my feeling about it in a nutshell. I've flip-flopped several times on whether or not to even blog about it given that I would prefer to downplay this piece's existence. But over the last couple weeks I've concluded that sharing the thing is very much in keeping with my warts and all approach. I consider this to be a "wart" much more than an "and all," so I will share it with you.
So, why do I feel the way I do about this piece? Why is it a wart? Well, it's an image I didn't really want to paint. It's the kind of thing I've done before but is something I feel like I've done enough of. It's a straightforward image of torture and pain. While the context provided by the Magic card it's printed on might provide depth in the form of symbolism or metaphor, to me the image itself provides no such thing. It's just a guy burning. I wish I did something different.
I've looked for the art order for the image, but I must have deleted it accidentally. But if memory serves, I was asked to depict a man consumed in blue flame with half of his face burnt off revealing the skull beneath. I also remember that they specifically wanted to be sure that the man's head was almost exactly half skull and half flesh, but asked that the delineation between the two not be a neat, straight line. That's about all I recall.
It's not a very complicated assignment, really. It also happened to be an assignment that I had no desire to paint. Still, I moved forward. I figured I'd give them what they were asking for and would just bang it out quickly and be done with it. This is both a bad attitude and a bad idea.
I should have tried to think of a different idea that I was more interested in painting. I should have taken the time to explore new concepts. I should have talked to my art director in order to find out if there was a way to make us both happy. But I did none of these things. Instead, I did this sketch:
There will undoubtedly be people reading this who don't see the problem. And believe it or not, there's part of me wondering the same thing. This is just another horror image. Horror is horror, right? Well, yes and no. To me, this is more torture than horror. It's a depiction of gore and violence. While that that certainly can be an aspect of the horror genre, I much prefer the tension and mood side of things. I find the latter more intriguing and I feel that it tends to look better on a wall.
This is not to criticize those who prefer the gore and violence, however. I get it. That's your thing. It just happens to not be mine, it turns out. You can like your red velvet cake. I'll keep my chocolate.
The biggest problem with accepting working on something I'm not into is that the time spent painting it becomes agony. The hours are filled with loathing and frustration, and I've found over the years that I end up prolonging the whole process. At the best of times I'm pretty good at avoiding starting my day of painting. When I don't like what I'm working on, I become an expert. Productivity drops to a crawl, thus extending my unhappiness. And so it was with this piece.
Obviously, they approved the sketch and this is how the finish turned out. It's oil on paper on hardboard and measures 14" x 11".
Looking at the piece as objectively as I can, it's by no means the worst thing I've ever painted. It's not even the worst thing I've ever painted for Magic. But I'm still pretty dismissive of it. A good friend of mine has always been fond of saying that not every piece is a portfolio piece. There are many reasons that this is true. It could be that a given piece falls short of greatness or is just not the kind of thing you want to represent you. Or it could just be that you plum don't like the thing regardless of quality or subject matter. For me, this is not a portfolio piece. It falls short of greatness to be sure, but as I've already stated, it's more to do with not liking the subject matter.
Additionally, I keep coming back to the fact that, whether any of us like it or not, our work represents us to a certain extent. Depending on the person and the circumstances, that fraction of the audience may be correct. Or they may be dead wrong. I know that not every artist thinks about their work in such a way — there are certainly folks who just paint whatever they're asked to, and indeed there are even folks who depict things that endorse ideas that contradict their own beliefs for the sake of a paycheck. I can't and won't say whether I think that's a good or bad thing. That's a judgement call each of us may have to make over the course of our careers. I can only speak for myself, and it turns out that painting stuff like this makes me feel kind of icky. I don't want to feel icky. And so I guess I'll be actively avoiding work like this in the future. Or, you know, will try my best to mold assignments like this into something that is more in keeping with the imagery I'd like to create.
Still, clearly this painting turned out to be important. I learned quite a bit about myself and my artistic needs from it. Plus, after rethinking the project long after it was done, this piece inspired the seed of a personal piece that I hope to paint someday. So I guess it was a net gain in the end.
So, why do I feel the way I do about this piece? Why is it a wart? Well, it's an image I didn't really want to paint. It's the kind of thing I've done before but is something I feel like I've done enough of. It's a straightforward image of torture and pain. While the context provided by the Magic card it's printed on might provide depth in the form of symbolism or metaphor, to me the image itself provides no such thing. It's just a guy burning. I wish I did something different.
I've looked for the art order for the image, but I must have deleted it accidentally. But if memory serves, I was asked to depict a man consumed in blue flame with half of his face burnt off revealing the skull beneath. I also remember that they specifically wanted to be sure that the man's head was almost exactly half skull and half flesh, but asked that the delineation between the two not be a neat, straight line. That's about all I recall.
It's not a very complicated assignment, really. It also happened to be an assignment that I had no desire to paint. Still, I moved forward. I figured I'd give them what they were asking for and would just bang it out quickly and be done with it. This is both a bad attitude and a bad idea.
I should have tried to think of a different idea that I was more interested in painting. I should have taken the time to explore new concepts. I should have talked to my art director in order to find out if there was a way to make us both happy. But I did none of these things. Instead, I did this sketch:
There will undoubtedly be people reading this who don't see the problem. And believe it or not, there's part of me wondering the same thing. This is just another horror image. Horror is horror, right? Well, yes and no. To me, this is more torture than horror. It's a depiction of gore and violence. While that that certainly can be an aspect of the horror genre, I much prefer the tension and mood side of things. I find the latter more intriguing and I feel that it tends to look better on a wall.
This is not to criticize those who prefer the gore and violence, however. I get it. That's your thing. It just happens to not be mine, it turns out. You can like your red velvet cake. I'll keep my chocolate.
The biggest problem with accepting working on something I'm not into is that the time spent painting it becomes agony. The hours are filled with loathing and frustration, and I've found over the years that I end up prolonging the whole process. At the best of times I'm pretty good at avoiding starting my day of painting. When I don't like what I'm working on, I become an expert. Productivity drops to a crawl, thus extending my unhappiness. And so it was with this piece.
Obviously, they approved the sketch and this is how the finish turned out. It's oil on paper on hardboard and measures 14" x 11".
Looking at the piece as objectively as I can, it's by no means the worst thing I've ever painted. It's not even the worst thing I've ever painted for Magic. But I'm still pretty dismissive of it. A good friend of mine has always been fond of saying that not every piece is a portfolio piece. There are many reasons that this is true. It could be that a given piece falls short of greatness or is just not the kind of thing you want to represent you. Or it could just be that you plum don't like the thing regardless of quality or subject matter. For me, this is not a portfolio piece. It falls short of greatness to be sure, but as I've already stated, it's more to do with not liking the subject matter.
Additionally, I keep coming back to the fact that, whether any of us like it or not, our work represents us to a certain extent. Depending on the person and the circumstances, that fraction of the audience may be correct. Or they may be dead wrong. I know that not every artist thinks about their work in such a way — there are certainly folks who just paint whatever they're asked to, and indeed there are even folks who depict things that endorse ideas that contradict their own beliefs for the sake of a paycheck. I can't and won't say whether I think that's a good or bad thing. That's a judgement call each of us may have to make over the course of our careers. I can only speak for myself, and it turns out that painting stuff like this makes me feel kind of icky. I don't want to feel icky. And so I guess I'll be actively avoiding work like this in the future. Or, you know, will try my best to mold assignments like this into something that is more in keeping with the imagery I'd like to create.
Still, clearly this painting turned out to be important. I learned quite a bit about myself and my artistic needs from it. Plus, after rethinking the project long after it was done, this piece inspired the seed of a personal piece that I hope to paint someday. So I guess it was a net gain in the end.
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