Illustration Friday: "Peace"

This piece is graphite on Bristol and in a slightly different style than I usually use.  But I loved drawing this.  Working on the details and shading while listening to my current music favorites was very relaxing!

Illustration Friday: "Temptation"

"The Open Gate"

Unplanned

This illustration was almost totally unplanned.  I was working on a commission this morning, and then suddenly I wasn't because I was working on this.

Often I want to say something in an illustration but (as I always complain to my husband) it's not a song or a poem where you can just say what you want to say.  It's an illustration so I have to try to communicate something with a visual image and I think lots of times that I just don't quite get there.

Today was different.  I wanted to communicate what it feels like to want to say something and to have something to say, but also how hard it can be to do that.  And how we must all have creativity and imagination and whatever inside ourselves but are a little reluctant to let anyone else see even though we want to.  Then this drawing started to happen and it was going well!  I didn't even want to bother with sketching so except for the little character, I didn't.  I wanted the whole thing to just be spontaneous.  So here it is.  I hope you like it!

Illustration Friday: "Egg"

A Few Doodles

Hi everyone!  I've been busy with life things and haven't been working on anything I thought was worth posting, but I have been doing little drawings in my sketchbook.  I wanted to check in here and say "hello", so I'll go ahead and post a few sketches.  These are all drawn quickly in ballpoint. I'm liking ballpoint more and more!  No smudging, no sharpening, no stopping to dip a pen!

Illustration Friday: "Hurry!"

Illustration Friday: "Sight"

"W-A-T-E-R"

One day in the spring of 1887 Helen Keller, then almost 7 years old, learned that there were names and words for everything.  Her teacher, Anne Sullivan, spelled the word "w-a-t-e-r" over and over into the palm of one of Helen's hands while running water over her other hand at the family pump.  Helen's world opened up and her life was changed forever.

I enjoyed reading about Helen this week while working on this illustration. Here are links to some of the sites I especially liked:

Helen Keller Kids Museum - Ask Keller
The Story of My Life.
Helen Keller - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Helen Keller Foundation for Research & Education

Illustration Friday: "Fluid"

This one's for everyone who spends any time with little children and is constantly on "nose watch" at the first sign of a cold.  Kids' cold germs are the worst, aren't they?

Illustration Friday: "Reverse"