well hello from a recent college graduate!

Hey all! I promise I am still alive and well, and busy working as always! I have to apologize for the month and a half absense! What with college graduation and moving and taking on three part times jobs I had about zero time for the last couple of weeks.

So as I mentioned, I graduated from SCAD at the beginning of June. Looking back on my four years there, I have to say that they were truly the best years of my life so far, and I think it will just keep getting better! I grew so much as a person and an artist at that school and made some of the greatest friends I will ever know, so here's my thank you to SCAD for every opportunity that they have given me and the many more that await because of that!

So, since graduation, I have moved briefly back to Louisiana for three summer jobs I was offered. I teach painting lessons to children for four hours every morning then I am choreographing a musical and helping with some set and costume work for another show. In between I had a three week stint as a secretary for a local government office. That last job reminded me a lot of Parks and Recreation, for those who watch the show, so merely pretending I was April in the office got me through that haha. Luckily now, all three of those jobs are winding down. I also designed the posters for the children's productions being put on by a local theatre this summer! I can't share all of them because some copyrighted material had to be used in the posters due to contracts with the production company they are being licensed from. Here are two of them that I can share though:

I have a couple more weeks with the painting lessons and the show, but the temporary secretary job is now over and my free time is starting to open back up thank goodness so I can finally get to work on some real work! Here's what you guys can expect from me over the next few months: a huge load of work coming in! I have so many techniques and so much subject matter I am just itching to get my hands on. I'm vamping up my portfolio to get ready to apply for grad schools for next fall some time around the end of this year. You can also expect some revamping of my portfolio site as well as the blog and my other social media aspects. Importantly, on the blog, I will now be making weekly blog updates. If it comes to a point where I'm making a lot, I might end up setting up a certain two or three day a week schedule for it, so stay tuned on that. Also, for the first time EVER! Get ready all of you convention goers because i'm making the transition and I'm going to be attending cons this year! It's such a great social networking opportunity, and honestly they all just look so freaking fun, it's about time I finally made the plunge and started traveling to some!

Lastly guys! I have a VERY exciting project that I will be announcing somewhere around the middle of the month, involving some very talented illustrators along with myself. So get ready to have your socks blown off!

Thank you all for sticking with me through the small quiet period and get ready for a lot of upcoming work!

a Victorian study

Hey guys! I hope everything is going well! Things have been really busy here in Savannah what with getting ready to graduate, the career fair, sorority business, teaching fitness classes and school work too, of course! One of my courses this quarter is Survey in Illustration, which is half studio, half art history. All of the projects for the most part are just sort of for fun, and our first assignment was to do a small piece inspired in some way by Victorian illustration.


Within the next couple of weeks, you can expect some new self promotion pieces, as well as the branding and redesigning of this blog, my website and my twitter! I'm also trying to find sometime to get back to doing some small pieces for Illustration Friday! So stay tuned! =)

fall quarter wrap up

Well it certainly was a stressful and busy quarter at SCAD, but I have to say it was WELL worth it! I think during this fall I made huge leaps in the improvement of my work as well as gaining a lot of knowledge in new areas. I learned so much about typography, something that I think I will come to find very helpful as I get further into the illustration business. I also got a lot of experience with oils in my oil based media painting class. I learned so much technique wise and thought oils are not something I have plans to include in my illustrations at this time, I look forward to exploring more personal work with this media in the near future; particularly in the area of plein air painting!

So before I go on to talk about my plans for the break and next quarter, I'll share with you guys my final projects in my studio classes. This first is for my Type and Illustration class. The assignment was to illustrate a double page spread of a poem and it could not be a children's poem. When I heard the latter part, I panicked a bit, but my mom suggested I illustrated Edgar Allen Poe's Annabel Lee. The poem is so dark so it was a bit of a change of subject matter for me and I really enjoyed the challenge!


Below is my painting final. The assignment was to use the broken color technique, doing an underpainting in contrasting color and color tempurature. The subject matter had to be a 20th century artist's painting, so I chose Wolf Kahn. Though I am not a huge fan of more contemporary art, I have to admit I found his landscapes absolutely stunning!

Final, 48''x 36''

underpainting

You'll have to forgive my for the rather blurry photographs of the painting. I have a hard time getting good pictures with my digital camera because I have such shaky hands. A good quality camera is definitely on my list of purchases for the near future. =)

So now that this quarter is over, I have my 6 week winter break as usual. My plans for the break are to whip out a portfolio piece or two, do some plein air oil paintings, paint gifts for my family, prepare my application for grad school, create style boards and start preparing my list of clients to approach when my website is up and my portfolio is ready within the next couple of months. I have to say, I'm really looking forward to putting myself out there soon! I just have to make sure everything is perfectly organized first =)

end of the quarter update

Alright guys, it's the end of the quarter here at SCAD and I've finally had some time to scan in some more of my Portrait in Illustration class work. This first one is from our first assignment which was to complete an editorial illustration of a contemporary literary figure. So naturally, I chose J.K. Rowling! I think I lost some of the likeness from my original sketches, but this is not from a photograph, rather we learned to look at references and draw from them to create an original illustration. This was completed in graphite pencil.




Next I have another of my alla prima oil paintings. This was completed in about an hour and a half or so, and is by far my best one, being the fourth and final one I did.



Lastly! What quarter would be complete without a portrait of my idol, Jessica Simpson!? We were given the assignment to do a stylized portrait for the cover of the Rolling Stone. I placed her lower on the page to leave room for the text of the magazine. This was done in a mixed media of watercolor and guache.


I have one last portrait to show you guys, it's my self portrait placed on a master study of a Sargent painting, but we haven't been given those back yet. I'll upload that later today or tomorrow. I have some paintings from my life drawing II class that I may take pictures of and post on here. It was a rough quarter in that class as it took some time to adjust to that particular professor's teaching style, but in the end, I am definitely pleased I took the course. I feel as if I have learned so much about the figure and my way of viewing and drawing it has transformed for the better.

I'll be heading home for spring break tomorrow and I can't wait to see my family! After a week off though, I'll be very much looking forward to both my Watercolor for the Illustrator and Book Illustration classes, as well as my Survey of Asian Art, art history elective!

xoxo