Dr. Sketchy's- Grand Rapids

Last weekend I went to Dr. Sketchy's Anti-Art School at The Meanwhile bar in Grand Rapids. Dr. Sketchy's is a global franchise, with chapters in cities all over the world, including one in Detroit .

Dr. Sketchy's hosts a different live model every week for artists to draw from. They use unconventional models (cabaret performers, burlesque girls, etc) and since it takes place in a bar, drinking and socializing are encouraged.

Heres how it works (in Grand Rapids anyway) you pay 7 dollars at the door (not bad for 3 hrs of live models) and that gets you in the door plus you get one ballot to enter a contest suggestion. The evening was hosted/timekept by my friend, burlesque girl Vivacious Miss Audacious, who calls the times, arranges the poses, and randomly draws the contest suggestion. Suggestions at this Dr Sketchy's included "best Art Nouveau" and "draw the model as your astrological sign." At the end of each pose, the celebrity judge (who in this case was Corey "Happypants" Ruffin from Super Happy Funtime Burlesque) chooses a winner who recieves a prize such as liquor, a groovy t-shirt, tickets to shows, and other good stuff.

The model at this Dr Sketchy's was Jacinya Sanchez, a drag performer with the persona of a 1950's housewife and mother. She was a real pleasure to draw, and a unique opportunity. Our professors at legit art school never gave us husky drag queens to draw.

I had a great time, and not only will I return, I intend to investigate the Detroit chapter.

note: In the one sketch there is a wee calf in the upper right corner. That's because I had sketched part of that page at the County Fair earlier that week.

A Summer of Sketches

Hey team
I know I haven't posted anything in a while (but it's not like anyone reads this thing anyway)
It may have appeared that I hadn't been working, but that simply isn't true. I don't know if I've ever been more disciplined about sketching than I was this summer, I just haven't had access to a good scanner.
In NYC I had access to a lot of good resources. The Metropolitan Museum of Art and the Museum of Natural History are both free (well, suggested donation actually . . . and since I am broke as a joke I donated $0 and walked on on in) and so I visited them both once a week, sometimes more. Also, at Society of Illustrators I went to sketch night every Tuesday and Thursday where I had access to the live models. My book was totally full with still a week to go in the city.
Now I'm back in Detroit . . . more sketches to come soon!

Sketches from the Met and Society

Hey
as the lowly unpaid intern at Society of Illustrators, I get to go to the sketch nights on Tuesdays and Thursdays
Today I went and warmed up by sketching classical statues at the Met beforehand

Not Posted Until Now: The Eldest Magician

This is an illustration for one of the Just So Stories by Rudyard Kipling. This story is "The Crab that Played with the Sea" about how the crab got its claws

Joel Grothaus

this here is a portrait of Joel Grothaus I did for children's book illustration. It is a watercolor with ink

The imaginary client would be whoever it is that is publishing the "so you're going to be a grandma . . . " book that Joel has been working on these last few months. Its a proposed book-jacket illustration. Never mind the impracticality of having a book jacket illustration of an illustrator done by some other illustrator.

Check Joel out, he's in the blogroll.

Vonnegut

heres a blast from the past

this painting is from way back in 2008, but I only just now got around to properly documenting it and disseminating it throughout the internets

its my portrait of Kurt Vonnegut. The assignment was to do someone famous and meaningful to me, but who was dead. I almost didn't do Vonnegut because it seemed like such an obvious choice, but no matter how much I brainstormed, doing anybody else seemed insincere.

The Heartskull

So as you may recall i showed you the sketch for this one a few weeks back. This isn't the crop that we will be working with for the final edition, but this is how she turned out.
In case anybody wants to assign meaning to this, it pretty much means that I only think with my heart these days. What a sap, right?