April 26, 2008

I was working on a drawing, but then I thought of my aunt back in Romania, who, when I was about 9, gave me a toy piano. It was a beautiful instrument, the only instrument I’ve ever had, and I played on it the only song I knew, "Frere Jacques", till I drove my parents crazy. In my mind I must have been a great pianist. It’s funny I got such a toy because I have no talent for music. I love music, but I can’t sing to save my life. The only subject I ever failed in school was music. I still remember the words my teacher said in passing to another teacher "she cried till her shirt shook on her" after she failed me for singing poorly. A few words from my mom and I never had to sing in front of the class again, but memorize biographies of composers.

This drawing is called "You gave me a piano" and it is for my aunt, who I love dearly and I hope to see soon and let her know that even though I don’t keep in touch, I think of her often and I miss her.

I love drawing hands, I think you can tell a lot with hand gestures, express music especially, hence the use of hands in this drawing. Also the "music" I played on my toy piano was loud and it involved a lot of fast chaotic banging of the keys. So I wanted to draw elements that would reflect the anarchy of my sounds.

First I outlined what I had in mind and then before adding the chaos, I made sure I taped the parts I didn’t want touched.

This was the scary part, I was quite nervous about spraying ink like this on my drawing, but I was looking for disorder and I couldn't think of a better way to get that feeling.

Tape removed off the hands, I started scratching at my paper with the nibs. This is the part I loved best.

This is the final product.

April 20, 2008

I cleaned up my desk! Well, truth be told I had no room for my drawing on it anymore. Cleaning it offered me a chance to procrastinate. After I was done with my desk, I did the dishes. After that I played some Civilization and then I couldn’t think of any more things to do, so I finally sat down and started drawing. I always have a hard time starting. Once I can see where my work is going, I am more eager and more focused.

It isn’t much, but I’m used to this. It will be a few sessions of very little advancement and then bang! I’ll work on it five hours at a time.

April 19, 2008

There’s always something special about a "first" anything. I wonder what kind of ceremony I should have for my first blog post. It might be my last. Who knows? I should definitely celebrate in that case!

Currently I’m working on this drawing:

As you can see, it’s in a very advanced stage. It will probably not be done until June since I’m going to be away from home the whole month of may. I would talk more about it, but I like to keep my two readers in suspense.

Something else... you’ve probably noticed that you can rate my drawings over and over again till you get tired of clicking. I have plans to change that soon, only I am still deciding what method to use. I will probably go for an IP check. I don’t think I will go to great lengths to ensure someone only rates my drawings once. If you want to do it more than once, then be my guest! I welcome any fans.

Yes, this blog is not like other blogs online, you can’t add your comments. I’ll think about adding that feature, but really, if you want to let me know what you think, you can always send me a message using my contact form.