beep boop nails

I’m going to be making a piece for Light Grey Art Lab’s Station Zero show! Completely overwhelmed by this news- it’s an amazing array of brilliant folks and I’m gonna have to step up my game. Also, we’re each getting an awesome book to read & redesign the cover for- how cool is that?!

Trying to get existing sketchy thoughts about androids and cliche sci-fi images in general out of my system before I get my book in the mail.

poster preview

I'm completely done my poster for You Can Do It! The show doesn't open until June 14th- I'll post the full thing (and links to buy your own copy ;) ) after the opening, so in the meantime, teeny tiny previews are the way to go.

I learned a lot about lettering while making this, so I thought I'd share my everyday handwriting for comparison. Atrocious.

sketch dump: cats & comics

Pieces of comics, plus bunch of studies for and a tiny tiny snippet of a preview of the piece I’m working on for Light Grey Art Lab’s You Can Do It show!

Thrilled (and honored!) to be a part of this one- I have an earnest cheerleader streak in me, and I’m excited to point it towards a topic I care about.

sketch dump: teal

Vaguely color-thematically linked sketches from the past week! Cat is equal parts these dogs, some stuff I learned in that skillshare texture class, and some experimentation with fake animals.

But I only know how to draw one animal pose ? ? ?

pokemonathon: ok we're done here

If you don't think pony -> unicorn is the best evolutionary line, I'm sorry to be the one to have to tell you this, but you're wrong.

pokemonathon: 69 -> 76

WHOA-OH
WE'RE HALFWAY THERE

Going to be using these as more of a style experiment in the future, so consistency is going to drop- but hopefully the long-term payoff will be worth it!

Loud patterns & fun closets

Finished up a second Skillshare class- this one under Brad Woodward. Also up on the website with a few other new pieces.

Brad ended up featuring this piece on his blog, Brave the Woods, along with several other successful student projects! I'm definitely going to be revisiting his lectures in the future as I start to do more with textures & patterns.

MOCCA & DDLL: comics, cards, prints, & zines- oh my!

Hey all! I wanted to take a minute to talk up all the comics, cards, prints, and zines I got at DDLL and MOCCA this year.  DDLL remains one of my favorite things across all possible categories of things. The new location was wonderful - and actually allowed some drawing to happen!- and big thanks to Lucy Knisley for organizing it in the middle of her new book tour, along with Alisa Harris and Tea!

L-R and top-bottom, DDLL goodies are: 

Kaitlin Sullivan- love the tetris motif!
Alisa Harris made a cute and informative mini! Cooking up Comics is excellent & highly recommended.
Ashley Austin drew this card on the spot based on a two-word prompt!
Katie McDermott has an awesome website URL and makes even more awesome illustrations.
Dre Grigoropol is sorely missed in Philly. 
Rel made a clever little mini with a neat twist!
Rebekka Dunlap's zine Waterslide is lovely and deserves a few readings.
Rebecca Mock is killing it with her illustrations (and mentoring a whole host of brilliant MICA students while at it)! Her tiny chewable zine was excellent for getting folks to make fun faces. Check her work out!
Kelsey Sunday's work is full of lovely palettes and neat game assets!
Michelle's card doubles as a cool sticker!
Luca is a rockin animator and possessor of a host of hamster cards.
Elise Dinkelaker does wonderful things with ink.
Bridget Gibson is making some amazing creature (and everything else!) illustrations.
Maugerite Dabaie has a really gorgeous comic going on that you should all check out.
Dirty Diamonds- I'll be sharing a table at SPX with DD editors Kelly and Claire! Now open for submissions for Issue # 4 : )
Aimee Fleck makes awesome fresh illustrations and comics!
Meg Brennan is currently making Pencil Pup, among many other wonderful things. It's delightful and terrifying and worth your time. Pencil Pup loves you! ◑‿◐
And a bonus donation sketchbook because DDLL is a worthy cause. I met a bunch of other wonderful people who had run out of trading things --a whole crew of kick-ass illustrators from MICA included-- and I can't wait for next year!

I went a little overboard at MOCCA itself on Saturday, but I'm honestly happy with everything I bought.

Women Warriors Zine, edited by Abby Boeh and Roxie Vizcarra- 100% full of amazing work by a ton of my favorite illustrators and comics folks. Should be available for purchase online soon!
Lead Paint Comics- a webcomic that makes me laugh; minicomic did the same!
Harbinger - stay tuned for a possible new URL for this comic, by Hillary Blair!
The Blacklight by Kelsey Sunday - intriguing and well-executed preview; looking forward to the rest of the comic!
Three Tales by Connie Li Chan- weird and wonderful retellings! Love the expressiveness of her drawing style.
Tomorrow and Boys with Flowers by Aimee Fleck-Aimee's comics are a treat and her zine full of drawings is wonderful, too!
Sup Kids by Noelle Stevenson - fresh & fun & friendly & generally delightful drawings! I got to meet Noelle at DDLL, too, and was very glad to do so.
Moonlight by Katie McDermott- a one-pager with a delightful surprise of a gorgeous full-page illo on the back. 
Pocket Book by Gregory Benton- a gorgeous collection of drawings from life. Love the tiny format. 
Let's Make Out by Annelise Capossela- fun accordian format and cute drawings. Check out her larger-scale color works!
Opposites Attract- a gorgeous zine collecting work from MICA's new MFA in illustration. I got to chat with Kevin and Alex about the program- thanks again!
House of Women by Sophie Goldstein- Sophie's work rules! Can't wait to read more of this one, and be sure to read Betsy and Mothership Blues as well.
Life of Luna by Meg Brennan- if you don't read Meg's comics (see: Pencil Pup, above) then you're missing out on a lot of clever, funny strange & wonderfulness!
Rockall, Part III by Amelia Onorato- no joke, this comic made me cry on the train. I think Amelia's putting together a collection of all three issues soon- buy them!
45* Dogs by Nora- super-cute little zine!
Animals with Jobs by Laura Kovalcin- funny & unexpected!
How to make strawberry milk by Milkyaway- I will never look at strawberry milk the same way.
Bug Boys 1 & 2 by Laura Knetzger- earnest, delightful, sweet, and fun. Read these!
Art Block by Chandler Moses- I laughed, I sobbed, I found my new life goal.
Freeze by Kelsey Sunday-really neat & well-drawn designs!
Between Blood & Water by Katie McDermott- another comic I very much want to read more of.
My First Time Buying Condoms, edited by Maritsa Patrinos-  Rebecca Mock 's and Kris Mukai's might be my favorites for the moment, but they're all brilliant and make a wonderful collection! 

I also bought a couple prints, continuing on my ridiculous goal to fill a whole wall up with artwork bought from illustrators I dig:

Othello by Steen- gorgeous screenprint with brilliant colors!
Smallest Feline by Hillary Blair - Hillary let me yoink the one blue variant of this super-sweet print, but I love the orange as well!
Sleep Sleep by Nora - I love the paisley & the pale pink goat together! Thanks to the artist for solving the mystery of who made it : )

In closing: it was amazing and I want to go again right now. Can't wait for SPX this fall! : )

mocca/ ddll goodies

 

I'm going to be at DDLL tonight and MOCCA tomorrow morning! I'm bringing a new minicomic, plus a few leftover postcards and copies of Rat King. If you see me, say hi and I'll give you a comic!

Editorial work

Illustration for an article titled Why Police Lie Under Oath. Done as part of a skillshare class, with Mike McQuade teaching/ADing.

I really like the puzzle/ phrasing aspect of this kind of work! I was pretty fond of the lie detector/ stats thumbnail, but in retrospect, it's a neat visual parallel but not clear what the chart refers to.

Also, thank you to jury duty for reminding me what a courtroom actually looks like?

screenprint: claim some space!

Another screenprint, and the final one for the winter term. 3 colors on white paper; edition of 7.

This was my first time trying to mix transparent inks, and it turned out a little darker than I would've liked. I really do like the two color versions shown below on test/newsprint paper- maybe I'll have to do another edition in the future!

Safe Passage for Light Grey Art Lab's Beautiful Forever show

I made a temporary tattoo design for Light Grey Art Lab’s Beautiful Forever exhibition! It’s now available for purchase for just $10, so you can grant yourself safe passage and classy guides wherever you go- for as long as it lasts, anyway. I loved researching nautical tattoos, and I felt like there was a serious lack of winking shirtless dudes (as opposed to winking shirtless ladies) in ink, so: here you go, world.

This is my first illustration group show, and I’m thrilled to be in such awesome company. The show opens this Friday, so if you’re in town, please stop by.

If you buy this and put it on your or someone else’s (consenting!) body, I’d love to see a (SFW) photo! I can even draw quick sketches of the first few people who do this out of sheer delight, if you’d like.

ASL ABCs: 3-color screenprint on tea-dyed paper

I talk up Fleisher all the time, but bear with me: I'm in the final week of a silkscreen class there now, and it's been wonderful. Like really great- fun and informative and well-instructed and full of great people. Give it a shot!

 I'm not involved with the Deaf community, and my ASL alphabet knowledge may be outdated (though I tried to refresh a bit!), but I wanted to tackle a variation on English alphabet posters. I left some tan cotton-based paper in a plastic container full of brewed tea for a few days before starting to print on it, which accounts for the fun texture. It smelled great at the time, but I have a sneaking suspicion that we all forgot to empty the tupperware post-dyeing, so. Going to be a fun cleanout in a few days!

A no-longer-daily sketchblog-

Hey folks,

I'm officially down/upgrading this thing to a non-daily blog. It's been a great run, and I don't want to erase it- all the old daily posts will stick around under the archive label. Some quick points:

Are you quitting this blog?
No way! I'm just going to be a little more selective about what work ends up here and what stays buried on my hard drive or in my sketchbooks.

How am I going to know when you update?
You can subscribe through google connect or your favorite RSS reader through links on the sidebar. Alternatively, keep hitting refresh until you bring down the blogger servers entirely.

But I want to see what you're making ALL THE TIME!
I'm flattered! Let's hang out on twitter, where I tell you more about what I'm up to than you ever wanted to know, or tumblr, the graveyard of instant gratification through silly doodles. But also, there are like 3 years' worth of posts on here to scroll back through. Knock yourself out.

Are you not going to make cruddy little doodles any more?!
Of course I am! A giant portion of what I draw is a mess, and I don't see that changing anytime soon. Maybe some sketch dumps once in a while can keep that old-time oversharing feeling around?

I have another question/ I'm Ron Burgundy?
Cool. Leave a comment, write an email, bother me elsewhere- I'm always happy to chat : )

I'll have a writeup on the pros and cons of daily sketchblogging soon, along with a process post for my LGAL piece. Until then,

also there are like 5 files in this folder named some variant on 'stress doodles'

I am just going to continue drawing everything except what I'm supposed to be drawing!

acting

No time for anything but one specific project = immediately produce mountain of unrelated doodles

i am gonna wear it until it gets grody

I’m making a piece for Light Grey Art Lab’s Beautiful Forever ! LGAL puts on amazing shows, and I’m really thrilled to be a part of this one- and in great company.

All the work is going to be printed as temporary tattoos, meaning this is going to be wearable. Get psyched. : )

transparency experiments

Got this up on the website as a placeholder until I can print the real thing! Class ends in two weeks, so- going to have something finished by then no matter what.

like, way too many hours

hey carey what are you doing in school this semester if you're not learning to draw and paint???

GLAD YOU ASKED!  I am spending absurd amounts of time on painstaking micron pen recreations of black and white collages, for one thing. Learned a lot about how the pens handle and got to explore some interesting mark-making stuff, but this semester is really all about long-term design/ compositional payoffs and I am very bad at delayed gratification so. Learning about that as well!

grump grump

AREN'T WE ALL I mean really now