Thinking Out Loud

Does this really need an explanation or descripiton?

Do Not

I just finished this one. It is, of course, dry erase marker on the bathroom mirror. The toilet paper roll was Ian's idea. I like the way he thinks so I just had to add it. This one actually was inspired by the holiday windows I've been painting. After drawing all the Santa crap I was looking around at what people normally have painted on windows. It's mostly text.

Here's a picture of my classroom whiteboard. The project is on Perspective. They have to create a four panel perspective composition four sides of a cardboard box. What they do with the other two is their business. The plant thing started because a student showed me a drawing what she thought would make a good Tat, so I kind of embellished what she had.

Aeroplanes

Here is my latest dry erase mirror drawing. Sometimes it's nice to just do a quick drawing composition rather than some elaborate, psycho color assault.

TARDIS Halloween costume

My son Ian and I made a TARDIS costume for Halloween. If you don't know, TARDIS stands for "Time And Relative Dimension In Space" and it is the name of the time/space ship that belongs to The Doctor on the British science fiction show Doctor Who. Ian (he's eleven) and I made it from cardboard boxes, electrical tape, acrylic paint, a mason jar, a flashlight, and a massive number of hot glue sticks. It was an enormous success, with people wanting pictures and facebook posts galore.

Cleanroom Sketchbook

These pictures are from a very strange sketchbook that I kept while I was working in a cleanroom, a factory where you have wear a special suit to reduce lint and static electricity. They use special paper in cleanrooms, it feels like it's made of plastic and it doesn't shed lint. I drew all of these with a ball point pen - not my favorite medium - but I like some of the drawings. There is a long ugly section of people eating, those are called Pie Hole I, Pie Hole II, etc... The drawings area about 2" x 6"

My Perspective

First drawing done with the new Pilot V-Board Master Whiteboard Marker. I am withholding my judgement for the moment. I will say gravity is an issue with this design. My son Ian got us started with some perspective then told me to take over. There is a tiny figure on the roof of the Sausage House with a thought bubble that reads, "As I watched Mark and Alecia speed away all I could think was... great, now I'm going to be sucked into that building across the street".

A Sales Representative from the Pilot Pen Corporation met my Wife Chris at a vendor's fair. They are introducing a new line of whiteboard dry erase marker so my wonderful wife showed the Rep some pictures of my dry erase murals. What do ya know, Pilot just sent me a bunch of the new pens and asked me to evaluate them. I guess they think I'm qualified. So far they are great pens however, they are very limited in color choices (only black, red, blue, green, orange). Also, they seem to suffer the same problem as their competition - when you are writing on a vertical surface like a whiteboard, the pen is angled up so gravity works against you on the ink and the tip dries out.

Drawing Progression

I like those videos where you see a time lapse of a work so I decided to make one. This is a simple two-point perspective with a figure sitting on it. It's starts as a light pencil sketch and I begin adding more and more ink. It's just mechanical pencil and Sharpie on 8.5 x 11 printer paper. I took the pictures with a cheap digital camera and compiled them on a windows movie making program that came with my laptop.

"Sharkmouth"

This is a shot of my classroom whiteboard. The lesson is on value and texture. I tell students that once I've drawn something (like the sharks), if I use it a few times, I'll usually remember it. I tell them that once you figure out how to draw something new, you can almost always find some other way to use it or another place to put it. This piece is "Sharkmouth" and the whiteboard is four feet tall.

Expo Retablo

Okay, so here's my latest. This is a drawing executed with Expo dry erase markers on my bathroom mirror. It is 3' x 7' and I procrastinated and went on vacation so it's taken a couple of months to complete. The title is just "Retablo" and the format was inspired by the Retablo de Ciudad Rodrigo which is currently on display in the University of Arizona art museum. A Retablo is an alterpiece, a work of art created to stand on, or behind an alter in a church. The Retablo de Ciudad Rodrigo has something like 26 panels each about the size of the two panels I've drawn here. My Retablo is just for fun. Hope you like it.

Sci Fi Roots

This is the only good pic I could find of this particular piece, unfortunately the right panel is incomplete... there was water in the hole and around the bricks, but I can't find a copy and the drawing has been erased. Anyway, this is "Sci Fi Roots" 3'x7' Expo dry erase marker on bathroom mirror.

You know, because they are on mirrors, they are really hard to photograph.

Firefish

This is the first of my bathroom mirror dry erase murals. "Firefish" 3'x7' took about three weeks to draw.

If you click on the label "whiteboard" below, you can see all of my whiteboard drawings so far.

You Are Here

This one looks a bit different because I did not use any florescent markers, they have a more opaque quality. Also, I left a lot of area uncovered so that it would reflect the doors across from the mirror and create a sense of white. The title is "You Are Here" and it's 3'x7', dry erase marker on my bathroom mirror.

I don't typically do a lot of overtly political art but, living in Arizona, I've been exposed to quite a few fascist cupcakes bent on world domination and this piece is intended to ridicule them.

Curtains

It's been quite some time since I've made an entry on this blog so, by golly it's high time I posted something. If you look back through this blog some you'll find a number drawings executed on whiteboard using Expo dry erase markers. I was rather proud of those for a while, however for the last six months or so, I've been doing large compositions on my bathroom mirror. I think I've gotten a whole lot better with this medium. All of it's dry erase, so it will wipe off if you bump against it and I drew it all on my bathroom mirror. This is the second of four I've completed so far (I will post the others following). Each composition is three feet tall by seven feet wide. In each composition I have created some device to allow me to leave an opening on the right side so that my wife can still use the mirror. In this case the curtains frame her side. The piece is titled "Curtains". I used a standard variety pack of twelve regular Expo's, plus a four pack of Expo florescent markers. I also used one yellow marker from some off brand. It took about two weeks to draw.