October 25, 2015

"I'm a Round Piece and I Don't Fit into Square Holes!"



There's not much more to say about this. Other than that our Dear Society as a whole has failed to pass a test that one should pass before age four or so. We know that round pieces don't fit into square holes. But we do try to fit everyone into square positions. The world is made for squares, enough said.

Daylight Savings, Without Savings...

Dear Readers,

Today is Swedish Daylight Savings Day, sort of. No actual plans for saving have yet been thought of, other than the one by Jonathan Swift; to conserve Daylight in pickled cucumbers, or whatever it was...


I'm to be back with you as soon as I can.






October 18, 2015

Demanding the Impossible



In Swedish -- I think that the expression is borrowed from a Baron Münchausen story -- lifting yourself by the hair is the same as lifting yourself by your English proverbial bootstraps -- i.e. quite impossible, and superiors, human or natural, couldn't care less.

As the arm is impossible, shaped for fitting what is demanded without remorse from the image, I've thrust something like a ruler through it. The face is drawn somewhat coarsely, mostly on purpose. So is Life.
















October 11, 2015

Watercolours, Electric Ink & Progress Quick and Slow


While I desperately want to give you finished works all the time, I'm sometimes into just too many things to make this possible. So I'll show you simply what's brewing:

This little sketch I did on the nicest spot that I could find nearby. I later used it as an example in class (I teach at times).


One of the points of it, apart from being nice, is to show conservation of time; it's a good thing that it was chilly and the autumn sun slowly setting, leaving no time to dilly about people or dotty details, one had to distil the landscape into its basics and I think it only got better for that. I let the water flow quite freely.


From one thing to another. This is a part of a pitch for a company that sells sound dampening screens with prints -- birds will be filled with birdlike colours. But I like the play of the lines. Digital is not aqua, and it will look better and stronger in print, but you loose the spontaneity of the water and the strength of the outlines (if you use outlines) after such vibrant electric colouring.


Progress on the latter has been a slow flight. Nothing got easier when my own computer suffered from a bug of sorts, and I had to borrow another.


I think that the real bug is less cute than this.

October 04, 2015

"Between Two Lives" -- CD Jacket Illustration



I'm quite happy with this hand that had to be done in zero time (standard time for rush jobs -- it's part of the professional pride to handle these sudden dashes) for a single, "Between Two Lives". Sophie's song (below) is about a soul that looses everything even faster than that; there's a sharp divide between Before and After, and it was irresistibly obvious to paint those fields white and black -- with outlines the other way round. I'm happy there are some colours too, they repeat on both sides of the great dividend, if yet irregularly so. They're not too opaque, and look very different on each background, as things do in life after a major change.