Heroes in Children's Literature tour...

Work on the Gracie Brave book continues. The authors have kicked off their kickstarter to help pay for the project and for it's next book, workbooks and materials for clinicians and parents to use with their children who suffer with depression. Here's the link if you are interested in learning more: https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/366317998/gracie-brave?ref=card

Gracie and her mom fly to Phoenix to visit her Grandma and start an adventure. Have you ever flown over Phoenix? The aerial view is pretty fascinating - like a piece of Navajo jewelry. 

A detail from a two page spread of Gracie running towards her Grandma in the Phoenix airport. 

I went on a field trip this past weekend to NYC. While I was there I visited the Society of Illustrators Museum.  It was a bit of a disappointment as I had my cousin and 13 year old daughter with us and the exhibition showing was all comic illustration some of which was pretty inappropriate for her to view. The only children's book illustration of note was spied at the top of a closed off staircase: 

We went on to discover some other beloved children's book heroes in the city...

Eloise portrait in the Park Plaza hotel, Hans Christian Anderson statue and Alice in Wonderland statue. 

Sketching and planning

Helping the authors of "Gracie Brave" with some promotional images as they get ready for the opening of their Kick-Starter campaign. 

Gracie, like many young children, collects lots of treasures. Her favorite are the heart-shaped rocks. 

Ellie is Gracie Brave's treasured friend 

I have enjoyed including little details in the illustrations for children to find

Completed the first black and white illustrations for the Gracie Brave project. I had loads of fun including details for small viewers to find in these pages! 

A few more pages for the Gracie Brave book...

a happy flower for a commission client...

...and some sweet little still lives on paper (available here on my site in "shop" 

The making of a dream

Some in progress sketches and bits for the final two page spread, front cover illustration for "Gracie Brave" book and project. 

I originally had Claire's eyes closed - showing a pride and prayerful meditative emotion for her daughter. But, decided against it as I thought it was too obscure for the front cover. I also ended up making her legs a bit longer. I think I could have futzed with it for days but at some point you have to step back and push it out into the world...like a child, I guess. 

It was a warm and gorgeous weekend in Central Massachusetts. It was a perfect weekend to take a field trip to the Eric Carle Museum of Picture Book Art to see the Mary Blair exhibit before it came down on Sunday. It was so inspiring to see her working color sketches and finished illustrations. I took her strong, simple and good design approach in and reminded myself to keep it simple in my own work. My favorite quote of hers on the wall: "I had three jobs. Raising children, keeping house, and making my art work." - Mary Blair

Seeing Mary Blairs work as well as the Uri Shulovitz animated film of his beautiful book, "Snow" as well as just being in the presence of all the great illustrator's work really helped me take a  breath and get ready to knock my next big project out of the park: Gracie Brave.

working color sketch for front cover of first Gracie Brave book 

working color sketch (left side) of wrap around front cover of first Gracie Brave book. 

worked on some illustration icons or "bling" that will be used to add interest and fun to the illustrations in the Gracie Brave book. I did these in gouache, colored pencil and experimented with adding pastel pencil on top of the gouache which I liked the result of. 

I have some exiting news! I have been contracted to produce the illustrations for a new project that will include books, workbooks, products titled, "Gracie Brave" for a small, independent publishing group ! I'm very inspired to help bring this strong and adventuresome character  to life and will be bringing updates to this project here on my website so stay tuned ! Here is a quick concept sketch for Gracie Brave: : 

I've been listening to a boat load of podcasts lately. Today I am listening to Chris Oatley's Artcast - the latest submission is a conversation between Chris, an illustrator and Claire Keane, Jenn Ely and Brian McDonald - all animators with major brands. Here's a link to his site: http://OatleyAcademy.com/nofear1/  You can find all his pod casts on iTunes.  

#angelsforchristine

Last week, online fellow artist, Christine Phelps, who I got to know through a Make Art That Sells class passed away after a long fought battle with leukemia. The group of artists who knew her from class followed her journey, sent her hand painted cards to her hospital room and wished her strength and healing on our Facebook page. I know I don't just speak for myself when I say we wanted Christine to keep creating her beautiful and adorable characters. We wanted her to live to realize her dreams. We decided to start a campaign of sorts, to pepper the internet and social media sites with angels for Christine. Rest in peace my friend, I'm so glad I got to share a bit of your journey on this planet. You will be missed by your family and your adorable dog but I am confident that you will live on through your art and your spirit will continue to shine in their lives. 

Change of Intention

I have switched up the intention for my "blog" to be more of a "what's doin'" from my studio. I will post quick little snippets and or videos of what I'm working on in a given week. My intention is to give your day a little life instead of weighing you down with one more thing to read on the internet. Today I am rearranging and reorganizing my studio to get ready for some new projects that are cooking. 2016 already feels like a new day for Phygment Studio! Please subscribe and thank you so much for stopping by today and into the future! Please let me know if there's something in particular you want to see more of, etc... 

This is my contribution to Dot and Flow's #foliofocus - floral pattern assignment

I've been building my children's book illustration portfolio. This horse will be a part of a larger illustration of a farm scene...

Here's a quick little valentine I did today. Happy Valentine's weekend! 

Leaning In...to the new year

Shhhh....don't tell my family: the presents are all opened, the Christmas meals made and cleaned up and now it's my time to hide in the studio and have quiet, quality time with me. 

I'm clearing off the clutter of the frenetic past month, taking a deep breath and organizing my thoughts. I'm simplifying my goals. I'm leaning in to any mental obstacles I put in my way. I'm letting go of those things that no longer serve me. One of those things is this blog. I'm just not convinced that it really fits into my over-all goals anymore. I'm going to take it down and see if I am wrong. Maybe I'll find that I have a renewed sense of needing this platform and in that case I will bring it on back. But for now, I'm going to let it go. I will post new work periodically on my welcome page as a way to remain fresh and interesting so by all means - please don't be a stranger ! 

If you are a subscriber to my blog - thank you for your interest and I hope you will continue to keep in touch via my Facebook fan page, Instagram, Twitter and Pinterest .

May 2016 bring you creative freedoms, peaceful moments of awe and memories to last a life time!