Author: mortargirl

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Dream Traveler South America

I am so proud to have illustrated this wonderful children’s book, written by Stacey Gates. Illustrating a children’s book had always been a dream of mine since my Art Center days. I remember taking several children’s book illustration classes taught by Kathryn Wirch. I remember being taught to come up with a children’s book idea, write it out and create a book dummy. I did the children’s nursery “Months of the Year” showing various cartoon animals enduring and enjoying all kinds of weather that each month would bring. I also remember sending copies of my book dummy to different large publishers, only to be rejected–which was to be expected.

I finally got my chance when Stacey approached me–a resounding yes! Although my illustrations are more realistic and not the typical whimsical, cute style that I see that dominate the world of children’s books, I enjoyed the creation and learned about the process at the same time.

It wasn’t until I saw the end product–the actual, beautifully printed hardcover book that I realized how spectacular this project turned out! Both Stacey and I hope to get this book and future books in this series out to the world.

You can purchase the book on Amazon or on the Dream Traveler website.

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Burne Hogarth

I had the privilege to take Burne Hogarth’s anatomy drawing class during a term at Art Center. I didn’t know who he was until he had everyone in the class buy his book Dynamic Anatomy. He also told us about his Tarzan comic days and would begin each morning with his personal musings. He’d then lecture us with the anatomical part of the day. The foot one day, the head the next. He knew human anatomy like the back of his hand, but done in his style. Conte crayon drawings. His bark was far worse than his bite. We’d be sitting in a huge circle on our drawing benches around the model and he’d go around yelling at us. “Drawn the peanut, dammit!!” and “No. no. no. not like this, like THIS!”. His technique was to start with the human torso in the shape of a peanut. Arms, legs, head were to follow. He forced all of us to draw his way, his style. You could hear his booming voice down the halls, forcing us to draw the Burne Hogarth comic style. I enjoyed his class and learned quite a bit. He’d bring in his original Tarzan art work and other pieces which were all amazing.

I remember one day we had a female model who was obviously a body builder with an impressive physique. He went off on her, saying that those muscles and that type of physique did not belong on a female. He was old school for sure. Despite that, we’d sit with him during breaks in the cafeteria and talk with him–which he’d lose his mean, junk yard dog demeanor and he’d be his normal, sweet self. I think his classroom persona was just a way of keeping us in line. I miss those days.

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Frederik Grue

About a month ago, I made the conscious decision to shift gears and start focusing on freelance illustration, graphic design and my own personal art. I started painting again which makes me feel like a kid again, literally, sitting in my parent’s garage in Thousand Oaks can spending hours painting in oils.

When I decided to start painting again, I started with a still life with my stone buddha head I bought at the 99 Cents Store, a lemon, and a Crate and Barrel Italian style ceramic pitcher. I laid a navy twin sheet as the backdrop and got to work. As I was painting, and thoroughly enjoying the process, I started thinking back of when my mom enrolled me in a painting workshop with Fredrik Grue. I used to take oil painting lessons in Newbury Park at a studio called The Art Experience, run by Jean McIntyre. She used to point out how much I loved to use the teeny tiny brushes–I still do- and how Frederik Grue would favor tiny brushes too. He was showing his paintings in the Oaks Mall at the time so my mom and I headed down there to check out his work. They were stunning still life paintings. Super realistic, meticulous details, and beautiful. When Jean set up a workshop for him, my mom signed me up–which got me out of junior high school for a few days!

In his workshop, I recall having to get masonite board and gesso. As we applied the gesso to the board, he encouraged us to kind of design fanned out patterns with the brush and gesso to create a nice texture to work on. He then set up a still life of a vase, a Japanese bowl with a black wooden stand and plums. We were to draw the still life in pencil on the the gessoed board. I believe there were about 6 of us–all older adults, probably my age now! Frederik was a little frustrated at us in the beginning, thinking we all couldn’t draw. We then used an umber wash as the base for the painting. The rest of the process was a blur, but Frederik turned out to be a funny, pretty easy going guy. The end result for me was as good as a 13 year old could paint and that painting still hangs in my parent’s house today.

I did end up buying a used copy of “Beyond Realism: The Life and Art of Frederik Grue”. As an artist with no formal training, he was so fucking talented. I think I will try painting another still life but in oils this time, a la Frederik.