a few books

during my time in the Artist's books course, I fell in love with the accordion as a book structure. And somehow, this led also to an interest in abstract painting, collage and mixed media. 

also this drawing

-Kristina

portraits

of Sam, a beautiful girl, done in Karen Warshal's portrait drawing class.

a spot illustration of Edward Fairfax Rochester

and one of Jane Eyre writing away for a position as governess.

Hazel/Alice

         

all done in fineart illustration studio RMX

this was a fun thing

that I did.

 Anna

 Phoebe & Andrew

Holly

Erika & Louis & Hanah

Jackie & Megan

Firmin & Gabrielle

here's a thing I did in first semester junior illustration six months ago that was a "response to the idea of love." Alain Corbel gives some very open assignments.

it's a pretty low quality scan and looks sort of weird here

but I like the original quite a bit

watercolor & gouache with ink

paintings

all done in oil, in the painting techniques for illustrators course.

we focus purely on the technical aspect of painting in this class, so in a way it is just like taking a straightforward painting course. It's just what I needed.

also a drawing I did:

kthx 
-kristina

I found, saved in the depths of my saved image files, some sketches I did in sophomore year for Visual Journalism. I wonder now why I hadn't put them up here before; older, junior-year-me likes them a lot. 

there are drawings of Walker, Stephanie and Jee-shaun.

I am so hopelessly attached to the sketchbook.
I am so hopelessly attached

 For this image, I was very compelled to do another Tarot card, (as I had done one about a year ago and never continued doing more, although I wanted to,) for my FineArtIllustration Studio RMX class. I'm particularly interested in the High Priestess:

 "The High Priestess is not about making a decision so much as holding decision-making at bay while you take time to listen to your inner voice. She wants you to gain knowledge before you act: instinctual knowledge, supernatural knowledge, secret knowledge, self-knowledge.
The High Priestess, however, goes beyond even that for those who seek more. Behind her throne is the curtain that leads to the deepest, most esoteric knowledge; the pomegranates that decorate it remind us of Persephone, who was taken down into the land of the dead, ate its fruit and became the only goddess allowed to travel to and from that strange land. The High Priestess is our guide to all that is mysterious and mystical."

I have always been drawn to this card. The High Priestess represents magic, the ethereal, and strong powers of insight, things which I certainly have an affinity with. 

"Continuing his journey, the Fool comes upon a beautiful and mysterious veiled lady enthroned between two pillars and illuminated by the moon. She is the opposite of the Magician, quiet where he was loquacious, still where he was in motion, sitting while he stood, shrouded in the night where he was out in the bright of day. Sensing that she is a great seer, the Fool lays out his sword, chalice, staff and pentacle before her. "The Magician showed me these, but now I'm in a quandary. There are so many things I could do with them. I can't decide."

The High Priestess doesn't speak. Instead she hands him a pair of ancient scrolls. Seating himself at her feet, the Fool puts his decision-making on hold and reads by the light of her crescent moon.

"I did not know any of this," says the Fool. The scrolls, like a secret manual, have given him insight into his new tools. "This information helps me to narrow things down, but I'm still afraid of making a wrong decision."

The words come to him then, not from without but from within: "What do your instincts tell you?" The Fool reflects on that, and that's when he knows what he should do. Decision made, he rises to leave even though he suspects that the High Priestess has more secrets she could reveal to him--like what lies behind the pomegranate curtain. Right now, however, he is focused and ready to be on his way.

Thanking the High Priestess, he heads off. But as he leaves he hears that inner voice, rising like the waters which spring and flow from beneath her throne: "We'll meet again...when you're ready to travel the most secret path of all."

No wonder I enjoy her so much. I have been attempting to teach myself to read tarot cards since my mother gave me my first deck in 5th grade. I'm pisces, so I can hardly help it (even if I wanted to.)

Yet somehow as I continued thinking about this piece and sketching for it, it developed into more of an illustration/personal response to the album Lullabies In A Glass Wilderness by Katie Jane Garside, which she put out in 2006 under the pseudonym Lalleshwari. 

After debating whether the text would be the album title or a song title or a song lyric, OR the High Priestess, I finally decided I would depict Katie Jane playing the part of my beloved card, because she, in many ways, feels like the perfect High Priestess to me. Give a listen to any of her stuff and I'm sure you'll see why.

As usual, here are a bunch of probably pointlessly, slightly different versions of the same thing.

this is how the original looks:

Here I am playing with different scanned versions; I enjoy how it looks digitally when the contrast it bumped up a little and the warm tone added in.

It would seem from previous posts that I am obsessed with Katie Jane, when in fact . . . well, I really am.
here are some of the preliminary studies:

I believe I now have a theme running through my two Tarot cards; my earlier one although it isn't supposed to be him exactly, is drawn with the help of another of my favourite musicians. It's very interesting that this one has developed this way without my being cognizant of the earlier reference.

this was an unusual assignment. 

our instructor gave us a large list of sayings & phrases that had to do with eyes. We were expected to illustrate one, hopefully without being very literal. Here are two different color versions:

I used gouache and ink on rives BFK.

This next one was a quickie for a story from a book called "The Season of Divorce" by John Cheever, which is about a husband and wife in the 50's who end up getting divorced. It was a very good story, I hope to find the book someday. the piece feels unfinished, mainly because I worked on it for no longer than 2 hours:

and this is a self portrait from my painting techniques for illustrators class, done in oils -

all of these pieces were ones that I sort of didn't know how to feel about, or I felt rather negative about. Yet they are all very important little pieces of learning, and so I feel they are worth blogging. There is a large update in the works on allll the oil paintings I've been doing the last two semesters. when I can take photos, whenever that is.