I had the pleasure of having an illustration featured in STEPHEN magazine. It’s was for an article on unconventional theatre set ups.

Other than that, just been busy working on other freelance projects and enjoying my first summer in Vancouver. Like I said, I did add a LOT to the gallery, so you should really check it out. That’s all for now!

I’ve been mostly preoccupied with settling down into my new home, but that doesn’t mean I haven’t been doing some kind of art. I’ve been doing a lot of playing with techniques as well as doing a lot of promotional works — working on my second portfolio book, promotional postcards, some client work — so I’ve managed to keep myself busy when I’m not running around getting things for my new apartment or applying for jobs.

Anyway, here’s some fun stuff I thought I’d share. First, just a collection of lighting tests I did. The subject matter is very boring — random girl’s faces OMG — but the purpose of the exercise was to play with mediums and lighting, not have some brilliant concept. These are very quick studies, about 30 each.

The next is a little treat — a preview of the cover of my new portfolio. It’ll be done by the end of this month, so check back later!

Anyway, some news of interest: I entered an Olympic themed exhibition that was set up to generate artwork that could be displayed locally at the celebration for when the Olympic Torch rolls through town, which had two prizes of $1000. Hi giant run on sentence! But how could I pass that up? So I entered a few pieces, an experiment and an old piece from second year.

Well, I ended up winning one of those $1000 prizes. Ooh, aah, pat on the back. That was nice, to be certain.

The piece that won is below — it was actually a 2-hour experiment, more in the style of my abstract and old web/graphic design work than my usual illustration. I just find that funny, in some way. It’s completely made out of circles, and only circles.

But that’s some artwork I’ve done. I didn’t put it in my portfolio section because I don’t think its really representational of my illustration style. I am doing some other stuff that I should hope to show you soon — we’ll see how that goes.

So here’s an update. I worked at the local art gallery all summer, which (I must reassert) is the best job ever. My mural team and I painted nearly 40 canvases that make up a total area of 11 x 36 FEET. Yes, my friends, it was a big job indeed. It’s still incomplete, and I must still do some touch ups as they were damaged in transit, and at the moment, I don’t even want to think about painting. Woe!

Beyond that, I’m still working at the gallery, and will until my planned move to Vancouver at the end of March. I’m teaching art classes in addition to retouching our pieces for the mural, so at the moment I am still quite busy (who knew there was going to be such a demand for my classes?!) but I hope — hope — that once everything evens out I’ll have a drive to work on my own projects, as well as start marketing myself to clients.

In addition to beginning a freelance career, I would like to fix up my website a bit more. And when I put my portfolio book in the Summer Show at the gallery I had several requests to purchase it and to make more. Seeing as my current portfolio was $150 (a bit pricey!), I think I may make a miniature version through Lulu.

I’ll post again soon, and this time with a few sketches that I managed to do in my down time.

The ACAD Portfolio Show was tonight and it was a mixture of fun, scary and nerve-wracking! I talked to sooo many people, while my voice did that stupid thing where it goes up an octave whenever I’m in a professional setting, but also got to hand out a lot of business cards so that hopefully means contacts. Got lots of great comments on my portfolio too (but I doubt anyone was going to totally rip into my portfolio right there, so I gotta take that with a grain of salt).

I also got to hang out with my classmates for a final hurrah, for a quick eat before the show and then at the after party. I’ll be glad to get out of the classroom and be making some income, but sad to be leaving all our weirdness/joking/feedback behind.

I have a few loose ends to tie up before I’m entirely done — moving out, turning in a project, convocation — but, for the most part, I’m out of the woods! It’s scary, but it feels good.

My outfit is a funny thing — I went out with Tanya, intending to buy dress pants and she intended to buy a pencil skirt. However, we did the opposite: I bought the pencil skirt, she got the dress pants! I’m very pleased with my outfit though and I stayed in my budget.

In other, more interesting news, I added more work to the gallery. I’ve had a few comments about how surprisingly dark my work is (I guess I don’t show a lot of people, outside of school, my darker stuff?) so I felt I needed to reinforce the fact that I do lots of cutesy things too. This is one of them.

It was for one of my final projects for school — to come up with a concept/concept art for a commercial, for any product of our choice. I chose a higher-end cat food, and had it set in a very fancy cat boutique. The concept was that the Owner (below, right) brings her spoiled kitty (below, center) to the shop to buy him something indulgent. The Sales Assistant (below, left) then proceeds to show her increasingly extravagant cat toys, peaking at an enormous, golden cat tower.

The cat is delighted by all these ridiculous, over-the-top goods, but the owner just doesn’t think its good enough. Then she spots something — the Cat Food. She returns to the cat, bearing the bag of food, and the cat is just as excited about the food as the silly golden cat tower. It was fun to do! I really like playing with this style, I may try doing it non-digitally once I get some more time.