Owls make the world go round...

To my delight, spring cleaning has found me some new surface space to display some of my favorite books and little thingies. This is a very rare occurance in our midget-apartment.


The men outside are yelling about giant fish they've caught while paving our driveway. I'm finding this a distraction to my work. As soon as I've finished writing this, I will blast music to drown out their machines and voices. Just look at how well my little owl figure matches the Baskin owl illustration. It's like somehow, they were always meant to be together...

Don't be afraid...

This is my most recent print entitled "Don't be afraid." I was enspired one sunny afternoon by reading a book of poetry: Holy Land by Rauan Klassnik.

I really enjoyed most of the poems in the book, which are mostly short little prose paragraphs. The one in particular that ensipired this image was this one:

Two girls are carrying a cage full of kittens down to the
river. Don't be afraid! This is the world's beauty. Look!--
with the cage between them still they're stepping care-
fully from rock to rock.

-Rauan Klassnik

This now proudly displayed as the opening image on my website. If you haven't visited in a while, maybe now is the time.

Lack of Translation

So a friend and co-worker of mine asked me if I would illustrate one of her favorite poems from her childhood, which is a poem called "Cantec" by George Cosbuc. Apparently this poem has never been translated into english from the Romanian, so she wrote her own basic translation for me and the rest was guess work. Here is the finished product.



They are all lithographs from pronto plates including the text.

news from the livingroom and beyond...

The past month I have been jet-setting around New England but it has finally come to an end with my return from New Hampshire a few days ago. I have been lugging around my little safe box of paints to try and keep myself working.

Since I've been back, I finally got my Gehenna Press poster in a frame (see above) and also made a mini bookshelf for my collections of miniature books. I used all scrap wood I found in my parents basement and didn't bother to finish it. I'm hoping it will fit in with the rest of my shabby things just fine.


One of the things that I used my Bush-buys-our-love-check on was the Christmas Nutshell Library by Hilary Knight. Only one edition was published in 1963 along with the Bunny Nutshell by Robert Kraus, and of course the famous Nutshell Library by Maurice Sendak. Sendak's was the only one that they continued to print. So now I have all three!


And of course I couldn't go one post without mentioning Leonard Baskin. His Miniature Library of Natural History has it's own little place on the shelf. OK, enough nerdy miniature collectible book talk for now.

While in New Hampshire, Brian and I hiked a mountain but didn't make it all the way up because I found out that I'm out of shape. Here is the closest we got to the probably magnificent views at the top.



Here is Brian disappointed with me:


Here is the lake, finally free of ice:


Now back to work! I've got a wedding invitation to design, piggies to paint and paper to trim...

Illustrator buddies

Ok. I swear this will be my last post about the cape. Here is a photo of Jess and Julia when they came down to hang out with Boomer and me. Inevitably whenever we get together we end up talking about books and complain about bad design.



Look at that clean floor...

country woman on the cape

Well as promised (or vaguely mentioned) I've painted the skirt on my country woman print. I did this out of solitary confinement on the cape. This is how it looks now:



beebedeee...

SOS success

So yesterday was a lot of fun. I got to talk to a lot of new people and managed to sell a generous portion of my prints. Here is a photo-walk-through of the day:











Yay. Thanks to Shelley and Melissa and everyone who came!

SOS!!

This Saturday (tomorrow) I will be at Albertine Press selling my prints as part of Somerville Open Studios. Shelley has graciously donated some space in her letterpress studio for my work as well as Pressbound, and Beck Wasilewski. There will be a beautiful variety of paper goods for viewing or purchasing so please bring your wallets! In the past these events have always been a lot of fun so I'm thrilled to participate again. I will have a selection of my most recent prints, such as chickens, bunnies, ladies and deers.

Hours and Location:

May 3 from 12-6

Albertine Press
561 Windsor St.
Somerville, MA 02143

(right outside Inman Square)

ok, see you there!