Revolution by Night

Penelope`s Letters

2011-02-24T18:59:00.000-08:00

Dear little blog, I do still love you... I promise. These past two years have been quite wonderful and overwhelming. I should like to resume posting things here every once in a while, and even though I believe I made such promises in the past, I will do my best this time around to keep this sketch-blog running and do so within more reasonable intervals.

To begin, I`d like to share a little video I made last semester. Frankly its somewhere between a video and a short film (can`t quite call it the former because it is set to a narrative).

The story is my attempt at an adaptation of and response to Penelope`s character, from Homer`s Odyssey. While recently reading The Odyssey (for the first time, I must shamefully admit) I was immediately drawn to the estranged character of Penelope, who is trapped within her little tower, while Odysseus roams the high seas for 20 years. In the original story Penelope is expected to wait for Odysseus` return, and her staying celibate for that entire duration of time is not only not seen as ludicrous (as we, perhaps, might view it nowadays), but, on the contrary, a mark of chastity, an esteemed quality of a good wife. While Odysseus plays an active role in the Homeric epic, Penelope serves as his passive, feminine counterpart.

In my adaptation, instead of weaving a tapestry in her quarters (as the original Penelope does), I bestowed my heroine with the ability to write, which she certainly could not have done during the actual days of Homer (in fact, it is disputable whether Homer himself was literate, and perhaps The Odyssey had existed as oral tradition first, for several generations, before being finally committed to parchment, posthumously, by someone else... although all of this is, for the most part, guesswork and speculation).

The main concept behind my altered narrative is the idea of concealing memory within a concrete object. In my story, Penelope writes letters to Odysseus, but since she has no idea as to his whereabouts, the letters can never actually be sent. Over time she surrounds herself with these letters, which she then literally makes concrete by casting them in plaster. The attempt here is to make something light and ever-shifting, ever-evading - namely memory - into something concrete and permanent. It is her absurd way of preserving Odysseus. My wish here was to draw attention to the all-too-neglected self-destructive aspect of Homer`s Penelope. She destroys herself through her obsessive clinging to the memory of a person, whose image, as anything else, cannot escape the all-too-natural memory erasure we are all subject to, bound as we are to time.

All that said, hope you guys enjoy! To see movie click here.

Here are some screen shots from the rough footage (some of which did not make the final cut):

some stuff from last semester

2010-01-26T15:40:00.001-08:00

This one is from a workshop by Vincent Desiderio, who was a visiting artist at our school for a couple of days last semester. For those of you unfamiliar with his work, he`s a great painter and you should definitely check him out. On the more technical side, he talked a lot about light and volume. Yet the much more interesting part of the workshop involved sharing his views on arthistory in a series of lectures. It is always very inspiring to have the privilege listen to artists who are passionate about what they do and who care to share their opinions and information with others. In short, I really enjoyed the workshop.

This is a sketch of one of the still life rooms. Like almost all these images it was done in one sitting, oil on paper.
This one is a quick (40 min or so) colour sketch for the longer study below.

Some pastels from the last week

2010-01-11T13:26:00.000-08:00

OK, so I know this is totally random, especially since I haven`t tended to this blog for a while. But here's the thing. I've been back home for my winter break from school (which, so far, has been very enjoyable) and took up sketching in pastel, since I left my oils in Philly. These are just a few things I drew over the past week. I included one close up of the above images, at bottom. I do promise to take some pictures of some of the work I`ve been doing at school, upon my return to Philadelphia. But, in the meantime, here`s some pastelly things...

In the meantime... Go Iran!

2009-07-14T13:10:00.000-07:00

poker, beer, and trampled revolutions
more about Iran here

Howdy!

2009-07-14T12:57:00.000-07:00

To the occasional reader of this blog (provided you do exist out there) - not to worry! - the blog is not completely dead, just taking a little break for the time being, will be back up and running quite shortly. I am going back to school, in a matter of a few months, and decided to start off on a clean slate. I might repost some of the older images, later on, though in general I wanted to get rid of a lot of the junk I had here for frankly no justifiable reason. Also, my work has taken a bit more of a narrative direction as of late and I would like this blog to reflect that. In short, old crap had to go!

On a somewhat related note, I will be studying at the Pennsylvania Academy in Philadelphia as of late August and at this point I am looking for a studio/room in the city – if you by some ridiculously miraculous chance run across this post AND know of a decent place somewhere around Centre City, I would greatly appreciate it if you were to send me an email, or just leave a message here (it’s getting pretty close to my moving date and I haven’t a place to live yet – is it time to start panicking?!? – I sure hope not!)

As to the links, I will update those shortly as well… have lot’s of painters I would like to put up there.

Hopefully within a few weeks this blog should be functional again – thanks for checking! :)

B-Y-E!

here's a better/cleaner photograph of a painting I've already posted a little while ago, below

2009-04-13T16:58:00.000-07:00

Suburbain Self with Kite

2009-04-12T10:37:00.000-07:00

Here's to the memory of two years!
The blurry image above is a destroyed version of this painting (I took it at night, hence the yellow blurriness). I decided that the background wasn't working with the head and so had to be toned down. But also, I painted the above at a point when I was going a bit crazy, and once I got back to the picture I realized that the mood of it had also had to change, to reflect my more calm state of mind at the time. Further, I wanted it to be a bit more hopeful - so I added "a kite" to hold onto. And that's that!
p.s. I had quite the trouble with the midtones on this face; they had to be repainted a kazillion amount of times, so as to work properly with the background, which I also kept changing. It was a bit of a pain, but hey, I'm learning.

Life Drawing Break

2009-03-29T20:05:00.001-07:00

2009-03-24T12:05:00.000-07:00

more life today

2009-03-22T20:44:00.000-07:00

has been a long time since I've been to lifedrawing

2009-03-19T21:26:00.001-07:00

a few oil sketches and a longer study

2009-01-26T14:07:00.000-08:00

Unlike the other paintings here, this one was a rather lengthy study (I would try and post a better image of it when I get the chance - neither of these two are quite right - top one is much too dark, and the one below out of focus...) The rest of the images here are all between1 to 3 session-long poses.

I promise to put up some paintings at some point soon; in the meanwhile there is this...

2008-11-21T11:57:00.000-08:00

Above image is from work, today. I work at Nelvana nowadays.

Starbucks, I love you! I really like going to the one at Chapters/Indigo on John St. to draw people and occasionally read books without ever paying for them.

My dad, looking a bit older in that image than what he normally does.My hopes are with Obama!

started a new sketchbook

2008-09-29T07:38:00.000-07:00

I really like drawing drapery. Since every time it constitutes different and new abstract shapes, it really forces you to look.

I also wish to draw more bicycles!
Lastly, I want to do a series of small abstract pictures. Unfortunately, as evident on this blog, since moving back to Toronto and starting working again, I haven't had much time to paint. Hence all these sketchbook posts. The only time I get to paint these days is on weekends. Perhaps shortly I'll post some of the - very few - pictures I painted in the city since coming back...

Another sketchbook finished

2008-08-31T14:37:00.001-07:00

Life Drawing Break Time

2008-08-13T22:45:00.001-07:00

good ol' sketchees

2008-08-13T11:50:00.001-07:00

corner of my room, Markham, Ontario
stairwell, Maisons-Laffitte, France

Portrait

2008-08-06T08:23:00.000-07:00

This picture started out purely as an exercise in observation. As I continued working on it, I realized that I wanted to develop it further, but still keep the main focus on the process. I am personally very inspired by painters that make process a frank and visible part of their work; markmaking in itself can very often be sufficient subject matter. That's the reason I decided to omit the focal point here and leave the head out of this picture. Of course, I can go back and continue working on it, but if I do so it will inevitably become a portrait, which is not the intention with which I set out to paint this. The point here is simply observation.

Yesterday @ TSA

2008-08-04T13:24:00.000-07:00

Kate (dissillusioned)

2008-07-31T11:54:00.001-07:00

Self + Hallway

2008-07-30T18:08:00.000-07:00

I'm back from France, so unfortunately I will not be able to finish this one.

blue pictures

2008-07-24T13:17:00.000-07:00

two unfinished sketches

abandoned sketch (unfinished)

2008-07-10T11:51:00.001-07:00

The lighting kept changing too much, because of the clouds, so I had to stop painting, even though I wanted to work on this longer. Perhaps I will pick it up again in a few days if there will be a similar lighting situation.

Garden in Summer

2008-07-05T04:49:00.000-07:00

My camera really saturated the blues on this, they are way too intense. Its kinda frustrating knowing that an image looks very different on different monitor settings, but that is outside my control...

window view sketch from yesterday, gouache

2008-06-21T07:01:00.000-07:00

Staying in Paris

2008-06-18T13:38:00.001-07:00

Staying at my teacher's house in Paris right now. It's very-very nice here. Here are some quickies from our garden...

I got myself a pass for the Louvre, while I'm here. Have been there several times now. More than anything I am looking at Corot right now. Perhaps the greatest French landscapist... ever!

some quick figure paintings; 1.5, 2, and 2.5 hours respectively.

2008-06-01T15:38:00.000-07:00

TSA this evening (10 and 15 min poses)

2008-05-30T20:57:00.001-07:00

mid-year resolution

2008-05-26T15:14:00.000-07:00

Hello there everyone!
I am again taking off from the city. I will be in Boston for a couple of days, to see an Antonio Garcia Lopez show (if you're unfamiliar with this person's work, you should definitely look in to it! - the Boston MFA is holding his retrospective right now) and shortly afterwards I'm flying off to Paris. Will spend June and July there, and hopefully will have many pictures to post!

On a related note, this year has been quite eventful thus far, as I have been on the go the entire past 10 months, and it is not even over yet! Consequently, all I have had to post has been exclusively sketches. I am looking forward to returning to Toronto in August and finally having the opportunity to spend some adequate time on images. I feel like I've learnt a lot by taking this long break from commercial work and having had the time to concentrate on my personal craft has been stupendously beneficial. That being said, I've long since had some ideas for larger narrative canvases and I am very much looking forward to the day when I have my own space and enough time to execute them. Till then, expect more quickies...

Repeat

2008-05-26T15:05:00.001-07:00

2008-05-17T15:43:00.000-07:00

One More

2008-05-16T12:51:00.000-07:00

Hmmm, I'm all into sketching today. Here's another head that I just did - this one's quicker than the previous one, probably slightly under 10 minutes. And funny enough, I'm just leaving the house so I can make it for life drawing later on this evening. I'm in draw-draw mood!

Just did this literally a few min ago - just a quick 15 min sketch...

2008-05-16T11:34:00.001-07:00

I think my biggest inspiration in terms of drawing from life these days, and in fact for the past little while now, is Rubens. I also absolutely love Watteau's sketches; Leonardo and Kathe Kollwitz are other big favourites.

One Minute Gestures and a Ten - haven't done this thing in ages - fun times though!

2008-05-16T09:05:00.001-07:00

a few rescans and a few new images (its nice to have a scanner and a proper monitor again!)

2008-05-06T08:33:00.000-07:00

Self, oil on canvas

2008-05-01T01:23:00.000-07:00

Sang-In neighbourhood rooftop view, Daegu, South Korea

2008-04-25T02:57:00.000-07:00

My rooftop view, in Daegu. This was a bit of a longer painting, painted in three sessions. As I mentioned earlier, my laptop monitor is very bright and I have no idea how this looks like on a normal computer; I do hope though that I won't have to re-upload all these last images, once I see them on my home PC in Canada.
On an unrelated note, I'm almost out of gouache, thus I don't think I'll be doing much more painting before returning back home - that happening on May 5th. I really miss Toronto!

Last sketchbook page...

2008-04-21T06:22:00.000-07:00

Hey guys, I have absolutely no idea how these last images that I've been uploading look like on proper monitors, as I'm currently using a laptop to upload them and my screen is very light. So I'm afraid I might have over-darkened some of the previous images prior to putting them up. Whichever the case may be, I will be back in T. dot very shortly, at which point I'll see to it that my next posts are of proper hue/value.

From the past few days (gouache again)

2008-04-18T01:52:00.000-07:00

Unlike some of the pictures in the previous post, all of these were very quickly executed, in one sitting, and all in my sketchbook (that would account for the pen doodles next to some of the images).
The top picture is my favourite among this bunch, but it is unfinished. I painted it yesterday afternoon, when there was a nice overcast day outside. Overcast being, in my opinion, the best light condition for painting, because the light doesn't change throughout the day, as long as the clouds obscure the sun, and the colours are crystal clear. Hence there's none of that squinting that is unavoidable under strong sun, when painting outdoors. The only obvious draw-back of course is that if there are clouds, it might rain. Such was the case yesterday, but since I was painting it from indoors, via a window-view, I was fine. Now, the reason I posted it unfinished is because today is excruciatingly hot, and the weather forecast in Daegu doesn't indicate anything but sunny days in the upcoming week.
On a related note, I have just changed my return tickets to Canada - coming back home on May 5th - can't wait to be back!

Gouaches of South Korea

2008-04-09T02:27:00.000-07:00

Been neglecting this blog for a few months now, my apologies!
A whole bunch of stuff has happened in that timespan. First, I'm no longer in Norway - came back to Canada for a couple of weeks, only to leave the country again, this time for South Korea. I'm currently staying in a city called Daegu. Planning on coming back to Canada at the end of May, though yet again uncertain as to how long I'll stay there. If all pans out according to plan, I might be back in Europe shortly afterwards.

The above are - all but one - gouache sketches. I know I promised to post my oil paintings from Norway quite some time ago, but I hadn't sufficient time to photograph and edit those pictures during my short visit to Canada (which is where those paintings are currently situated).

I'll try to post stuff more often, so keep checking! :)
Cheers,
Andrew.

just before I go...

2007-12-04T07:47:00.000-08:00

Meet Edvarda. She likes to come into my room and stare at the window at night to ponder long and hard about deep existentialist matters , such as the purpose of her existence in this mysterious universe. She also likes to catch mice and purr when you pet her.This is the view from the same window Edvarda is peering from in the previous image. Painted today, just a few hours ago, before the sun went down (the sun sets very early here in Norway this time of year).
This is the same view done just a few days ago. As opposed to the gouache above this one was done in watercolour. Which one do you like better? Personally, I prefer the gouache, because it feels more like a painting, but the watercolour medium is just a lot more mysterious and free, I think, no matter what you paint.

This is my dirty little desk in my room, with a mirror reflection. Watercolour, again.

apologies!

2007-12-04T05:34:00.000-08:00

OK, so I'm really sorry for false promises to post some paintings next time I update this thing. My lousy excuse is that the camera, which I did eventually manage to get my hands on, gave very poor results and the light conditions at the place I tried to take the pictures were not too favourable either. Soooooo, what this all means is that I will have to wait till I come back home (which actually happens pretty soon) so I could take proper photos and hopefully upload them at that point. In the meantime, I'm gone to Madrid for a week - woohoo - that should be absolutely awesome! And after I come back I have another week and a half before I return to Canada. So, in two weeks-ish (hopefully) I will post some pictures.
Cheers!
A.

more and more and then some

2007-11-18T03:39:00.001-08:00

K guys, I promise this is going to be the last time in a little while that I post sketchbook images, as I really want to upload some real paintings I've been working on here in Norway for the past little while and not these little notebook doodles. So, hopefully I will get my hands on a camera at some point next week and post some oil paintings. Till then!

New Link

2007-10-28T09:55:00.000-07:00

For a long time now I have been a very big fan of Antonio Garcia Lopez's work. In my opinion, he is one of the two greatest figurative painters alive right now. I could never find enough of his work online however. I have added a new link (to the right) of a website I stumbled upon recently that has a very good selection of his paintings and drawings. Please take a look, many of his pieces are absolutely breathtaking! I find it sad that the world doesn't have very many people whom I could call masters alive right now (he is amongst the select few that I could sincerely allocate that term to).

Lazy Day

2007-10-12T09:21:00.001-07:00

Today I have done almost absolutely nothing. Towards the end of the day it dawned on me that I haven't painted a thing the entire day. So before the sun set down I went outside and sketched this little gouache of a forest, nearby where I live right now. It took me about 30 or so minutes. Its done on absolutely god-awful watercolour paper, as I am presently waiting for my folks to send me my favourite watercolour sketchbook from Canada (as Norwegian artstores don't carry it). Until then I have this pad of really bad paper to finish... :(

check this out!

2007-10-11T09:38:00.000-07:00

Sophie Jodoin has just updated her website, which makes me incredibly excited! In my opinion she is one of the greatest draftsmen alive right now and seeing new work from her is always quie the treat! Please go and do your eyes a favour by visiting her website (link on right) - lots of beautiful new paintings and drawings!

Norway Sketchbook I (the opaque colour sketches are gouache)

2007-10-02T07:54:00.001-07:00

Notice of Absence

2007-07-18T15:17:00.000-07:00

Dudes, dudets and hermaphrodites, hello there. This is a notification for anyone who reads this blog. I am away from home right now, studying in Norway. Thusly, i do not have an access to a scanner, neither did I bring a digital camera with me. Hence, posting will be sparse to nonexistant within the next 3 to 6 months (depending on when I return). I am here to learn painting, and hopefully once I come back I'll have much better pieces to showcase. Till then I thank you for your patience.

Have a great rest of the year,
Andrew.

Roads Split where Trees Grow; a pastel and a whole bunch of sketches (another sketchbook finished).

2007-06-13T01:16:00.001-07:00

blurry midnight portrait

2007-05-04T10:15:00.000-07:00

just did this small painting yesterday night, started around midnight finished around 2:30
I resort to using myself as a model quite often when I get a sudden urge to draw/paint from life but there are no accessible subjects...

Old Head Study (for a painting)

2007-04-17T14:58:00.000-07:00

Dema

2007-04-17T14:49:00.000-07:00

One sketchbook done, another started, and a couple of watercolour sketches (sorry bout the recent lack of posts; been kinda busy)...

2007-03-04T09:02:00.000-08:00

It seems to be a recurring motif with me to get extremely depressed every winter around the holiday season, and each year it gets worse and worse. This time around it was an exceptionally ugly winter in the city, lots of mud and dirt, and not a whole lot of snow. At times like that I start spending a lot more time writing in my journal, or reading books, and not doing much drawing at all. But I just came back from two weeks up north, and got my yearly snow needs all covered, so I think my mental state is finally recuperating. ...In the mean time, this is a random collecdtion of some of the drawings that I've done since around December...

This was done about the time I was leaving Core. The idea came to me one day while listening to Pink Floyd at work. I wanna do a larger version of it in oils, just need to find a proper model... This one is guache over watercolour.

One day I was taking the GO bus on the 404, it was a pretty windy day and grey and hazy outside. Out of the corner of my eye I saw this tree bending in the wind. And for some reason I immediately thought that it would be quite awesome if there were a naked girl standing there next to it in the wind. Donno why, but the idea just seemed very cinematic to me. So when I got home I painted this sketch...

I wanted to send this to Lucia, but when I took the paper out from the watercolour pad it got torn on the bottom. Sorry Lu, I'll send you something else then...

Just sitting in the librarry one day, thinking about 23...

I love drawing people when they move a lot!

before...

after... :)

These are from the new sketchbook:

Wouldnt it be neat if people could levitate like that? i think it would be quite awesome...

. . .

something new, I'll post more soon...

2007-01-25T15:04:00.000-08:00

unemployment drawings

2006-11-24T00:37:00.000-08:00

So this is the stuff I've been doing in my one or so week of unemployment (I seem to ride streetcars too frequently and this is where most of these drawings were done, both the life sketches and the ones done from imagination)...

Also, on account of my unemployment, I very logically decided to reward myself with a scanner, which might mean more sketchbook posts.

Lastly, I just switched to the new blogger account and been having some problems with it - for instance, when I leave comments on other peoples blogs it doesnt seem to register my information or account info (so its kind of like posting anonymous). On top of that when I log into my account I always have to log in using my old account name & password, otherwise it doesnt show my blog info. Does anyone else have these problems? What am I supposed to do to fix it?

latest in life drawing\painting adventures

2006-11-15T10:34:00.000-08:00

Big Sketchbook Dump

2006-11-05T21:31:00.000-08:00

Still no scanner, but went to Oakville yesterday and scanned some stuff at Sheridan. These are from the last two months in descending chronological order (the sketches on the top are newer...)

two models at TSA (from yesterday)

2006-10-21T06:48:00.000-07:00

Duccio

2006-09-30T08:54:00.000-07:00

I dont have access to a scanner right now, so I'm posting some old stuff. This is a development piece I did a long time ago for an animated short (which might even get done one day, who knows...)

Some semi-recent oil sketckes

2006-09-12T18:11:00.000-07:00

man i really want to learn to paint more refined! oh well, one day...

doodling at work...

2006-08-28T09:02:00.000-07:00

Picasso's Eyes

2006-08-06T09:17:00.000-07:00

These are some early concept sketches I did for a film me and Aiden (link on right) were planning to work on back in Sheridan. Unfortunately by the time third year came we realized that it was too grand to pull off as a student film and we both ended up working on our own separate films (which in retrospect was a good decision). Though I still really like the idea behind it and hopefully one day we'll actually find the time to work on it.
Till then there's these drawings...

Sketchbook Bears

2006-07-17T21:11:00.000-07:00

More of the same...

2006-07-13T19:45:00.000-07:00

I coloured a few of those characters I had in my schetchbook... voila!

Melancholia...

2006-07-03T11:29:00.000-07:00

oil sketch from this saturday at Artist 25 (6 hrs)

Just finished a Sketchbook, here's a few Pages...

2006-06-24T15:47:00.000-07:00

Finally, I've got internet again!

2006-06-13T21:45:00.000-07:00

Yeah, internet is awesome sometimes! Here's a painting I just finished a few days ago. I painted this while listening to Beck's Sea Change (over and over) which I think had a something to do with the way it eventually turned out...

Berlioz' Last Phone Call

2006-05-07T21:39:00.000-07:00

A Little Homage to my Favourite Cartoon

2006-05-01T17:14:00.000-07:00

Cat

2006-04-12T20:08:00.000-07:00

This one started as an interpretation of Begemot from Master and Margarita. However its been a while since I read the book, and once I actually finished painting this piece I obviously realized that the cat is supposed to be black... Oh well, better luck next time!

Some really old life drawings from the good old Sheridan days...

2006-04-12T19:23:00.000-07:00

Sketchbook Doodles

2006-04-11T19:18:00.000-07:00

Some oil paintings...

2006-04-11T19:14:00.000-07:00

More Duccio

2006-04-10T19:30:00.000-07:00

Duccio - visual development for an animated short

2006-04-09T18:51:00.000-07:00

This is going to be an interesting experiment…

2006-03-27T17:50:00.000-08:00

I guess now that its officially not cool anymore (or so I am being told) it is finally the perfect time for me to start a blog! Been kinda hesitant about this for a while, but as always must abide Lucia’s wishes… So here goes nothing!

It seems appropriate to introduce myself here; I am a recent graduate from Sheridan College’s Classical Animation programme (I graduated in 2005). I love drawing, and I also paint on occasion. Commercially, I am currently working as a character designer in Toronto. I am interested in making short films, and reading good books. Hope you enjoy my blog!