Advent 1

I'm going to draw and post something for each day of Advent. Some of them might be festive. Or not. This evening I've been doing a bit of monoprinting. Cat dreams:

Some more streetfolk

Street People

Sketching folk from a coffee shop, reminds me of being on my Foundation course.

Calvin & Hobbes

I'd never realised how brilliant the comic strip Calvin and Hobbes is/was until last week when it came up during some research. It's one of those things that I was dimly aware existed but had never paid the slightest bit of attention too. I've missed out. 


These adventures of a six year-old boy and his pet/ toy/ imaginary-friend tiger are philosophical, satirical, thoughtful and witty in a way unlike any other comic strip I've ever seen. All backed up by masterful inkwork. And very funny. I picked up a compendium book of the strips (There's Treasure Everywhere) in Oxfam for £1.50.


A couple of strips from this book. I love the innocence captured in this one, which gives the book its title:

Crosswords:

After 10 years in newspapers, Bill Watterson, the strip's creator, admirably knocked the whole thing on the head in 1995, and always refused to merchandise the characters.

Here are a top 25 Calvin & Hobbes strips from a blog names Progressive Boink:

http://www.progressiveboink.com/archive/calvinhobbes.htm

Happy Monsterday!

Grant Museum of Zoology

Seems stupid that I'd never been to the Grant Museum of Zoology (at UCL down by Euston) until monday. It reminded me a lot of the Pitt Rivers Museum in Oxford, but with a purely zoological focus. The collection was established in 1828 and has a stunning array of skeletons and jar-preserved animal specimens, including an intact Tasmanian Tiger skeleton, a jar of moles and a human or two. I sketched some skeletons.

Grant Museum of Zoology

Ruth Borchard Self Portrait Exhibition

Went back down for a proper look at the Self Portrait exhibition down at Kings Place Gallery (next to Kings Cross, the building in which the Guardian and Observer are based). The show fills the huge lower floors of Kings Place, as well as the actual gallery itself. There are some cracking portraits on show, although I felt the exhibition was a little bloated at 170-odd paintings- half of that would probably be more comfortable.


The exhibition is on every day until the 25th November. And congrats to the winner of the competition, Celia Paul.


My portrait: I think the wonky board looks alright in the end:

Some of my favourite portraits from the show (links at the bottom):


Tony Noble's Self Portrait, Red Brick Mill Studio, a brilliant acrylic piece:

Andrew Whamond's frank and expressive Self Portrait Standing:

Gilly Lovegrove, Untitled:

I saw an Alison Lambert solo exhibition in Soho a few years ago. She produces stunning large-scale portraits in charcoal, pastel and layers of torn paper, giving the pieces a deep relief and wonderfully sculptural topography. It's like the portrait has actually come from within the paper. Fantastic draughtsmanship (draughtswomanship?) too. Really worth seeing in person. Self-Portrait:

 Sheena Russell's Red Portrait:

Artist links:

Tony Noble

Andrew Whamond

Gilly Lovegrove

   Alison Lambert

   Sheena Russell