Card + Happy Thanksgiving

For 2022, Principia invited alumni artists to submit pieces for consideration in its calendar. Apparently the calendar committee received enough submissions it liked that, after the submission deadline, it decided to also to create a set of note cards (which are given as gifts to those who join the alumni clubs and perhaps to donors). One of my paintings was selected for the card set; it’s one I’ve shared before: SV Tommy Dundee. The set is 12 cards, each featuring a different piece.

Interestingly, I hadn’t initially planned to submit the oil painting, but I had an inkling that maybe I should anyway.

Supposedly there is a collage on page 2 of the calendar, & one of my sea turtle paintings, Honu Resting, is included. (I do not have a calendar, so I cannot say where for sure.)

The Principia cards and calendars are now available for purchase at www.principiaalumni.org/calendars.

If you would like more than 1 of SV Tommy Dundee in your card collection, you can order a set of my existing cards (5 for $7, 10 for $10); just email me. The artwork on my card covers the entire front (no white field) and fits nicely in a little frame, too.

On another note, I have ideas for at least two more Art Walks. One of them will probably be ready before the end of the year. Stay tuned.

Last but not least, have a happy, blessed Thanksgiving!

All About August

Just for fun, I reread posts from August 2014 to see some of what artistic things I did a year ago. Some highlights: finishing the Alice Moran (tugboat) painting (framed & delivered Sept. 2014), planning Pandagrams, and starting an illustration commission for Do You Have a Pebble in Your Pocket?

If you’d like to revisit those posts, too, just type a keyword such as “panda” in the search bar (top left, just under the colorful Racing Pajamas header). The results page shows several posts & pages; scroll down & click “older posts” (at the bottom of the list) to see more results.

Having looked a year back, you might wonder what new things I’m doing now. First off, I’m painting a series of shells in watercolor, and I’ll likely print a couple of them as notecards. (Previews peppered about this post.) Second, I’m celebrating that we’ve gained a blog subscriber this week–hooray! Third, I’ve been recruited to do art for a board game–fun! More on that next time.

January Jaunt

Greetings, my dear regulars, and happy new year!

As 2015 rolls into fashion, I find my customary holiday hiatus from the web blog much extended. As my Romanian French teacher from high school used to say, “believe you me,” it is not from a lack of things to mention nor from a wish to avoid such charming people as yourselves. Rather, ’tis thanks to that familiar nag called a deadline. Not the kind that creeps up on you, stealing into your chambers and suddenly rattling your bedpost, but rather the ominous kind that looms in the distance, that billows as you realize just how much more you didn’t know you have to do.

But I, like the sunshine on a spring day, am not worried about those clouds. Everything is moving forward in preparation for Kawa-Kon. Yesterday, in fact, I did a test print for the Pandagrams card template. A few tweaks there, then it’s formatting the set & off to the printer–tally ho! Completing Cartage will require a much greater push, but it’s definitely doable.

Now that I have taken and relished the opportunity to wax mildly poetic, I must crack my own whip, return from this little jaunt, and get to work! Until next time, whenever that may be!

Noteable Read

The latest issue of Imprimis, a forever free “Monthly Digest on Liberty and the Defense of America’s Founding Principles” is very applicable to my purpose & outlook as a storybuilder. The article? “The Case for Good Taste in Children’s Books” by Meghan Cox Gurdon, who reviews children’s books for the Wall Street Journal.

To read it, click this: http://imprimis.hillsdale.edu/archives & select July 2013.

Noteable: I am formatting another card (daffodils) & revising the tulip one I explored partway through summer.