Halloween illustrations

I had a great summer this year, but I’m always excited for my favourite autumn season. Joel and I put on a big Halloween display at our house, and I look forward to it every year when the kids fill the streets by the hundreds for trick-or-treating. Here are some unashamedly Gothic Halloween-themed illustrations:

 

Portrait of Edgar Allan Poe

Summer Plein Air

 

 

 

 

 

Every year September rolls around and I go “What? Already?!”. This summer was a good one for plein air drawing, even though Joel and I always feel like we could do more. Plus, he just bought me the artist-quality Winsor-Newton compact watercolour set for my birthday and I haven’t tried it out yet!

 

The following drawings were done in and around the Westport, ON area and on our Pacific Northwest road trip.allanmill_web vistahouse_web gypsy_web perth_web

bowesmill_web

Molting

I’m digging back into the archives to finally post this piece that was created for the Nook Collective Holiday Show. The criteria was only that the piece had to be circular, everything else was up to the artist. My piece reflects on the metamorphosis idea often found in Celtic mythology, where one will “shed one’s skin”, hence the title Molting.

Ink, watercolour & coloured pencil, 11″ diameter. Antique frame with antlers made of Sculpey and painted in acrylics.

molting1_web molting2_web

Recent lifedrawing

Joel and I are also fortunate to have been able to join a lifedrawing session here in Westport. After teaching lifedrawing for 5 semesters at Cambrian College in Sudbury, it’s nice to be able to concentrate on doing your own thing rather than teaching others how to do it (although I did enjoy that, Students, don’t worry!). Teaching lifedrawing definitely helped me with my own lifedrawing skills; I guess if you drill it enough in others you listen to your own advice!

Lifedrawing, approx. 2 hrs.

life32_web

Lifedrawing, 25 minutes.