Will I have failed to keep this as a ritual but..

Last night was a new experience!

Had the luxury of painting with a crowd following along while we enjoyed the fresh underground hip hop mixed music!

I didn't finish the piece but here is the start and I'm excited to finish it.

Seems I work best under pressure because I haven't been able to get this far in one piece in the span of 3 hours at home. SO.... I'm gonna try setting up at my neighbors place to work. We'll see if more work turns up on here.

Wanting the timid look captured in the Kelpie. How foolish! The digital sketch ups have helped in accelerating the process of making a painting I feel, but it's to not helping with the feeling that I need to get some figure studies back under my belt.

So sorry if it looks like I'm staring at you. I'm not judging you. Just noticing the natural flaws that create the unique characteristics that we use to recognize one another. ;D

Lets talk business

The lull of business in this failing economy had me 1.. think of another slogan I could stamp on well... anything. (more later)

But what did I work on for the last 2 hours of the 6 hours I told myself I would be working? My coworkers boyfriend is a prime interior/exterior painter but its always dead this time of the year in general. So, were taking it as a time to put together a better marketing plan... by starting one. :S

Still finessing the minor details but he was initially weighing between a modern slap in your face look/ to the more illustrative approach. (Inspired by the drawings by my close friend Fran)

So I'll get a review tonight after dwindling it down to these two that he liked and go from there!

girl in the mirror leads to..

Lady in the water?

So with bouncing inspiration off my boyfriend, he's been sketching lots of water horses. Not to be mistaken I guess with sea horses. It got me to thinking about another type of horse like creature. The Irish Kelpie. Which can shapeshift to tempt unsuspecting men into its waters.

I have accumulated a number of large canvases and I want something that has a very ominous mood to it. Soo... as you saw the girl in the mirror (which is a ref. to the oz chronicles) I was thinking it would be fitting to have a large painting again of a female figure.

Yes the Kelpie, which does have other names its known by, are creatures known for luring unsuspecting men and children into its waters to devour them. Of course, what's more alluring then a woman covered in lake weed? My sister helped model for the perspective in our grandparents pool, which became a nice way to occupy the worlds most boring day (Dec 25th)

The digital sketch I ended up with before bed last night:

Dreams

Hey! I had a dream that I remembered! I normally don't and I have been meaning to just use it as another painter/color practice. Dreamed that I was white water rafting and made a rest stop under the cliff. Note* I didn't bother to put myself or fellow travelers into the sketch.
Check it out!

Tell the monkey one thing and it will probably do the other

Color study to figure out how to make green walls at night still green. Sold? I should be working on concepts for an art show with my boyfriend but alas I can't walk away from a canvas. Maybe its because its about as tall and wide as I am and in a small small living space, but I've sat on this sketch for over a year now and this felt like the opportune time to flesh it out!

No more then a thumbnail to start. I always avoid colors until the very last minute because I just dread trying to force my eyes to see colors I dont know how to conceive in reality.

Actual painting pic coming soon! Or you can just check on twitter : http://twitter.com/#!/Swiss_Sweiss

I can't let go of this just yet

So the picture beside was meant for the MCAD art sale. Didn't get around to finishing it in time, but now that its made... I dont know if I can part with this one. A whale painting I did (just realized its not on here) and my other sea life work feels like a constant inspiration to do anything else. I requested more canvases for holiday this year. Crossing fingers I get some 5x6 ft canvases. Excited to work on that scale, just frustrated on where to store them :S

I also keep meaning to bring those suture scissors back to work >.>

UNDERWAY UNDERWAY

So the work above is a gift for mom and dad. Its been hard lately to get everything I want off the ground. Assessing the layout and content of the website(s) starting tomorrow.

I themed my holiday cards though. So that is a step up from, well, no creativity last year in my gifts. Ghibli theme is what I'm sticking to. Catch them in the next post or two!

sketch mc sketcherton

Uploading a coloring over my sketch book. What was behind the freezing state? Who will know? Ok its just the pencil sketch underneath but my brother was watching me etch this out and thought of another "witty" state piece I think I'll attempt this week.

Also working on an ipod cover. Will post soon!

color color!

Quick digital coloring!

Old thrones..

The detailed idea I would like to incorporate into this comic I was going to do on the side. It never really kicked off. But this sketch needed some color. Love the underwater feel of Edmond Dulac

Hopefully can get this mesh of line and watercolor to work well with each other.

Not mine...

This is my sisters but I scanned and formatted for presentation. Pretty darn impressed she pulled this off in 10th grade. I don't think i had a grasp of composition yet.. or even now? Hehe.

Every time I see her (seldom >.>) I ask if she's still interested in visual arts. Would really be awesome to collaborate or something in the future. Or at least offer guidance and tips so she can surpass what even I know in a shorter time.

Check it out!

Art sale 2011

Well that came and went!
Didn't really put much into it, therefore it didn't pay off.
4 pieces total and only one sold. >.> But alas, more then what I had before I sold anything!

The piece was sort of an experiment. Also just a way to detract from a crack in my wall...
The sketches and the final piece!

Why it's been years!

This site is going to get organized sooner then later. I've been creating a body of social networking all under the TRTL title. The blog is mainly to present the works I'm working on or finished with. With events and maybe some personal insights about my life. But for now this is just a finger exercise to simply make me feel like I'm starting a new.

As we come to a close with the final month and a half of this year. I'm setting dates and making personal goals to get my own illustration career underway.

Wooooo!

Art Sale

Well this isn't for the art sale. I should post the finished work for that but I don't have it uploaded yet on the computer. But this will be the cover for the yellow pages.

Art Sale is going to happen. Hope to make a little extra. Student loans are going to start soon so anything for a little padding while I settle into the life of an adult paying off loans.

Tis safe now.

Made this for the wrapping paper for a friends wedding gift. I got them a hand carved gourd with a santa riding a shell slay and some sea horses instead of reindeer. But I figured to top it off it needed custom wedding-ish wrapping paper rather then tissue paper in pink white or blue. Sooo......

Its been awhile no?

So the Ketubah is finished! This is very exciting and I'm feeling nervous and ready to kinda get my name out there and continue in this little niche I fell into. Here's the finished piece.

Here is some painter work. I fail at this still. I need to keep playing with it, but there are just so many options it makes my head spin.

Also here is digital sketch for an idea for the art sale.

Lucky Lucy

So this is in regards to the house cat of the clinic I work. She past away after living a very long and relatively healthy life I think. Our morning kennel guy wrote the ode to Lucy and asked if I could put a visual to it. Its kinda rough but I like the outcome for what it is. She really liked Green Mill Hamburger. 

Not much left to say

I will come back to Maui. I'm sure there are other amazing islands I need to fall in love with along with the amazing wildlife under water in their own reefs. But this place feels good. 

Yesterday I got back to Makena Bay. Swam all the way out to Turtle Town. Thought it was going to be a bust but given time. Out of the blue we were visited by another sea turtle. Swam along with us for a good half hour. Soon enough we were trailing behind it as it went to the South part of the bay. It brought us to this amazing reef. Nothing like Molokini or the open flat reefs we were so use to swimming over. This was that kind of reef where there are mountains and valley's!

Fish of all different shapes and colors. The clicking noise of fish eating away and the wash of the current pushing you through and along with the schools of fish through the reef. It was unreal and so enjoyable. 

I hate that MN is so far away from such sights. I would trade pine trees, snow, squirrels, deer and of course our state bird the mosquito for this every time I went out to play outside.

I head to the airport within the next hour. I'm all cleaned, packed up and as ready to go as I can be. Taking as many deep breaths as possible. The sea air is so clean and refreshing. No allergies, no stuffy or dry nose.  Clean soft rain, hot sun, cool breeze. Thick jungle and bright saturated colors. THIS IS PARADISE!

Delays, delays

I apologize for the lack of post but the last two days were pretty exciting. Well yesterday more then the last. My minimal yard work consisted of mowing the 2 acres, taking down 7 trees and dragging them over the cliff and doing some hedge clipping all around the resort walkways. Refilling the washed out gravel and collecting palm fronds from all over and bringing them to the farthest side of the grounds. 

But it was all worth the work out. I was able to leave to spend the night down in Kihei since Susan was able to line me up with a free tour of Molokini and whats known as Turtle Town. So down off Makena Bay they picked us up in an awesome 61' Sail boat and in a matter of 15 min.  had arrived to the Molokini Crater! Jumped off the boat from the diving ledge and right as the bubbles cleared away all I could see was a school of very curious black triggerfish. Below you could see the coral shelf rising all the way to the sides of the crater wall. Closer inspection showed even more!

Rainbow, and striped parrot fish, 3 different types of box fish, a peacock and spotted groupers (baby sized so about as big as my forearm) butterfly and angel fish! An ungodly amount of tang fish. More I didn't recognize. I was worried they were going to force us to use snorkel gear and flotations. But instead I was free to choose, so of course I kept my goggles and flippers which were far better then what they offered. I was able to free dive around in the deeper parts and one of the tour guides showed me under the shelf about 30 or so ft. There was a hiding place where schools of squirrel fish hide. So we get down there and from above its like that illusion in labyrinth when sara is trying to get past the entry way and the worm tells her to walk forward. It looks like the coral just reached to the sand. Till you look at a horizontal view and there is a cave! Filled with wide eyed striped fish! It was so cool!

For about an hour we were out there and then we started to head back to Makena Bay, which not a 1/2 out from shore is "Turtle Town". We parked in about 30 ft or so of water and swam out afew yards and there was a lane made naturally of coral and it was a cleaning station for turtles and other large sea creatures. They swim through and cleaning shrimp and fish jump on and clean the shells while they chill. Got an entire camera's worth of pictures of these two 400 something pound Pacific Green Sea Turtles hovering about the coral. 

The rest of the journey was spent on the boat after this. Getting food and drink complimentary and enjoying the views on and off the boat. We also were lucky enough to have some bottlenose dolphins ride along side the boat. I got some film of them. Mind the swarm of kids that were infront of me. I was filming without seeing through the viewfinder. >.>

Overall and awesome trip, but the real treat was after. Right off shore when we were getting off, there were two more sea turtles not 15 ft away from the beach. Eating the algae and whatever off the rocks. So after the tour I jumped right back in and for an hour or so got to swim maybe a little to close to these awesome gentle creatures! That is what this trip was all about, and since all beaches on this island are public I'm heading back there 2 or more times if I can to see them again!