Revvin' it Up And Making Ado

Some lettering from an old sketchbook. It was made by the hand of Alan Garvie in Friederichshain, Berlin out of old kitschy DDR wallpaper.

The Mayoress of Cloud Town

Messing around & preliminary sketches for a new logo.

Summer Schemings

Some more pattern experiments from the past couple of weeks (click to make bigger).

I've also started working on some medieval-type border ornaments which is really fun - I'll post those a little bit later.

Tonight is also the end of year show at the Centre des Textiles Contemporains - I've got some work set up there, and will be showing visitors around the school throughout the evening. Everyone is welcome, and the show 'Passage Haptique' is up until June 13th. My and my fellow textile students' work will shown until June 2nd... then it will be our turn in one year to show our final projects!

Recently

It's been a long time since my last post, because I've been working away both at school and in my temporary studio at The Long Haul. I've been using my time at the studio to get back into painting and drawing and as a result I have become a bit obsessed with pattern designing - drawing things by hand and manipulating them in Photoshop... I've been loving trying some things out in that direction. Here are some of the latest results:

(I feel like this last one would be be perfect for gift-wrapping anything in Pee-Wee's Playhouse)

I've always loved hand-lettering and calligraphy so I've been enjoying practicing that too.

Shop Signs of Lower Villeray

Doodled while sitting & waiting around in the laundromat. My neighbourhood has some weird and wonderful typography that I enjoy very much.

Old Man Winter (Extended Remix)

I haven't posted for over a month, but lots has been going on... things are in the works at the moment and I am biding my time for warmth and sunshine to return so I can get all energized and do lots of stuff all at once.

One sure sign that winter's days are numbered is the traditional Nuit Blanche festival, the night where thousands upon thousands of young antsy Montrealers find themselves jammed together inside the Belgo building. My personal favorite event is Monastiraki's awesome collage party; Billy and Emilie are co-owners and they are super-duper people. They have a new baby but they were willing to stay up 'til midnight so everyone could collage their brains out. Here is my creation:

The one thing I have been enjoying about the winter in a purely visual sense are the frost-flowers on my windows. I find them so pretty that I feel compelled to record them for potential visual references in my work.

 Some of them look like tiny sea creatures.

A couple of weeks ago I did a presentation at my school for the first edition of CABARETEXTILE, a sort-of Pecha Kucha night loosely based on anything textile-related. I showed some pictures of weird macramé jugs, ugly crocheted capes, matching sweater sets and also a photo of a banana cream pie that went over really well. Here's a picture of me from that event looking kinda crazy.

Credit goes to Adam Cantor for digging this one up.

Warning: This Post Contains Jamaican Bad-Words!

Lily Hammer

Lately I have been on a 'Figure Skating Moments In History' kick - I had never really considered how deeply the drama of early-to-mid-'90s figure skating affected my childhood, specifically this infamous incident, but I guess it must have.  There was something very operatic about the whole thing that appeals to me still (although the costumes are silly and the music is tinny).

Trying to draw hands has always been a challenge for me.

Last Post 'Til Next Year

This afternoon I'm doing my '2013 In Review' exercise, looking through agendas and sketchbooks to remember important events and just reflect on the days of the year that was.

Above all, this year has been, for me, a time of very stimulating and exciting creative growth. I was especially inspired by my summer in Newfoundland, and I'm hopefully going to be returning again next summer. Though this year wasn't as explosively eventful or ground-shaking as 2012 (though that's probably a good thing...), 2013 for me was about steady, progressive building and exercising enough patience and diligence to see a project through. I think I matured a lot professionally.

Keeping up this blog in a regular way has been very useful in many ways, and though I don't know if anyone else actually looks at it occasionally, but if they do, I hope they enjoy it.

Here are some last few drawings to round out 2013 - and bring on 2014!

Comix in Classez

I haven't posted in a while, but here's something I made up while taking notes in class:

Haggletooth Snafu

My friend Adam and I made some drawings on post-its at  his garage sale a couple of weekends ago while waiting for customers. Adam's great blog can be viewed here - he takes strangers from Craigslist on field trips around Montreal and photographs them.

And some pictures of food: