Off for Framing... and Flowers!

I got the portrait of Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn to a good stopping point and gave it to my neighbor to build a frame for it. We have been trading work back and forth, I design print and website stuff for his carpentry business, and he builds me beautiful frames. It has been working out great. So while the portrait is across the street, I have been keeping myself busy with these flowers. I am making ten of these, plus the one in the portrait makes eleven. Eleven flowers for eleven years Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn spent in the labor camps.

The process for making these is quite simple. I tried to use mainly photos I took of the roses in my backyard. Once I ran out of those I turned to the internet. I didnt spend a lot of time on the actual details and getting everything perfect. I wanted to keep them a little sloppy. I painted each flower on the beginning of each chapter, 1-10, from Solzhenitsyn's book Cancer Ward (the same book I used for his portrait). I will be selling these flowers at the art show for pretty cheap. Like $20 a piece, cheap. So make sure you come get one before they are all gone!

Almost Finished...

After finishing up all the outlining, it was time to start filling in the body with black ink. I actually went back through and filled in all the smallest areas using that same fine point brush. I also used it to round out any detailed areas in preparation for a bigger brush. With artwork, I was always taught to use the biggest brush you can, and thats exactly what I did here. I used three different brush sizes to ink in all the areas. Below is as far as I got yesterday, that shoulder is responsible for most of my time...

My close friend and fellow world traveller has posted up Aleksander Solzhenitsyn's biography for this weeks Wikipedia Wednesday! Check it out here, and look at his site often. There is fresh and very entertaining posts daily and his music reviews are always right on. Thanks Brad!

And make sure you mark your calendars, call your friends, cancel your appointments, because Beneath the Broken Bottles and Cigarette Butts begins in 10 days!

Up close with the fine point brush.



Got the details in and even finished the flower. You can also see the pages I had to paste over for my late night shading mistakes. It all works out in the end... Now the body is ready for the big brush!