J is for John
Posted on March 7th, 2011
J is for John by Amy Crook
My second Sherlock Holmes/Edward Gorey pastiche, this one is based off of “J is for James who took lye by mistake” from The Gashlycrumb Tinies and BBC’s new Sherlock tv series.
Click the image if you’d like to really see the ridiculously obsessive line work — the wallpaper was particularly labor-intensive, and I have no one but myself to blame. I’ve been in a mood lately to do work like this, that involves a lot of tiny pen-and-ink details, and unlike similar attempts when I was younger, I find it rather meditative now. I often put on audio recordings and just sit and let the two things filter into my brain, though there are frequent breaks to IM friends and goof off online, not to mention stretching my back and resting my poor hand.
Now that I’ve got the techniques down, I have to figure out what I can do with them that isn’t a parody, pastiche or plain old copy, though.
J is for John who took lye by mistake, 8.5″x5″ pen and ink on sketchbook paper, sold.
You can still get the pair of them as handmade blank greeting cards on Etsy, though!
Categories: Daily Art, People, Figures and Faces, Series and Books, Things I'm a Fan Of
Tags: baker street tinies, crosshatching, edward gorey, nfs, pastiche, pen and ink, sherlock, sold, watson
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Weeble Wednesday: Bat!
Posted on March 5th, 2011
Weeble Bat by Amy Crook
When I asked my friends what other cards I should do for Halloween, they were unanimous in requesting a bat, so here he is! I elected to save myself some future carpal tunnel and colored the background with Photoshop, but the rest of it’s done by hand with my trusty Copic markers.
I love the patterns bats make when they fly, so different from birds somehow, so I drew in a few of his friends who are flying off into the sunset without him. Don’t worry, though, he’ll catch up, he was just mugging for the “photo.”
Weeble Bat, 5″x7″ pen and ink and Copic marker on watercolor paper.
Categories: Daily Art, Series and Books, Whimsical and Strange, Zombies, Skulls, and Other Morbid Things
Tags: bat, copic marker, halloween, pen and ink, photoshop, weeble
Lovecraftian Wallpaper
Posted on March 4th, 2011
Lovecraftian Wallpaper pattern by Amy Crook
My second and much sillier wallpaper experiment, I decided to try a repeating motif of tentacles and eldritch horror, or at least creepy eyes. If you click on this one you can see it larger and with a bit more vertical repeat as well, to get a better idea of how it would look staring out at you from your walls.
Definitely not a bedroom pattern for those prone to nightmares, anyway!
I think it might make fun pyjamas, though I’d probably make the background green darker and the eye a properly evil yellow, were I to bother getting a Spoonflower sample. I keep thinking it’d be fun to have my own designs on my pyjama bottoms, and then I remember that means I’d have to actually sew them. Sad, really.
Lovecraftian Pyjama pattern by Amy Crook
Categories: Angels, Cthulhu, and Other Myths, Daily Art, Tentacles
Tags: cthulhu, nfs, wallpaper
Box of Envy
Posted on March 3rd, 2011
Box of Envy by Amy Crook
I was torn for what to call this experimental little watercolor piece, so I poked around quote sites until I found a Shakespearian insult from Troilus and Cressida, “Thou damnable box of envy.” I liked the way the metaphor fit with the one I’d created, especially mixed with the shades of green from teal to chartreuse that permeate the image.
Box of Envy, 6″x4.25″ watercolor on handmade watercolor postcard.
Categories: Abstract and Just Plain Weird, Daily Art
Tags: for sale, postcard, watercolor
Weeble Wednesday: Dancing Skeleton
Posted on March 2nd, 2011
Dancing Skeleton by Amy Crook
This little guy is a sketch I did during a slow moment when I was having a “Meet the Artist” day last month. My window at the Book Shop is down now, but this funky little guy lives on.
Categories: Daily Art, Whimsical and Strange, Zombies, Skulls, and Other Morbid Things
Tags: nfs, pen and ink, weeble
Tentacle Deeps 3
Posted on March 1st, 2011
Tentacle Deeps 3 by Amy Crook
It’s officially a series now because there’s 3 of them, so I gave them their own tag. I’ve made up some more blanks for different ones, greens and reds, so expect a few more before I get tired of painting them.
This one was a different sort of paper, recycled watercolor greeting cards, and I painted over the faint image with rich, opaque Japanese sumi-e inks. I let the paper mostly dry, and then made a mixture of black and green. Between the paper and the wetness of the inks, the tentacles tended to pick up on the color beneath more than the previous two pieces, giving them a faded feeling. I also shaded the paint using blue-violet to blue-green from left to right rather than vertically shading from light to dark, and covered the whole page rather than leaving a white border, so the whole piece has a slightly different feel to it than the others.
Tentacle Deeps 3, 5″x7″ ink and watercolor on watercolor paper.
I also made another computer wallpaper and iPhone wallpaper for this one — please let me know if you download them.
Tentacle Deeps 3, framed, by Amy Crook
Categories: Angels, Cthulhu, and Other Myths, Daily Art, Free Wallpapers, Series and Books, Tentacles
Tags: blue, for sale, iphone, tentacle deeps, wallpaper, watercolor
Blood Moon
Posted on February 28th, 2011
Blood Moon by Amy Crook
Tonight I got out some watercolor paper and my paints and sat down to just play. I painted a number of washes for future use. This red-pink circle had dried just enough that, once the paints were put away, I sat with a red fountain pen and just started shading. Once I’d put in a small section of red on red, I started to see the moon shape forming, so I finished it up deliberately. Then, at the end, I took a darker red pen and put in the little spirals, over the places I’d dripped in a bit of blue-black when the wash was still wet.
I used a simpler texture than the one from my Texture Experiment 1, which let the work go faster and less precisely. In general, however, I’m finding a heretofore-unknown penchant for obsessive detail and crosshatching. I must be maturing; the last time I tried it with etching, I hated the fine, tedious work.
Blood Moon, 5″x5″ watercolor, pen and ink on reused watercolor paper, sold.
Categories: Abstract and Just Plain Weird, Daily Art, Whimsical and Strange
Tags: blood moon, crosshatching, moon, nfs, pen and ink, sold, spiral, watercolor
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