Blog « Antemortem Arts | Art & Writing by Amy Crook

Country Mouse, City Mouse

Posted on June 20th, 2010

Country Mouse, City Mouse by Amy Crook

Country Mouse, City Mouse by Amy Crook

This is another tiny bedside-notebook doodle, this one inspired in part by the Aesop’s Fable, and in part by one of my not-so-secret addictions, the Facebook game MouseHunt. I imagine the country mouse is from somewhere far away from Gnawnia and its strange mice and determined hunters with their bizarre traps, while the city mouse would fit right in with the other denizens of the kingdom.

Categories: Daily Art, Things I'm a Fan Of, Whimsical and Strange
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If Wishes Were Fishes

Posted on June 19th, 2010

If Wishes Were Fishes by Amy Crook

If Wishes Were Fishes by Amy Crook

This doodle springs from a conflation of two sayings my Mom used to use, “If wishes were fishes, we’d live in the sea,” and “If wishes were horses, then beggars would ride.” Somehow my brain mixed the two up, and we have this doodle — “If wishes were fishes, then beggars would ride.” I went Seussian with the fish, giving the whole thing a cheerful, if surrealistic, feel.

Click the image to see it bigger!

Categories: Daily Art, People, Figures and Faces, Sea Creatures and Other Animals, Tentacles, Whimsical and Strange
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Reflect

Posted on June 18th, 2010

Reflect, detail, by Amy Crook

Reflect, 3″x3″ monoprint on 9″x9″ watercolor paper

This monoprint has always made me think of giant, ancient trees growing right at the edge of a pond, reflected such that it’s hard to tell where the trees end and the water begins. You might see something totally different, of course, since this is a very abstract image. I did a couple of prints with this color scheme, I’ll try to post the other one tomorrow or next week. Actually, I used to dye my hair both of those colors at one point, though these days I don’t like to bleach it out in order to go blue or green, so mostly I stick to red or purple.

A monoprint is created by using thick, fingerpaint-like water-based inks to paint onto a blank acrylic printing plate, and then running the result through a press with wet paper just like an etching. It creates a single one-of-a-kind print that’s a merger of painting and randomness, the image flipped and often changed by the pressure and the way the ink interacts with the water-soaked paper. I would often print half a dozen in the course of a session and only keep the ones I really liked.

Reflect by Amy Crook

Reflect by Amy Crook

Categories: Abstract and Just Plain Weird, Daily Art, Flowers, Trees and Landscapes
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Being Your Slave

Posted on June 17th, 2010

Being Your Slave, art by Amy Crook, poem by Shakespeare

Being Your Slave, 9″x12″ oil on canvas board, poem by William Shakespeare

A recent late-night discussion on Twitter about the movie The Pillow Book with Ewan McGregor reminded me of this piece, so I thought I’d post it for today’s art. Shakespeare’s Sonnet 57 adorns the chest of our nameless man, the swirls and strokes of hand-painted calligraphy decorating the planes and valleys of his torso.

I first painted the figure itself, and then once it was dry the painstaking brush calligraphy was applied by hand on top. I suspect the process, while far easier on the flat surface, is a lot less fun when the person in question is merely a painting.

This piece is painted on canvas board, which is primed canvas wrapped around a cardboard base rather than stretched on wooden bars. Because of the nature of the piece, it wants to lean insouciantly against a stack of books or be tucked into a nook in a bookshelf rather than framed and hung — any frame or matte it was put in would obscure part of the calligraphy.

I’m not sure if Shakespeare would approve of the use to which I’ve put his words, but given his penchant for low humour and bawdy lines, I like to think he’d be amused.

Categories: Daily Art, Nudes and Other Sexy Things, People, Figures and Faces, Things I'm a Fan Of
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Bonus Cartoon! Chris Anthony

Posted on June 17th, 2010

Chris Anthony by Amy Crook

Chris Anthony by Amy Crook

Apparently I completely forgot to make an art post yesterday, oops! Busy Amy is busy, but at least I got banana bread made before the bananas got too ripe, which made an excellent breakfast.

A few months back I had a chance to turn Chris Anthony of Etherjammer into a cartoon, and I never did post it here, so I thought I’d put it up today as bonus art (yes, this means today’s real art post will follow). His cartoon was especially fun because of the challenge of drawing a weeble with facial hair — interesting placing a mustache on someone with no nose!

If you want to be a cartoon, I’d love to draw you!

Categories: Completed Commissions, Daily Art, People, Figures and Faces
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Cartoon! Wendy & Me

Posted on June 14th, 2010

Wendy and Me by Amy Crook

Wendy and Me by Amy Crook

Today’s art is another cartoon, this time of me and Wendy Cholbi, tech mermaid. Wendy wanted to expand her WordPress Installation offerings to include a package with some design included, and so I drew up this image to go with our bios on the sales page. It was fun not only to make Wendy into a mermaid, but to give my hair a bit of extra color (in real life that color would be so hard to maintain!) as well as the bunny ears, and a couple of t-shirts from ThinkGeek that neither of us actually owns — yet.

We’re also doing a free Website Color Clinic call on Wednesday to help people pick their own web palettes. Come join us and listen to me babble nervously about color!

Categories: Angels, Cthulhu, and Other Myths, Daily Art, People, Figures and Faces, Sea Creatures and Other Animals, Things I'm a Fan Of, Whimsical and Strange
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Monster Under the Bed

Posted on June 13th, 2010

Monster Under the Bed by Amy Crook

Monster Under the Bed by Amy Crook

This is another wee bedside doodle, this one dipping its toe into the horror genre. I swear to this day a part of me still believes in things that lurk under the bed — how else to explain the sound of something sliding against the metal frame when both cats are asleep, and in sight?

Categories: Angels, Cthulhu, and Other Myths, Daily Art, People, Figures and Faces, Tentacles, Zombies, Skulls, and Other Morbid Things
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