I checked out Nelsonville for the first time. I heard good things about the festival and watched it progressively get better and better acts. Thought about going last year actually but skipped it. This year the line-up was too good not to go.
(almost finished coloring this one. it’s a slow process as I’m fighting the photoshop brushes to get them to do what I want them to.)
Went to Derf’s talk at the Wexner last night. Slightly marred by this horse’s ass in the back who kept heckling Derf and the Wexner… the whole evening. Well until the police were called to escort him out. I think the guy confused the place with Bernie’s down the street.
Anyway good time despite that. Come to find out a lot about Derf. His process and background that’s pretty similar to mine, except he befriended a guy that turned out to be a serial killer. We both come from small rural towns. Though our styles are completely different, how we start a page and finish are pretty similar. I don’t block out any of my blacks and neither does he. A few years apart but growing up in rural isolation is a universal experience. Cripes, the high schools looked similar.
The whole evening was interesting. OSU’s student union has really improved since I was last in it. I had a Jamaican pork over plaintains & beans. Definitely not the sad options I had when I stayed there for some 4-H thing I vaguely remember.
(some people doodle on paper while taking calls. sometimes I doodle in photoshop. wasn’t half bad so I finished this at home)
Heard the sad news that Maurice Sendak had passed away this morning. He was 83. I don’t recall us owning any Where the Wild Things Are growing up on the farm. His work became a fast obsession while I was in college. Pouring through his books. His renderings were a joy to look at. Sendak created books for himself. They just happened to be sold as children books. He never coddled children or censored himself for the ‘children’s sake’. There’s something refreshing in that in this sanitized kids market. Sendak gave kids more credit than their parents did. Parents want to shelter their kids from the world which I think is a great disservice. Before Disney completely Disney-fied fairy tales, they were pretty jacked up by today’s standards. The original Red Riding Hood had the wolf gutted to release Red and her grandmother. This got switched to the wolf hiding granny in the closet instead of being eaten.
Rest in peace Mr. Sendak. I hope your supper is still hot when you get home.
Thanks to Packrat for having me at their FCBD extravaganza. I was a little nervous going in, last year didn’t go so well. There was a group email sent out that there were only half-tables. I had a half-table last year tucked in a corner. It didn’t start to improve till late in the show when the guy next to me called it a day. I was able to spread out but it was too late. To my surprise, when I arrived at my table, it was a full table. Yay. I feel very fortunate as space was really tight this year. They lost the space they usually have to a renter in the strip mall.
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