Tag Archives: desert

The Desert Year Part III

Leave a reply

This is obviously just the attribution to the quote, and I was kind of out of steam. But the cactus came out cool. I made the saguaros wavy because that’s actually how they look when it rains. They store up so much water they get little rolls like fat. When they don’t get any rain, they shrivel up and get skinny and look sad. I like them fat and jolly like this.

The prickly pear has one pad shaped like heart, because when you go among prickly pears, there’s always one pad shaped like a heart.

Usually I guess I go a little brighter for the summer bulletin board, but overall I’m satisfied. I know it’s not summertime for most of the country yet, but it’s definitely summertime here in the desert.

The Desert Year II

Leave a reply

This is the second part of the Joseph Wood Krutch quote from A Desert Year. This image is also kind of minimalistic compared to my other work, and the photo also doesn’t quite do it justice.

If you zoom in you can see that the raindrops have a sort of Eric Carle thing going on. I wanted then to look sort of luminous and I thought I could use use the metallic markers on the black paper but that wasn’t bright enough. So I colored a variety of blues with a bit of green and purple to cover a bit of white paper and cut the raindrops from that, and the effect is pretty good. I added some staples to make it look wetter.

Jackalope!

Leave a reply

So, the thing about true cryptids is that they’re all made up. Some cryptids turn out to be real animals, but most of them reside in the collective unconscious, inspired, I believe by the intersection of the natural world with the boundaries of human knowledge. The jackalope, as far as I can tell, is a 20th century cryptid, created, I’m guessing, to sell southwestern merchandise, and perhaps to share the mystique of the desert and inspire romantic thinking about the region. It may not have the same glorious history as some fantastic creatures, but it holds a place in the hearts of many.

I was asked to create banners for the seven columns in the library, and when I asked what I should depict on the banners, I was told “I don’t know. A mix of realistic and magical?” What’s a more appropriate mixture of realism and magic, than a taxidermied bunny with antlers sewn to it?

I wish I could say there was a greater meaning behind this mythology, but I just don’t think there is. I think someone just made it up for marketing purposes.

But I love it, and the kids seem to like it too. One of them told me his nickname at home is Jackalope, and he was quite touched by the homage.

More to come, of course.

Summer Starts NOW

Leave a reply

In all the world, there is no time or place like the Sonoran Desert in Summer.

I’m still slowly coming back from my COVID deficits, and haven’t been as productive as I like, but today was the last day of school, and I managed to put this one in in record time, probably only about 3 hours, mostly because the cactus and the bat are the only pieces I cut out of paper, and everything, including the spines on the cactus and all the details on the bat, are drawn with metallic markers, which really look pretty stunning against the black background.

The cactus, is, of course, a saguaro. The bat is a Mexican free-tailed bat, which summers here and gobbles up our local mosquitoes before heading back to Mexico when the temperature drops in the fall.

In hindsight, I realize I didn’t want to put stars in the part that is supposed to be the shadowed bit of the moon. Oh well. It’s not a scientific illustration, although I did make the bat look pretty true to form.

I have one other cool and timely thing to share, but I’m going to make a separate post for it.

Another Sonoran Switchplate

3 Replies

I’m painting a lot lately, and I am working on a bigger canvas all week: it’s about 4 feet high and 18 inches wide. Making a lot of progress and wasn’t done painting for the day, but I needed to let that project rest/dry, so I did another switchplate. I’ve been wanting to do this design for a while. Honestly part of the problem was that I couldn’t find a screwdriver. However, I persevered.

It started out pretty good but then some of the paint pens exploded, and some of the pens weren’t flowing so all. I cleaned it up as best I could but some bits of it were better before. Paint pens are less versatile than actual paints. Still, it’s about what I wanted. I meant to put it by my front door, and put the zentangle that’s there now in my studio, but in fact they’re different plates. The one in the front has 3 switches.

Only 2 blank switchplates left in this house. Gonna have to start painting the walls soon.

Local Monsters on RedBubble

Leave a reply

I had a few (local) requests for this design on a T-shirt, so here it is. I tweaked the colors and fixed the font, but otherwise, it’s the same design as the Halloween bulletin board that inspired it. And it can be yours on a T-shirt, sticker, mug, water bottle, and dozens of other functional products.

Check out Respect Your Local Monsters in my RedBubble shop. (This is a great time to buy from RedBubble. Pretty much everything is on sale!)

Sonoran Switchplate

1 Reply
This one matches its environment.

That’s 4 down, 3 to go. I like this one better than the ones I did the other day. The green pens are still acting weird but at least I got the paint to flow out of them. Unfortunately, it flowed into a puddle, but I made it work, more or less.

This design fits with the other decoration on the wall near it. I think I’m going to move the zentangle into my office and make the one in the front a sunset landscape. And then the one in the den will match my ketubah. Not sure about the kitchen; you can barely see that switch to begin with.

anyway, this is how it looks where I live.

Welcome to Chupacabra Country

Leave a reply
The chupacabras are happy you’re here.

Last year I was out in the desert with the Fox and he suggested we take a bushwhacking off-trail detour to look at a hilarious piece of graffiti someone left. “Welcome to Chupacabra Country,” it said on the back of same random abandoned building. This is indeed the land of the fearsome goatsucker. And the inscription stuck with me so long that I went out and got some polymer clay and made this plaque for the Fox to enjoy.

This is my first time using polymer clay in this way. I made a lot of mistakes. I learned a lot.

The color is Unicorn Spit, which I had also never used before. Lots to learn.

I made the letters by pressing an old set of refrigerator magnets into the clay. The little dots in each letter were actually formed by the magnet.

Probably will make another plaque like this for myself, but I think I’ll flip the coloring so the background is read and the lettering is yellow.

Three Saguaros: Father’s Day in the Desert

Leave a reply
The real desert shinier and pricklier.

Wow, it’s been so long since I’ve posted something here that WordPress actually logged me out of the site. That never happens.

I have made some art, but most of it was for a book that hasn’t been published yet and the editors asked me not to share it yet. But also, the world is on fire (here in Arizona literally, and figuratively everywhere else) and it’s hard to focus. I’ve been reading a lot.

This card is for my father, who loves cactus, for Father’s Day. By the time this page is published, I’ll have given it to him in a socially distant way. Happy Father’s Day, Dad!