Archive for the ‘Drawing’ Category

July 20, 2011
Trimmed and burning

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Heceda Head Light, OR

As you may have noticed, I kind of have a thing for lighthouses.

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Point Wilson Light, Port Townsend, WA

It’s no surprise they’ve cropped up in my work lately, since my corner of the world is fair teeming with them.

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Tatoosh Island, Cape Flattery, WA

But I find myself sneaking them in every now and again, even when it’s not strictly necessary.

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Cape Disappointment, Ilwaco, WA

So you can imagine my excitement on my Pacific coast trip,

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Point Reyes, CA

upon finding a beacon practically around every corner.

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Battery Point, Crescent City, CA

So you can bet that on my trip back east,

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Umpqua River Light, Winchester Bay, OR

I’ll be keeping a sharp eye out.

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Point Robinson Light, Maury Island, WA

And I’m betting that if my drawing hand has anything to do with it, something new will come out of it before long.

Posted by Chandler at 8:00 AM in Adventure, Drawing, Illustration, Letterpress, Life, Pacific Northwest, T-Town, Travel  |  Permalink  |   Comments (1)
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July 13, 2011
Pirate’s cove

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My next stop on the trip was one I would have made anyway, just for the sheer natural beauty. But what really happened is that I let my inner movie geek take over. Recognize that location?

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Ah, Cannon Beach. Home of the iconic Haystack Rock and filming location for a whole host of movies. I would have loved to stay longer, but the only thing likely to roll in that morning wasn’t a pirate ship—

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—it was another storm.

I finally managed to tear my eyes from the ominous horizon—less gaping, more fleeing!—but as I turned to walk back to the car, I happened to glance northward:

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The moment was more like an instant; there was just enough time to let the shutter fly before the light disappeared.

As the first sheet of rain reached me, I jumped in the car and got the heck out of there.

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At last I was finally back on my mental map, with just a sliver of Oregon remaining. Within minutes I was perched at the summit of my favorite place to watch the clouds, where the weather is always changing: Astoria.

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I stopped to fill in a few of the last remaining nooks and crannies in my sketchbook,

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and then set about finishing what I started the last time I was in town. Without a detailed map or internet access to tell me where to go, all I could do was wander around. But that’s the best way to explore a place like Astoria—and I found what I was searching for anyway.

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Look familiar?

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Or how about this?

Even if I hadn’t been location scouting, I had my hands full with a beautiful panorama around every corner. I love the view of the bridge from here.

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That bridge. Oh, my.

But staring into the mouth of the mighty Columbia, just as the rain turned into a heavy snow squall, reminded me that home was still many miles away—and that I was hoping to get there before dark.

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There was just enough time for one final rainbow,

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and then I embarked on the last lonely stretch of empty road.

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As I pulled over for my last glimpse of the Pacific, I realized that I’d come almost exactly 1000 miles along the coast. Even with six days spent on the road, those miles flashed by entirely too quickly. But then I remembered that I still had the southern half of Highway One left to explore—and the promise of a whole lot of meandering, some day, to get there.

Sounds like a plan.

Posted by Chandler at 9:00 AM in Adventure, Drawing, Life, Pacific Northwest, Travel  |  Permalink  |   Comments (1)
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June 30, 2011
Butterfat Palaces

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Eureka!

(Sorry. I just felt a great need to say that. Ahem.)

Located on a flat coastal plain, exactly halfway between two redwood forests, is the city of Eureka, CA. I stopped there for a cuppa after my sojourn in the trees, and was charmed in a heartbeat.

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Thanks to its obvious proximity to timber, Eureka is chock-a-block with fancy Victorian and Art Deco architecture. And it’s not the only town on the Redwood coast that can make that claim. I wandered into a bookstore downtown, and found a volume on the subject—it mentioned a whole host of nearby towns teeming with Victorian buildings.

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Since one of them was only a few miles away, in the direction I’d already come, I turned around and headed back up the valley to Ferndale.

ferndale_4_4544This “Cream City” had its heyday in the 1880s, when the area’s prosperous dairy farms provided much of the wealth that built the town. These affluent farmers built ornate and sumptuous homes there—which the locals nicknamed “Butterfat Palaces.”

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When I got there, the light was fading fast; looks like the cream would have to wait.

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So I spent the night here,

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and after an early breakfast, I took a stroll around town.

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As seemed to be a running theme for the trip, I had the place to myself. The only sounds I heard were mourning doves and lowing cattle—and the early morning glow bathed the buildings in sunlight.

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Ferndale is a tiny town; if you add up all its historic buildings you might get three or four city blocks. But the place is worth its weight in butter when it comes to the details.

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Those details actually played a large part in saving the place from destruction and “urban renewal.” In the 1940s the buildings on main street were slated for demolition, until a local resident bought up every threatened building, and then painted them in outrageous Victorian colors—essentially creating the tourist draw the place enjoys today.

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Now, I probably could have stared at this stuff all day, but then I turned a corner, and stopped dead in my tracks. But before I go on, I have to provide a little back story.

The Tailor and I have a tradition of putting together a jigsaw puzzle on New Year’s Day (a riveting pastime, I know, but we love it)—we’re always raiding thrift stores in search of the next puzzle. This year’s was an image of an ornate victorian house, in some town I’d never heard of.

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Well, when I turned that corner, I was absolutely gobsmacked to discover it was the jigsaw puzzle house!

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Let me introduce you to the Gingerbread Mansion. It’s a place I know well, having reconstructed its facade from 1000 pieces of cardboard.

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I meant to stay longer and do a more complex drawing, but it was cold that morning, and it felt like I was going to freeze my fingers off. It looked like quick sketches were going to be another theme for the trip.

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So I completed the loop of my walk instead, and discovered my favorite Butterfat Palace of them all. I mean, come on! Who doesn’t love gumdrop topiary trees?

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And that pink door! Just enchanting.

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So … when can I move in?

Posted by Chandler at 10:00 AM in Adventure, Drawing, Life, Travel  |  Permalink  |   Comments (1)
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June 24, 2011
Cathedral trees

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The tree is more than first a seed, then a stem, then a living trunk,
and then dead timber.  The tree is a slow, enduring force straining
to win the sky.

—Antoine de Saint-Exupéry

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I’ve had four months now to mull over the experience of driving through a redwood forest in the early morning, in complete solitude and silence. And even now, there really are no words to describe it.

Now, I seem to have plenty of words to describe the phenomenon of drive-through trees, which, in my humble opinion, are a perfectly concise illustration of exactly everything that is wrong with America.

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Thankfully, though, a redwood forest by its very nature makes it easy to ignore such things. Because my brain certainly wasn’t going to get a handle on what my eyes were seeing—nor was my camera.

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And neither, it turns out, was my paintbrush. I needed a sketchbook that was six inches wide by about twenty feet tall.

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And then I realized that I needed a sense of scale, a point of reference. Enter the only other car I saw that morning, and my wide-angle lens.

Eh. That’s still not it. The only thing to do is to go there in person, crane your neck, and gaze upward in wonder.

Posted by Chandler at 12:00 PM in Adventure, Drawing, Life, Travel  |  Permalink  |   Comments (1)
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June 19, 2011
Land’s end

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Even though my trip south originally brought me across the Bay, it seemed like San Francisco was the logical starting point for my long trek home along the coast. So before I crossed the bridge,

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I decided to inaugurate the journey with a quick sketch. Of course, then I had to resist the urge to get sucked in and just stay there all day (all week, all year…), just soaking in the place. But then I realized that San Francisco is quickly becoming what New York always was to me in the past: my go-to destination, my sister city. That thought—and the knowledge that I’d most definitely be back (and back, and back…)—gave me the wherewithal to stick to the plan.

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So I waved a quick goodbye on the other side of the Gate (and that Journey song popped into my head for the umpteenth time that trip), and headed north.

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It wasn’t long before I’d left civilization almost completely behind. My chosen route was the (in)famous Highway One, which winds a precarious path along the shore, with breathtaking views and treacherous challenges at every hairpin turn. In other words, it was perfect in nearly every way. Despite the environmental guilt of it all, I confess that I love driving—and hugging the curves of 300 miles of switchbacks in a stick-shift Subaru? Pure, unadulterated bliss. And while I missed the company of the Tailor, or any of my other traditional travel buddies, it was nice to be able to stop and take a picture every thirty seconds, without the risk of annoying anyone!

Anyway, I knew that by traveling the Coast Highway on a weekday in February, I’d have the place pretty much to myself. But I was completely unprepared for the solitude that awaited me at my first stop along the way: Point Reyes National Seashore.

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Point Reyes is a long, jagged cape with an equally long history. Sir Francis Drake reportedly landed there in 1579, and people have inhabited it, farmed it, settled it, and even wrecked their ships upon it for many, many generations. Since the 1850s much of the land has been parceled out into dairy farms, which are still in operation today, thanks to the protection of the National Park Service.

What first struck me about the place is the near total absence of trees. The place reminded me more of the Scottish highlands than anything I’d seen in California—and in fact, one of the few small towns located on the peninsula is called Inverness.

And I’m sure that at the height of summer, the place is crawling with tourists—but that day I was completely alone. For miles and miles and miles, it was just me and the cows.

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Oh, yeah, and these gals.

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I hadn’t intended to travel the whole length of the cape; I wasn’t on a fixed timetable or anything, but by that point it was already late morning. But I saw a sign indicating a lighthouse ahead, so I kept going. There was no mile count on the sign, and I didn’t bother to fish out the map. It couldn’t be far, right? Well, the road wound on and on and on, with no sign of a lighthouse, and no indication of where this would end. But then, a full twenty miles on, the track came to an abrupt end. I got out of the car, faced back north, and nearly had to pick my jaw up off the ground.

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The lighthouse was just a short hike from there:

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I could see why people were forever dashing their boats upon the rocks.

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And that wasn’t the only thing I could see. I was staring into the bright teal surf when something surfaced and caught my eye:

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A gray whale! It’s funny—I’ve lived on one coast or another for over eleven years of my life, and I’d never seen a whale in person before. If that wasn’t worth the forty-mile detour, I don’t know what is.

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By then the morning was gone, and I was beginning to crisp in the sun. So I did one quick, 2-minute watercolor, and made the long trek back to the highway.

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The remaining stretch of Highway One was almost equally deserted. It made the miles melt away quickly, and gave me the feeling that I had the whole Pacific to myself.

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Before long, the rolling hills and eucalyptus trees tapered off,

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and the landscape gave way to cypress stands and evergreen forests.

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The road ended just as the day did. As the sun went down the path turned eastward, away from the shore, and plunged into the thick darkness of coastal forest. By the time I pulled into a hotel for the night, it was pitch black, and Highway One had been replaced by the other Pacific Highway: US 101. I was in completely unfamiliar territory, and would be until I came all the way north to Astoria several days later, but despite the darkness and lack of bearings, I knew what lay ahead. And I was almost too excited to sleep, because I knew that in the morning, the sun would reveal exactly where I was: in the heart of redwood country.

Posted by Chandler at 12:00 PM in Adventure, Drawing, Life, Travel  |  Permalink  |   Comments (4)
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June 14, 2011
Hitting the road

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My usually insatiable wanderlust has been at an absolute fever pitch lately—and a recent, intense case of studio burnout has only intensified the feeling. So in order to recharge the old battery a bit, and maybe stir up some brand new inspiration, I’m closing up shop and hitting the road. The Tailor and I are embarking on an epic five-week cross-country adventure, starting tomorrow morning. Along the way, if all goes according to plan, we’ll visit eighteen states and six Canadian provinces—and probably a host of camera stores on either side of the border, since I don’t think I’ll ever have enough memory cards to keep up with my trigger finger.

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We’ll be back in the third week of July, which will give Jessica and me just enough time to design and print a new Dead Feminist broadside, and then hop a plane with the stack of prints. Jessica and I will be among the presenters at the first annual Ladies of Letterpress Conference in Asheville, North Carolina. If you happen to be local (and since a curiously huge percentage of our customers and followers live in NC, you might be!), swing on by and say hello! The conference will be held on August 5-7—as far as we know, we’ll be up to bat on the first evening.

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So as you can see, I’m going to have some blogging to do in the near future. Which reminds me that I never had the chance to report back about my last road trip. Either time flies, or I’m spinning too many plates. Since I won’t be set up to live-blog from the road this summer, I’ve queued up a series of posts about the Pacific Coast Highway to run while I’m away. It’s almost like being in two places at once!

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But before we traipse from coast to coast,

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there are still a whole lot of ducks (plovers?) to line up.

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There are keys to turn over to the house-sitters, packages to load into the car … and so help me, I’ve got to remember to water the plants!

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So anyway, you take the high road, and I’ll take the low road,

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and we’ll meet up again, at the other end.

Posted by Chandler at 7:23 PM in Adventure, Drawing, Life, Travel  |  Permalink  |   Comments (6)
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January 01, 2011
Turning the page

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This might seem a little strange, coming from me, but the New Year’s resolution at the top of my “art” category is to draw more.

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I mean that I’d like to spend more time with my sketchbooks—with everything else that happened last year, there just didn’t seem to be a spare second for observing the moment and jotting it down.

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The daily book was about the only thing that received any attention, and even it spent the entire year on the back-back-back burner.

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I still have quite a bit of catching up to do there, though—

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so that’s where I’m going to start.

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It’s a daunting prospect; even just filling in half-finished sketches (maybe I should have shown you those instead!) amounts to a huge time investment, and a mountain of work.

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But I’ll get there. And besides, it’s those last two blank slots on every page that interest me the most.

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They stand for the future that’s unwritten, and I find I can’t imagine what could possibly complete the picture—nor could I ever have predicted what has ended up here thus far.

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When I first started this project, it seemed like a painfully slow undertaking.

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But now I’m surprised at how quickly the book is filling up,

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and I’m anxious to find out what will fill out this page—and the next, and the next.

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Well, today I flip the book back to the beginning, pencil in hand—and so I’ll find out soon enough.

Happy New Year!

Posted by Chandler at 6:17 PM in Book Arts, Drawing, Illustration, Life, T-Town  |  Permalink  |   Comments (6)
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December 25, 2010
Merry and bright

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I was afraid I wasn’t going to have any holiday photos to show you—when I was in Portland the other week, my camera took a nosedive after being bumped off my shoulder in a crowded room.

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Snippets from my daily journal

So I shipped the lens off to the good folks at Canon for repair, and switched to paper for awhile.

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One of Maurice Sendak’s eye-candy stage sets for the Pacific NW Ballet’s Nutcracker

My favorite thing about sketchbooks is that I can take them anywhere—including places where cameras, functioning or not, are strictly verboten.

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More Nutcracker scenery, plus Christmas on Pine Street in Seattle

The downside, though, is that it takes me a lot longer to draw a picture than to shoot one—so my output is always smaller than I’d like.

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But then the Fedex guy showed up with my lens, good as new and just in time for Christmas.

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I managed to refrain from hugging him, and then hopped around the house in manic glee, documenting the holiday the Tailor and I have spent all week creating.

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(We finally broke down and bought twinkle lights for the tree; which provided the perfect inspiration for this year’s card!)

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Wherever today finds you, have a warm, cozy, abundant, and very merry Christmas.

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Posted by Chandler at 1:29 PM in Book Arts, Drawing, Illustration, Life, Pacific Northwest  |  Permalink  |   Comments (5)
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December 07, 2010
Interview: Mirka Hokkanen

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I am always inspired by people who can create a whole world with just their own two hands. Take my friend Mirka Hokkanen—she’s a printmaker, illustrator and crafter who seems to be well on her way toward shaping her own universe with pen and ink, and needle and thread. And the best part: we’re all invited to the party. Tacoma folks might recognize Mirka from the Tacoma is for Lovers or numerous other Northwest craft fairs, where she never fails to draw a crowd to her table like kids to a candy store. But her toys and accessories are just one small facet of Mirka’s world—she is equally at home (and even more engaging) in a gallery, or a classroom.

Originally hailing from Finland, Mirka moved to the U.S. over a decade ago to attend college in Rockford, Illinois. She finished her BFA in 2002, and moved on to receive both MA and MFA degrees in printmaking from University of Dallas. She has taught printmaking and art history at the college level, and has exhibited her work both nationally and internationally. She currently resides in Dupont, Washington with her husband, an officer in the U.S. Army. I asked Mirka to chat with me about her work, and what it’s like to juggle teaching, a full-time fine art career, a small business, and life in the military.

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How did you get started with printmaking?

Ever since I can remember I have loved to draw. Paint just really was not my thing. I had never really tried printmaking, except for the random linocut in school, until I went to college in Rockford. I took printmaking my first semester and was hooked. I was initially drawn to the possibilities of making drawings that I could reproduce and the idea of multiples and all the possibilities that came with it.

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I’ve seen you work with many different printmaking techniques—from traditional to experimental. Do you have a favorite printmaking method?

Intaglio is my first love and still my favorite medium, because of the lines. I love the depth and variety of line work and marks that one can print from an etching plate- there’s nothing like the satisfaction of pulling off that first print from your plate. I am also hooked on really detailed work and love all the processes that go into a finished print. I have worked in just about every other printmaking media, relief prints, screen printing, letterpress, some lithography and mixed media work and encaustics and magnets.  I am working right now to learn more about engraving and letterpress.

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Because my husband is in the military, shop availability changes all the time as we move and I get to know the print community in a certain area. After the initial idea for a piece, I figure out what kind of equipment I have access to and then figure out what media to use for the print. I love that printmaking offers such a wide variety of techniques and I can change the technique to something else, when I get bored with it. On the other hand I do like to work somewhat consistently with a media when I get started. You get a feel for the material and tools you are working with, and it is hard to change daily from lets say a linocut that needs a strong hand to an etching with fine lines. I have slowly acquired an etching press and a small letterpress, so I am currently working on small relief prints and engravings to print in my home studio.

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What inspires you (other artists, places, objects, etc.)?

Oh my, so many things can inspire me. I have lived somewhat of a gypsy life since childhood. Nature and animals have always been a grounding and soothing element for me with all the hassles that come with moving. In the woods I can center myself, find peace and really appreciate God’s creation and the mind staggering diversity of it. I also am drawn to old worn out things, that you can find in antique shops and fleamarkets (to my husband’s joy). It’s fascinating to imagine who owned them and what kind of a life they lived. The torn, worn and tattered surfaces of the objects tell the story of how it was made, used and then cast aside.

Historical artists such as Joseph Cornell, Albrecht Dürer and Norbertine Bresslern-Roth are some of my favorite artists. I am normally drawn to a type of work more than a specific artist. In my studio lies a box with innumerable clippings and postcards of favorite works. When I am looking for inspiration to start working, I’ll often flip through pictures, to get my mind working. In general my eye catches things that I am conscious of in my own work- something that makes me chuckle, beautiful lines, earthy colors or a worn look.

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Your work often deals with animal themes, and runs the gamut between innocent storytelling and black political humor. How do animals tie these things together? What draws you to animals in your work?

I have always loved to depict animals over people. I found them more interesting to draw with fur and patterns than people with skin. As I got older and more serious as an artist, it seemed that depicting animals was a less confrontational way to address sensitive issues, like factory farming, than if I had directly pointed a finger at you. I wanted more of an open approach to let people think for themselves rather than forcing my opinions on them.

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Animals also hold so much symbolism and meaning in every culture. We can see them as gods, symbols, metaphors, heroes, food, clothing and objects. We reflect ourselves on them or give them anthropomorphic qualities, they are leading characters in folktales and modern movies. It is interesting to dwell in our relationship with them, and bring it out on paper.

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You also create stuffed toys, which are really beautifully designed and cleverly constructed. I tend to think of them as part of your whole body of work, but you seem to keep them pretty separate from your prints and illustrations. Is there a reason for that?

I have made some stuffed animals as part of an exhibition before but in general I have tried to keep them separate. I figured that to be taken seriously as a young artist, it was better to be just a printmaker and keep the cute handcrafts on the side. I originally just sewed little things for myself and for gifts. While in GA I had a hard time getting access to any printmaking facilities, so the handcrafts started to pile up on my free time. I started an Etsy shop, through which I was able to make enough profit to buy a small press to make prints. Another reason to keep them separate was that the art had a political bent on it (meaning behind it) and the stuffed animals and other things had no meaning behind them. They were just cute things for people to enjoy. For a long time I have been trying to think of ways to incorporate craft techniques with printmaking, but haven’t come up with a solution that I was satisfied with so far. As time goes by, it is harder to keep them separate, simply because there are a limited amount of hours in the day and everything in printmaking and crafts takes up a lot of time. I love what you did with the Mnemonic Sampler show and Whitney Lee’s latch hook art. Another great resource I go for inspiration is Embroidery As Art.

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How has Finnish culture influenced your work? Have you had any influence from American culture as well?

I get my love of nature and handcrafts from Finland, since that is what I grew up with. I learned to draw and sew early and to knit in first grade. We lived by woods and had a summer cabin in the country, so I spent countless hours outside playing and exploring and as I got older picking berries and hiking. My grandmother also loved collecting “antiques”, and I loved going through their drawers and nooks in the garage to see all the treasures they had stored up. Also the simplicity of Finnish design is more attractive to me than rich colors and pattern that I see more over here.

After moving to the US I have learned to speak up more and to adapt quickly to situations (which also goes for my art). After living in IL, TX, GA and WA- I am not sure if there is one culture here in the US. I think I am happier at the moment making my art here, because I can reach a wider audience and find printmaking communities just about everywhere.

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Translations—clockwise, from top left: “Yet a new day can change everything;” “Thank the Lord of my Soul!” and “Welcome to the house! As a guest in our cottage!”

Tell me about the Huoneentaulu Project.

The project came out of my love for handcrafts and my ongoing desire to incorporate them in the same body of work. These Finnish hand embroidered wall hangings were very popular in the early 1900’s, and hung in just about every house, but now they are becoming harder to find. They would have a center piece that had a short (most often religious) verse or saying. Sometimes embroidered embellishments were added and a fabric border. I think these wall hangings are very endearing, a sign of their times, but now they are becoming harder and harder to find, because they get worn out and thrown away and their original owners die. I wanted to save the story of this folk art by collecting as many pictures as I can, with stories, and then looking into them for common threads. I will use that as a jumping off point for more modern versions of the huoneentaulus that people could hang on their walls today.  I also think that now is a great time, with a revived interest in young people in things/traditions of old.

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Translation: “My home, my happiness.”

How will you be translating Finnish handcrafts to the medium of printmaking? What techniques or materials will you use to convey your ideas about the original textiles? Will the meaning behind the objects change as you recreate them?

I wanted to use relief printing and letterpress for the new wall hangings. I figured they are old techniques as well, so it would be appropriate to use them to revive an old tradition and they work well for large solid areas and text. So far I printed the first huoneentaulu with a letterpress on paper, but I am playing with ideas of printing on fabric, embroidering paper, or using fabric to print on paper.

I am currently doing research on the original wallhangings, to get a sense of what they meant for people. The method of distribution will change, since before women would embroider their own hangings to have on their own wall, so they would have something that spoke directly at them. Since I will be printing and other people will hopefully be hanging these in their homes, the maker and media changes, but I hope that people would still hang one because the message speaks to them.

This will be a pretty slow project, just because it is taking a lot of time to figure out how to reach people to get pictures/stories for the research. But as I dig in deeper, I am finding more interesting things. At the end, I hope to have a book printed with the original wall hanging pictures, my work and an essay on what I found out through my research.

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What does your ideal work space look like? Do you have any goals for your studio?

I dream about a great studio just about every day. Right now I work in a spare bedroom and garage which is cramped and rather gloomy. So far my husband is career military, so I don’t have high hopes of getting a great studio until he retires in our 5os. I imagine lots of space and large windows. I would love to have a communal shop in Finland that would bring in printmakers from the area to work together. It would be awesome to have a nice large press and equipment to make intaglio prints, and a letterpress or two, and a separate area for sewing and fiber work.

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Do you have any advice for people who want to run a business by selling their handmade work?

I would say make sure that’s what you want to do, because it is a lot of hard work. Have a clear goal in mind and an identifiable product. In today’s world networking is also key, so get plugged in your local art/craft scene. I am so happy to be in the Tacoma area, they have a great supportive community here.  Etsy and Artfire are also great places to sell, if you can consistently keep up your shop. Consistency is a key element. When people know where to find you and know what you do, things will roll along much easier. Military life makes things pretty hard, but I try my best to get settled in every couple of years. Having an online store and website at least gives people the chance to find me after I have moved away, but it’s easier to get work from the contacts around you.

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What’s next for you? Is there anything you would like to work on in the future?

I seem to always have many irons in the fire. Right now I am illustrating a Christian children’s book by Robbie Edgren and working to make prints for several upcoming shows in January and April. The wallhanging project is ongoing and I hope to concentrate on it full time after my last scheduled show in April 2011. I am really looking forward to this project and all the challenges it will bring with research, grants, writing and exploring new media.

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Thanks, Mirka!

Posted by Chandler at 9:20 PM in Book Arts, Drawing, Illustration, Kindred Spirits, Life, Pacific Northwest, T-Town  |  Permalink  |   Comments (3)
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September 15, 2010
Nose to the grindstone

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I can’t believe a week has already gone by since my last post. I’ve lost all track of time, because I’ve spent nearly every waking minute with my face an inch away from the drafting table.

Let’s step back, and stretch out a bit.

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My studio is often a sea of papers—an occupational hazard—but these days the swells have consisted of pencil snapshots for my Mt. Rainier book. Dozens, and dozens, and dozens of them.

Time is ticking down, counting closer and closer to zero, and there are still many miles to cover before the clock strikes deadline. Yet suddenly, things are starting to come together. It won’t be long until I can share something that makes sense—something that looks more like a book, and less like a pile of drawings. I promise that you’ll be among the first to see it when I do.

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I’ll do my best to pop up here regularly in the meantime (and in the comments sections of my fellow bloggers), but if I go missing for long stretches at a time—well, you know where to find me.

Posted by Chandler at 11:06 PM in Behind the Scenes, Book Arts, Drawing, Illustration, Letterpress, Pacific Northwest, T-Town  |  Permalink  |   Comments (7)
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