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Art/Design Professional The Flying Dutchess

New backdrop portfolio

Check out my newest portfolio of backgrounds and backdrops for animation (mostly for The Flying Dutchess).

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Art/Design

Invisible Cities

This is a series of intaglio etchings I did with some Spiderman collage variants.

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blog watercolor

Pershing Square Watercolors

I was blessed to move to Los Angeles last year at the end of September 2022. As many of the Old Masters once painted the buildings and sculptures in the parks and squares of cities they lived, I have endeavored to do so in reverence to them.

Title Guarantee and Trust Company Building – watercolor on paper, Oct. 2022

In an attempt to cure my insatiable love of Art Deco buildings, I visited Pershing Square. The Title & Trust building is an Art Deco gem situated off the square, named after prestigious WW1 General Pershing himself, mastermind of the Argonne Forest Campaign. In this watercolor, I did not do any underdrawing with pencil or pen and painted this with the brush from observation with no reference photographs. This process increases dexterity with the brush and better economy of line with each brush stroke.

View from Pershing Square Two – watercolor on paper, Oct. 2022

Pershing Square was redesigned by Ricardo Legorreta in the 1990s and these elegant, orange spheres feature prominently in the square vibrant new look.

A photograph of the Title Guarantee and Trust Building with Orange Sphere in foreground
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blog Home Studio Personal Studio

Zen Deco Bungalow Remodel

I recently finished remodeling my +650 sq. ft. bungalow with a new style I created called “Zen Deco”, which combines the art deco style of 1920s &30s with a Zen Shinto shrine aesthetic. These are a few preparation drawings and floor plans I drew during the project.

My artsist studio with final sealer/varnish on floors – Aug. 2022
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blog europa Sketchbook watercolor

Some watercolors & drawings done in France this April, rendered from life

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europa watercolor

Burgos Fountain Watercolor

Fountain in Front of the Burgos Cathedral – Watercolor on Watercolor Paper ( 7th of May 2022)

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Art Criticism Art/Design Design Home Studio Studio

Axial movements in Guido Reni’s Baroque masterpiece, “Aurora”

L’Aurora (The Aurora) is a large Baroque ceiling fresco painted in 1614 by Guido Reni for the Casino, or garden house adjacent to the Palazzo Pallavicini-Rospigliosi, in Rome. I created this gif to illustrate better the geometric structure underlining Reni’s beautiful sweeping forms of gods, goddesses and angels in the glorious gold-filled dawn.

The Baroque was known for dynamic movement and triangle compositions that seemed larger than life yet replaced the idealism of the renaissance with something more akin to the drama of an opera (which also became hugely popular around the same time in the 17th century). Below is another of my favorite Reni paintings, Susanna and the Elders (1620-25). The Susanna painting also uses a fantastic composition with powerful axial movements galore.

Susanna and the Elders, Guido Reni / 1620-25

When I was in art school at Pratt, we had several assignments requiring us to select an Old Master painting to break down axially. Any significant curve, line, or other shapes that define the big moves of colors or a figure in the image can be broken down this way. Our professor had us take tracing paper and draw out the significant axial movements with different colored pens or markers directly over a printout of the original painting. These exercises helped me to understand the deeper essence of composition and our class looked at Baroque paintings in particular for their use of balancing diagonals with triangles for a dynamic yet balanced and compositionally strong image. I still make these from masterworks for inspiration and historical allusions in my artwork.

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Art/Design old gems Professional Studio

Portrait of Anthony Graziano

I recently added some portraits to my ink wash and watercolor section, this watercolor portrait is of one of my best friends from when I lived in New Orleans. Anthony Graziano is also an incredible musician. I am very happy with how this portrait turned out.

Also, you can check out his music on his Bandcamp
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Art/Design Pratt

Pratt Cathedral assignment

St. John the Devine Cathedral, Charcoal

St. John the Devine Cathedral, 2011 – Charcoal on paper

6 hour drawing I did at St. John’s in Haarlem