What a wonderful Kirkus review!
(Paired here with my favorite improper contraction.)
"A thoughtful look at life, in all its beauty and strangeness.
...
This delightfully deadpan musing on life urges compassion for others. Howden’s straightforward text is on the philosophical side, though also rooted in the absurd. Hahn’s spare black graphite pencil watercolor, mostly set against a white background, are imbued with humor and empathy for the pickle, with the foodstuff’s expressive eyes conveying many emotions at once. "
https://www.kirkusreviews.com/book-reviews/sarah-howden/the-wise-pickle/
THE WISE PICKLE
by Sarah Howden ;
illustrated by Sabina Hahn
RELEASE DATE: June 23, 2026
Look I give my cats when they pee or break something. It's like why? You have boxes and why you need to be breaking things? Half the time you don't want me. I don't own cats...they own me. I should have known this.
#28 - A collection of ballpoint pen sketches drawn on printer paper & scanned. This is what my lines look like when I'm not using a stabilizer in digital software to get the nicest clean lines. I tried to separate my scanned lines from the various shades of off-white that the scanner picked up. I adjusted the brightness and contrast levels in photoshop but I'm not very knowledgeable on how to achieve the best results.
For some reason, I had to prove to myself that good art does indeed take time. Anyways, this is an angel character (they're not real angels, they're a fictional species of mine) in my "spacefluff" style. I think I want to name her Mosambi, because she's sweet.
I made my golden calf in the arbour because it was a pagan place and a circle is always a good setting for sculpture.
It was very difficult to get the legs to stay upright but in the end they did and I nailed them to the socle just to make sure. Sometimes I stood still, listening for the first rumble of the wrath of God. But so far he had said nothing. His great eye just looked right down into the arbour through the hole between the tops of the spruce trees. At last I had got him to show some interest.
- Sculptor's Daughter by Tove Jansson
#dailydrawing #tovejansson
A playful, mixed-media tribute to the aquarium life. This piece captures a slice of a fish's world, complete with a warning to "Keep Lid Closed", miniature castle, forgotten net, and a $75 price tag on a fish. It's a whimsical look at the serious business of pet fish ownership.
A variety of colorful and delicious looking pastries and cakes are displayed under a glass dome, resting on a wooden base. The arrangement includes an assortment of treats, such as cupcakes and slices of cake.
I was kinda bored when I drew this, so it came out in the art work. Incidentally, this guy looks a bit like a character in the nameless city series of graphic novels, which I finished reading recently. The first book is rather heavy handed, but the last two are much better by comparison.
I remember how I just started making this piece with no guidelines no measurements.. nothing. Just me looking at the reference and goin blind in the feelings. I wanted to make this piece as alive as i could..I wanted to feel his presence near me.
I absolutely love colored pencils. The smell, sound, and feel of them, their texture is amazing. Shading and depth control are so easy with them. :) Lucy looks pretty worried. Don't worry, Lucy. I'm sure it will turn out fine.
I used to see this friendly dog that would wander around and I would pet him. He disappeared for like a year. I was sad because I missed him and I didn't know what happened to him. I saw a dog last week that looked like him or was him but I wasn't able to get close enough to know for sure. It inspired my to finish this drawing I started a while ago.
This is my 2023 OC Paxton. It's hard to call him my character when he looks like several black-haired protagonists of a Shonen anime lol. I made him very young even though he's a married man and father of two children. I'm still drawing his wife she has several designs and styles
Hopefully the colors on this one are as bright as they look on my phone! I've been using Pixilart to relax before bed, and it's been a great way to mess around with color and texture.
A couple of surfboard concepts done for a laser engraving project. It seems to give me extra energy and inspiration when I use different colors to sketch. It's also nice to look at.
"BUTTCHEEKS" The top bookmark is the genuine "Skav Art" piece which was done with a 0.18 technical pen on 110mm x 30mm off-cut card. The one below (the "bottom" one - Heheh!) was a deliberate copy I made of the first and, even though it looks neater, proved to me that those dreaded "processes" do start to creep in. The differences are slight, but they are there. Such processes can mount the further you go with them, until they totally erode the creative energy you originally had. So, it was good to do, even if it does mean I've now got two artworks with the same title!
Sketch of a joke Dark Crystal OC, "SkekKaren". Someone pointed out that ALL of the Skeksis are "Karens" and okay, point taken! Haha. Based her look on Queen Victoria and a Patoo.
Another Ink drawing inspired by Miss Betsi's Youtube Channel. They are fun to do when you are not sure what to draw that day.˖ ࣪‧₊˚⋆✩٩(ˊᗜˋ*)و ✩ Filtered digitally to give it a softer look.
I was feeling very anxious one day so I decided to look up what to do on Google. Google recommended I draw a bunch of circles. So I started drawing tiny circles, (if you zoom in you will see all of the circles!) and it turned out looking like an eye. So I added a tear :) The circles didn't help my anxiety much but hey it is an alright piece of art don't you think?
It's a mess, right? Not particularly beautiful or impressive. That is what self-hatred is like. Easy to achieve. Not great to look at. Very common. And very, very hard. To all of the people that struggle with self-hate, it's all in your head don't worry. You are the only one that sees you the way you see yourself.
