self

2B pencil focusing on the eye, nose and mouth. The reflection today is a suggestion that we find what we look for, and we see what we want to see. Our family dinners include a sharing time of: 1. Who blessed you today? 2. Who did you bless today? and 3. What are you thankful for? It is suggested by some that if you focus on the abundance, you will not see so much of the lack, but if you focus on the lack, you will not be able to see the abundance so well. This was illustrated by the questions: "How many red cars did you see on the way to work this morning?" My answer was: "No Idea!" It is because I was not looking. If I was being given $100.00 for each red car I spotted, I would have certainly been looking, and maybe even getting creative with the definition of 'red'. What are you looking for? What are you finding?

After family dinner - tired or not - a ten minute self portrait is our current family activity. Families who draw together, stay together.

Hi. Am I hard to see? You are free to look closer. This is how I will most frequently present myself as, drawn here in an effort to rejuvenate past drawing abilities . Both Ego and Shadow are delicately present as one, although still not the truly completed form. That is still outside my own grasp within the field of creativity. Everything here has some meaning, including the blank background. A "Domain" in the form of a canvas. The ability to bend reality. A shadow that opens the door to the extraordinary. The simple tools to channel one's creativity. Most importantly, an Avatar of one's being.

This took quite awhile for me to finish I hope you like it

Dmitry Shostakovich (1906–1975) Shostakovich’s contemporaries do not recall seeing him working, at least not in the traditional sense. The Russian composer was able to conceptualize a new work entirely in his head, and then write it down with extreme rapidity—if uninterrupted, he could average twenty or thirty pages of score a day, making virtually no corrections as he went. But this feat was apparently preceded by hours or days of mental composition—during which he “appeared to be a man of great inner tensions,” the musicologist Alexei Ikonnikov observed, “with his continually moving, ‘speaking’ hands, which were never at rest.” Shostakovich himself was afraid that perhaps he worked too fast. “I worry about the lightning speed with which I compose,” he confessed in a letter to a friend. Undoubtedly this is bad. One shouldn’t compose as quickly as I do. Composition is a serious process, and in the words of a ballerina friend of mine, “You can’t keep going at a gallop.” I compose with diabolical speed and can’t stop myself.… It is exhausting, rather unpleasant, and at the end of the day you lack any confidence in the result. But I can’t rid myself of the bad habit. - From Daily Rituals: How Artists Work by Mason Currey #dailyrituals #inktober #shostakovich @masoncurrey

Been developing in a way to free myself from external reference-based OC concepts, which was where I started from in drawing. In a way, exploring how I view characters from my own eyes. Here, is an example of drawing myself in two contrasting counterparts. Personal preferences are actually pretty simplistic by appearance.

Samuel Beckett (1906–1989) On a late-night walk near Dublin harbor, Beckett found himself standing on the end of a pier in the midst of a winter storm. Amid the howling wind and churning water, he suddenly realized that the “dark he had struggled to keep under” in his life—and in his writing, which had until then failed to find an audience or meet his own aspirations—should, in fact, be the source of his creative inspiration. “I shall always be depressed,” Beckett concluded, “but what comforts me is the realization that I can now accept this dark side as the commanding side of my personality. In accepting it, I will make it work for me.” - From Daily Rituals: How Artists Work by Mason Currey #dailyrituals #inktober #samuelbeckett @masoncurrey

Teddy Bear's Change of Seasons - Sophie's Christmas included! Is beautifully written and illustrated, Teddy Bear’s Change of Seasons includes four charming stories, wonderfully rolled into one children’s novel.  Teddy Bear and his friends create magical ways to explore and learn about the snow-white, wonderful world they live in, which changes from summer to autumn and into an unforgettable Christmas.  Teddy’s journey of self-discovery through four seasons, Christmas included, begins in a magnificent old-growth forest, but Teddy is stuck inside a dark and lonely place. His dreams look far away and out of reach, until Teddy rescues a small mouse, who is desperate for help. From this one act of kindness, Teddy's life changes in ways he never imagined, bringing him close friends, a new loving family and the kind of challenges and adventures other teddies have never encountered before.  This is a dream of a book, the perfect snuggle-down bedtime story, accompanied by hot, sleepy cocoa.

Imagining a cover design for an imaginary self help book. Case in point. LOL. // Playing with text positioning - putting "out" outside of the cloud text bubble for literal applied meaning.

Immanuel Kant (1724–1804) Kant’s biography is unusually devoid of external events. As Heinrich Heine wrote: The history of Kant’s life is difficult to describe. For he neither had a life nor a history. In actual fact, as Manfred Kuehn argues in his 2001 biography, Kant’s life was not quite as abstract and passionless as Heine and others have supposed…. If he failed to live a more adventurous life, it was largely due to his health: the philosopher had a congenital skeletal defect that caused him to develop an abnormally small chest, which compressed his heart and lungs and contributed to a generally delicate constitution. In order to prolong his life with the condition—and in an effort to quell the mental anguish caused by his lifelong hypochondria—Kant adopted what he called “a certain uniformity in the way of living and in the matters about which I employ my mind.” This routine was as follows: Kant rose at 5:00 A.M., after being woken by his longtime servant, a retired soldier under explicit orders not to let the master oversleep. Then he drank one or two cups of weak tea and smoked his pipe. According to Kuehn, “Kant had formulated the maxim for himself that he would smoke only one pipe, but it is reported that the bowls of his pipes increased considerably in size as the years went on.” - From Daily Rituals: How Artists Work by Mason Currey #dailyrituals #inktober #ImmanuelKant @masoncurrey

Sketchbook #11. Since the 100heads challenge was real tiresome for me, I devised myself another challenge - "50 heads". Basically it's a "100 heads challenge", but for lazy people) The rules are simple: I had to draw 10 two-page spreads of 5 heads, no time limit, no nothing. And I decided to use different materials for each spread. Spread #1 - ballpoint pen (+ a little bit of watercolour) - NEMOPHILA.

You can listen to nothing but rock music and wear nothing but black clothing and only date short guys in their thirties. Those are valid preferences. Choosing not to hire people of color or refusing to let trans people use the bathroom is prejudice.

Living, breathing, and creating with nature When you wake up to the gentle sights and sounds of the pond, trees, plants, birds, bees, and dragonflies, inspiration flows effortlessly. So, when the owner asked for a menu design for @SarayaGoa Art Café, I thought—why not let nature speak for itself? Using pen and ink, I captured the beauty of my mornings here—each stroke reflecting the lush surroundings that make Saraya unique. Instead of focusing on just food items, I filled the cover and inside pages with illustrations of the vibrant life around us. Dining here means eating among the green, surrounded by the diverse plants of our permaculture gardens. This study is a tribute to the beauty that shapes every meal at Saraya.

I mean, I’m going with option c) myself!

This one more or less speaks for itself!

Benjamin Franklin (Part 2) The plan worked, up to a point. After following the course several times in a row, he found it necessary to go through just one course in a year, and then one every few years. But the virtue of order—“Let all your things have their places; let each part of your business have its time”—appears to have eluded his grasp. Franklin was not naturally inclined to keep his papers and other possessions organized, and he found the effort so vexing that he almost quit in frustration. This timetable was formulated before Franklin adopted a favorite habit of his later years—his daily “air bath.” At the time, baths in cold water were considered a tonic, but Franklin believed the cold was too much of a shock to the system. He wrote in a letter: I have found it much more agreeable to my constitution to bathe in another element, I mean cold air. With this view I rise early almost every morning, and sit in my chamber without any clothes whatever, half an hour or an hour, according to the season, either reading or writing. This practice is not in the least painful, but on the contrary, agreeable; and if I return to bed afterwards, before I dress myself, as sometimes happens, I make a supplement to my night’s rest, of one or two hours of the most pleasing sleep that can be imagined. From Daily rituals by Mason Currey #daulyrituals #inktober #benjaminfranklin @masoncurrey

17 AUG 2024

Ludwig van Beethoven (1770–1827) Beethoven rose at dawn and wasted little time getting down to work. His breakfast was coffee, which he prepared himself with great care—he determined that there should be sixty beans per cup, and he often counted them out one by one for a precise dose. From Daily Rituals : How Artists Work by Mason Currey. #dailydrawing #dailyritual #beethoven #coffee #inktober @masoncurrey

(Gel Fineliner on A5 Paper) “Wait...Did you just call me Phil? I'm a multi-dimensional higher being, you ignorant little tit! You don't just call someone like me PHIL! I was about to share the fruits of my knowledge with your species, ushering in a new age which would have been a significant step in human evolution, but now you can all PISS RIGHT OFF! You humans deserve to wipe yourselves out!” (It is widely believed that humanity constantly subdues itself with lazy misunderstandings like this.)

(Gel Fineliner on A5 Paper) A piece for Inktober, but one which references the way some artists self-censor so as not to offend anyone.

FEDERICO FELLINI In a 1977 interview, he described his morning routine: I'm up at six in the morning. I walk around the house, open sindows, poke around boxes. move books from here to there. For years I've been trying to make myself a decent cup if coffee, but it's not one of my specialties. I go downstairs, outside as soon as possible. By seven I'm on the telephone. - Daily rituals by Mason Curry. #inktober #masonCurry #federicofellini #dailyritual

I was feeling listless about this inktober until I picked up Daily Rituals : How artists work by Mason Currey. I immediately knew that I want to do these portraits for the inktober. FRANCIS BACON. At the end of these long nights, Bacon frequently demanded that his reeling companions join him at home for one last drink - an effort, it seems, to postpone his nightly battles with insomnia. Bacon depended on polls to get to sleep, and he would read and reread classic cookbooks to relax himself before bed. #inktober #portraits #francisBacon

Painted in Paintstorm Studio on iPad Pro M1

Re-did an older animation I did as a still-doodle, just improved on the general look and feel of the scene itself. Tried to go much brighter than I normally do, color-wise.

Don Cutter (Full name Cookie Cutter) relishes in making their last name self evident. [This was done as a trade for a friend!!!! At present, she has no socials for me to link to, but I will update this if that ever changes!!!! (P.S. the name is *unofficial* but I am campaigning hard for her to canonize it!!!!)] P.P.S. this is the first image I am uploading of my (admittedly rather limited) backlog/body of work, so expect more updates in the near future [followed by a WHOLE lot of nothing for a while (I work SLOW ;-;)]!!!!

After experiencing a DNA surprise/shock earlier in the year I needed to express my feelings in my artwork. Conception is a representation of how random life can be. A sence of belonging yet somehow not belonging and finally being able to link together those aspects of myself.

my memory is my recent character i made so far inspired by serial experiment lain. my memory is partially self projection. a computer scientist who lost a student he was close with and saw them as their own spent 20 years creating a new project to commemorate his former student, emory. after 20 years, the project was a success, a humanoid machine has emory's memories stored in her and everything feels like deja vu for my memory. a confused and curious my memory must learn to function in society as a robot.

Given my propensity for walking a little too fast in public spaces, I’m something of a “rapid charger” myself… xD

The concept for this painting started as a design for a pumpkin carving contest. I felt the message of the design is so important for people to hear, I decided to make it into a painting. The original design, done in pen and ink. The design only shows the two doors of the entrance to a fortress. I tried to keep the design simple, because the carving event is both timed and live. You must create your masterpiece on the pumpkin they provide, on their location, Infront of live spectators. The evolution of the design? I added a wall on each side of the entrance, with matching pillars. Explaining the design of the pillars The triangle top: the triune God. Representing three persons of God: Father, Son, Holy Spirit. The cross shape opening in the pillars: The cross is the only path to God, to have the debt of sin satisfied. To reconcile humankind back to himself. To be released from being a slave to the Devil. To be a new creation empowered by God Spirit. Explaining the design of the entrance way(gate) The top of the entrance is in the shape of a heart, represents the seat of human passion, ambition, and allegiance. The cultic three petal flower is used to represent God in three persons united. The symbol inside the flower: God’s ministry toward humankind. Crown: Highest authority Cross: God’s loving salvation and restoration plan. The dove: Spiritualty made alive, fellowship with God, empowerment to weather the storm of life, and equip for service to God. Change in the design of the door. In the original design, one door had roses carved on it. The pattern took up the whole door. The other door had a grape vine carved on it. The pattern took up the whole door. I modified the emblem on the doors by making them smaller and simplified, so I could place them inside heart shapes, so the new images would more clearly communicate what they are meant to represent. I also added color to the emblems (color pencil) to make them clear of what they are, because of their size and the ink medium ,they were hard to interpret. Understanding the symbol of the two doors. The door with the rose inside the heart emblem represents a heart whose passions, ambitiousness, allegiance are focused on the cares, worries, and abstaining riches of the world. Only giving God lip service. I chose the rose to represent the heart of spiritual allegiance to the world, because roses are pretty, but you can’t eat them to nourish your body. They also have thorns that can cause injury to the body. So, the parallel point is, just as flower fade and turn to dust, so will the person who chases the thing of the world and has no time for God. For life is very short, we know not which will be our last breath on this side of eternity. But if a person leaves this earth without excepting the gift God offered them which is salvation from penalty of sin and given enteral life through the work that was done on the cross by God’s son. Then that soul will appear before Jesus, and just as they did not know him in their life on earth, He will tell them he knows them not. Into the lake of fire, they will spend eternity. The door with the grape vine in the heart emblem represents a heart whose passions, ambitiousness, allegiance are for God. To know Him intimately, to obey His teachings, to serve his will. I chose the grapevine to represent the heart of spiritual allegiance to God, because grapes are nourishing to the body. Jesus also used a grape vine in one of his parables. He paralleled the spiritual relationship he had with his disciples and the grapevine. He told them just as branches of a vine must depend on the base of the vine to live and bare fruit, so they must abide him to have abundant life. Abiding in Christ is not a religious act. It is outside of religion. It is an intimate relationship. Example: you can belong to a fan club of Paul McCartney and know a lot of things you have heard about him, but he doesn’t even know you exist. Where, if Paul is your father, and you have a good parent to child relationship, then you know him intimately. So, abiding in God, we commune with him through read his word and living by its teachings. It is spending time in prayer. Sharing our hearts with God and spending time listing to him. Trusting in him as our provider and giving thanks for his provision. Living our lives, with the purpose of pleasing him with the work of our hand and loving our neighbors in the workplace as well as in the community. Just as a healthy grapevine continues to grow and produce much fruit. Having an imitate relationship with God should be more and more evident in the way we live our lives. So, when the angel of death pays you an unexpected visit, he escorts you to Jesus’s throne, you know for certain he going to welcome you with loving arms and said welcome home my faithful servant. Now to which door I chose for my life? It’s the one that is open. This bible verse one of a couple that inspired me to design this illustration. 1 Corinthians 3:12-13 King James Version 12 Now if any man builds upon this foundation gold, silver, precious stones, wood, hay, stubble. 13 Every man's work shall be made manifest: for the day shall declare it, because it shall be revealed by fire; and the fire shall try every man's work of what sort it is. This verse is not referring to the rebellious people who have rejected God, this is referring to people who are children of God, who failed to serve God faithful. Written by Stephen J. Vattimo. 3 Jan 2024 Evolution of the design of this painting. I believe God through His Holy Spirit guided me to change the crosses on the two pillars, one on each side of the doors. Instead of these windows being fill with darkness, which would represent death by crucifixion, which Jesus endured for humanity, that who so ever is willing may be delivered from the power of sin and be adopted by God to become a member of His family. I was inspired to put light in both cross windows. The cross window on the side the open door, with the grape vines on it, the light matches the color of the light that is coming out the windows of Icons shapes representing the ministry of tri union God. The color I used is a bright firry orang yellowing color. For the bible says God is a consuming fire. The cross windows on the side of door with the flower on it, I used the color greenish yellow lite; to represent a false light, the bible call it a form of Godliness without power. Who so ever tries to approach God another way, than the path God has ordained. They will not be received. The Devil distorts the truth, to lead many to their demise. The only way to know the difference between truth and fallacy, is to study God’s word. Written by Stephen J. Vattimo August 7,2024

I have given my students the problem of creating 100 self portraits in 20 days on 5x7 in paper. The challenge is to create something other than an image that depicts a 'dead-pan' stare. When the brain is given a problem, it goes to work immediartely to solve that problem. I have seen some wonderful solutions. This is a tall order for teens who are sensative to judgment and still developing in thier perception. It has generated wonderful discussions of self-awareness, world view, and judgment. Those who engage in the exercise in an authentic manner have only good things to say about the experience. It is not an exercise for everyone. We are on a journey. Be Bold! Be Honest! Draw what you see. Draw what you think. -Peace