Biscotti!

These biscottis are so good I couldn't just eat 'em, I had to paint one! We got them at the amazing Queen City Bakery near the train tracks in Sioux Falls.

A Tale of Two Doggies

This is a street person and his beloved dog. I met them in Piccadilly in London this October. They were huddled in this doorway against the wind and cold. You could see the love between these two.

"Dogs are a blessing, aren't they?" I asked. He replied simply, "He's my whole family." I think he called the dog 'Captain'. I'm really not sure.

It was cold here in Sioux Falls this morning and cold and raining in London. I thought of these two. At the time I put some money in his cup but now with winter upon us here and there I wish I could've put them both in my pockets and carried them somewhere safe. I wonder how they'll fare this winter.

When we first moved to Sioux Falls, one year ago September, there was so much hub-bub and tsuris (Yiddish for miseries), we had boxes in the living room, in the garage and piled on the front porch. it was embarrassing! Carroll and I were always out there trying to go through and throw out stuff.

I went to great lengths to insure the safety of our four dogs, adding new fences and gates to the back yard and patching the existing ones. And then one day while Carroll and I were in the front, our little Chihuahua zipped out the front door, past me and past Carroll and started down the hill toward traffic.

Carroll saved her. But I was so upset by the fiasco that I slammed my favorite walking stick on the ground, breaking it in two. Temper, temper!

Well, when Carroll first brought up taking a trip to England, I realized it was a rare opportunity to go back to Herbert Johnston, the shop where I had purchased the stick- and maybe get it repaired. So, I had lugged it with me on the Queen Mary 2.

And that is how I found myself lost in Piccadilly Circus, talking to this man about his dog. My love for my dog was somehow connected by fate, string theory, synchronicity or gravitons to this man huddled with his dog.

So I am thankful today for the blessings in my life, two and four legged, for the miseries that have somehow missed us and for the opportunities life gives us to do some little good were we can. To lend a hand or just hold one when there is a need and a chance to connect.

Peter Beagle said:

"What is given, burns the hand, and what is gone, is gone." All true.

But the Bard trumps him: "How shines a good deed in a weary world."


We have some great charitable organizations here in town: The Banquet, St. Francis House. And I don't want to forget the Humane Society. I always try to remind people that "the best friend you'll ever have is waiting for you at the Humane Society."

It's true.

Paintings and drawings

Recent works, some silly, but all helped me in in some way.

A Missing Cartooning Lesson

You know I've never seen a book on cartooning go into the importance of erasing and it occurs to me that it's a big part of how a lot of cartoonists work. A lot of cartooning is course correction. You get the basic shape and the dialogue balloons in the right place, but then you brush it down with a kneaded eraser or an eraser bag and redraw, correcting as you go. I know it's just a little thing but I thought I'd write it down here before it leaves my brain.

Grilled Cheese

Detail from A Genie in MacDougal Alley

White Out

Feeling a little better today. Drew some, painted this, watched TV, took meds. Haven't quite got my land legs back yet.

Detail of "5"

I have not been well lately and this is the first painting I've done since my return for London. Can you tell, even the critter in the painting doesn't feel well? By the way, what is he? Bear or mouse? Mousebear? Bearmouse? The full painting appears on my Sketchbook blog.

A Happy Halloween

Halloween is my favorite holiday, probably because it's all heart. It's the most creative one and it really is all for kids.

I loved making costumes, masks, cardboard robot suits. My father taught me how to make a papier-mâché mask one year. I made Quasimoto, the Hunchbach, with the droopy eye and discolored purplish skin tones.

We sat on the flagstone patio outside the family room on Rivergate Drive, in Wilton, Connecticut. We made sketches in green covered Clipper sketch pads and then measured our heads. It was sunny and the air was crisp, a New England Fall.

We sculpted our monster faces out of dark olive drab plasticine clay on masonite boards. We mixed some flour in a plastic bucket with warm water and ripped and dipped our strips of newspaper from a copy of the Wilton Bulletin. Then we applied the strips, so gently, this way and that, criss-crossing for strength.

And then we'd watch it dry and while it would dry we would sit and talk. Or pet Lucky, my dog. Or just sit. Breathe. The pines creaked in the wind, birds chattered. Mom clunked pans in the kitchen.

It wasn't much of a mask, but it's a major memory for me now that I am 56 and my dad is long gone. They say take the time, but when you spend time with your kids, you're not taking, you're giving.

Thanks for giving me that time, dad. Thanks for my best Halloween.

The official LOST 2009 trailer!

Thank God for second chances.

Van Gogh's Bunny Hill

My beloved, life-long friend Barbara Moore sent me this postcard- Landscape with Rabbits by Vincent Van Gogh! I love it!

I have just returned from a long trip, hence my long silence here on the blogs. But I am back and read to rumba! I will be posting an update on our vacation on my other blog, The History Lesson, shortly.

Good to be back!

Chris

The Nemo Cookie

I paint so many cookies, today I decided to design one! When I have time I may actually make a cookie mold and make a bunch.

The Nemo, named for my favorite anti-hero, would be a toasted vanilla bean cookie with a raspberry creme filling. It would contain no nuts or dairy of any kind. Half the thickness of an Oreo, with a crisp baked cookie (tapered like the new iPod!) It would also be wider than an Oreo.

It would feature a submerged Nautilus submarine on the top cookie amid waves for texture and grip and on the bottom, an art deco squid!

Of course I don't own a cookie company, but who knows? Isn't there room in this world for a cookie that anyone can eat and that encourages reading?

Love is Strange

How I Spent My Summer Vacation

This was a favorite of mine when I was a kid. Wish it were out on DVD! Before LOST, before The Prisoner, there were other mysterious islands run by diabolical evil geniuses. Hooray! Starring Robert Wagner, Jill St John and Peter Lawford. Be seeing you!

Portrait of A.I.M.

(An Imaginary Man)

Dum-Dum

Here is a Dum-Dum lollipop that has been floating around in my bag since my last visit to the dentist.

Castle

Another cookie painting! This one is another Chessman featuring a Rook. In the game, Rooks are strong but limited, useful but vulnerable. In other words, a tough cookie. But still, a cookie.

I talked with a friend at my syndicate today and he raved about his Cintiq tablet. My brother and I have talked about getting them so I feel I am ready to take the plunge now. They really look cool and I think it would be a great tool for some of my work.

We went to see CHICAGO at the Washington Pavillion in town, our first musical since we got here. Kind of a milestone for us to do that because we have been in Sioux Falls ONE YEAR THIS WEEK! They say a man's home is his castle... that may be true. I'm happy that we've landed just exactly where we should be.

We feel very lucky and very blessed.

Creme That Egg!

This may be the best thing ever. I love this beyond words. Does that make me a bad person?

Gummi Bears

I found these sugar free Gummi's in the bottom of my bag. Too far gone to eat but never too far gone to paint!

Hummingbirds!

Your fortune

...and mine!

Cartoonist Picnic!

We attended a cartoonist picnic gathering at a park right near our house today and it was GREAT! Very fun and talented people, great breezy weather and conversation and everyone put up with my silly and long stories of my misspent youth. And great homemade cookies! Yea! Thank you to all the Sioux Falls cartoonists, my new friends- you ROCK! Chris and Carroll

Old Tree

This is a very rough drawing of a tree. I LOVE trees. My ancestors were Celts and before that, Druids.

Tree worshippers. They had the right idea. Trees are divine.

This tree figures prominently in a book I'm laying out, about a little boy who gets stuck, up in a tree. In the finished artwork the tree won't be outlined in red. I promise!

Sugar Free

This is a Murray's Sugar Free Chocolate Chip Cookie. Not bad! But given my druthers, I'd opt for Pepperidge Farms version of the same thing.

We had a nasty dog fight here today, a territory & food dispute between our 2 males (6 year old Scotty and 20+ year old Terrier mix!) It ended with the elder dog going to the animal hospital but amazingly he seems okay now.

I am making huge progress on my studio and also have found old sketchbooks and some vital (to me at least) missing children's book artwork that was lost in the big move West. So it's all good!

Special thanks to all of you, for your kind words about my paintings and sketches. You have kept me sane (certainly saner than I would have been) this past year.

Thank you!


Chris

Fortune

Here's another cookie painting. Nice to have a model who can sit still. Although cookies don't seem to stick around long after the session.

I finally saw The Dark Knight tonight- what a wonderful movie! I love how it all suddenly pulls together at the end. Just lovely writing, directing, acting. Not for kids, though.

Just Think

If they had had modern anti-depression drugs back in 1890, Vincent Van Gogh would still be alive today.

Elephant and Castle

I love this song by great indie band The Age of Rockets. Great music to paint by!

Ironically, I was once in love (from afar) with a waitress (and friend) from the Elephant and Castle restaurant; but I never told her. Darn!

"Take every opportunity, because one day they just stop coming along!"

... John Irving, The Hotel New Hampshire.

Werebaby

Had a great day. Friend Ken and I hung out at Kaladis and then went to Rainbow Sports Carts, a comic book shop in town. It was fun! Got my comic book fix!

Empty Glass Bottle

This was fun to paint and took less than an hour as opposed to my Black Book painting that took a week.

Love is here to stay

George and Ira Gershwin were working on the film The Goldwyn Follies when George suddenly died of a brain tumor. The last thing George wrote was the melody of this song, which Ira completed after his passing.

Few people realize it's really about Ira's love for his brother and a bond that survives all challenges; even death.

The more I read the papers
The less I comprehend
The world and all its capers
And how it will all end,
Nothing seems to be lasting,
But that isn’t our affair;
We’ve got something permanent---
I mean, in the way we care

It’s very clear
Our love is here to stay
Not for a year
But ever and a day

The radio and the telephone
And the movies that we know
May be passing fancies---
And in time may go

But oh, my dear
Our love is here to stay
Together we’re
Going a long, long way

In time the Rockies may crumble,
Gibraltar may tumble
(They’re only made of clay)
But—our love is here to stay.

More Cookies

Here are more paintings of cookies. A Milano and a Chessmen Rook. Yea, Pepperidge Farms! I used to live in Wilton, Connecticut, not far from where these are made and they really are wonderful. And fun to paint. My blood sugar this morning was 122. Ha!

It's raining on Bunny Hill, but lots of birds outside, beautiful cardinals, robins and crows. They are loving the newly mown short wet grass, revealing worms and slow moving locusts. Smorgasbugs!

More paintings of cookies here. Enjoy!

Work in Progress

Part of a work in progress. It's fun to get to use my watercolors on Hagar. Wouldn't I love to do a graphic novel about Hagar! The comic strip format doesn't give you the chance to develop character or story arcs. And I'd love to do 2 page spread battle scenes! Wouldn't that be fun? I actually have an outline for a sort of 7th Voyage of Sinbad graphic narrative.

Maybe someday!

Lost Dance

Toad Ya So

Women, be wise: they're not all princes. Many are just toads; some are worse!

Détente

Why indeed can't we all just get along?

The Bigger Chill

Carroll and I just came back from an amazing road trip that would've made a fabulous movie, sort of a sequel to The Big Chill.

Here's the pitch: The Bigger Chill

An extended Baby Boomer and Gen X family and friends gather in a lodge near Mt. Rushmore to relax and regroup for the last 4th of July before the elections. Humor, angst and reflections on the meaning of independence (an co-dependence) abound.

Fireworks, of all sorts, explode.

That said, we really had an amazing time. I like a little personal growth with my vacations- although I think it should be used as a spice, not as the entre.

Our main event was to take the 1880's steam train to the side of Mt. Rushmore and see the fireworks there on the third of July. That was terrific!

We also saw Mt. Rushmore in the daylight and it is so much more inspiring and amazing in person than it is in day-for-night shots of Martin Landau chasing Cary Grant over Jefferson's philtrum in North By Northwest.

We also went to Deadwood, visited the Crazyhorse monument, drove through the Custer State Park and saw buffalo, burros, deer, antelope and prairie dogs!

After our lodge adventures, family members departed for New York, Florida and California and Carroll, Tom, Patrick, Alicia and my brave mother-in-law Luvy, pressed on thru Wyoming into Billings and Bozeman, Montana.

Unbelievably beautiful country, especially Paradise Valley, where A River Runs Through It was filmed. Wow!

We climbed to the base of Devil's Tower with our Melinda Dillon look-alike friend Alicia. I only had to send one set of Hagar work from the road during our ten day trip and managed to keep up with e-mail, sort of, via my iPod Touch (I love that thing). At Wall Drug, I met a 6-Foot Bunny and a Jackilope!

If anybody out there doesn't love this amazing country, I encourage you to hop in a car (or hybrid) and go see it. The people are great, the history and the wilderness are so inspiring and breathtaking.

I love America! We're very blessed.

This trip was made possible by my brilliant wife's Carroll's vision, Patrick's Road Warrior epic driving and the heroic efforts of many family and friends to leap out of the box for a week or so.

So how did it end?

Patrick drove us for something like ten hours on the last day, from Billings back to Sioux Falls.

When we finally arrived at he foot of our street we discovered the city had BLOCKED IT OFF WITH BARRICADES and a fresh slick of sticky black oil!

We could SEE our house- but couldn't get there!

Exhausted, we had to check in to a hotel in our own town. But my the next afternoon we were cooling our heels in the backyard at Bunny Hill where several new bunnies appeared. More babies!

GOOD TO BE HOME!

Mr. Gray

Here's a screen shot from tonights Twilight Zone episode, The Parallel.

Isn't that Mr. Gray in the background? What an intergalactic ham!

Dove of Peace

Great news! I've seen 2 bunnies on the hill. One large male and 1 medium probable female. It bodes well!

Okay, this is not the real Dove of Peace, it's a Dove Bar. But it'll have to do for now.

Bunny Watch

I haven't seen the bunnies in about a week and now I am worried about them. If I'd just see one I could feel that the other's are safe somewhere, but not seeing any of the four of them for so long is ominous. What could have happened to them? Cottontails have about a one acre range so where are they? I'm especially concerned about the baby bunny we saw last week.

I'll post more about this, especially if I see one of them. This is really bumming me out. Chris

Cookies

Out of life's school of war: What does not destroy me, makes me stronger.
Friedrich Nietzsche, The Twilight of the Idols (1899)
German philosopher (1844 - 1900)

I feel the same way about cookies.

Top to bottom: Sugar-free shortbread; Oreo; Archway Windmill.

Veg Out!

Detail of my new painting, Veg Out!

"Could this be the un-met friend?"
...from The Year of Living Dangerously


.

The Age of Rockets

Inspired by wonderful Indie band The Age of Rockets, now touring America with MC Chris Is Dead (not me, another Dead Chris). Click the title above to go to their MySpace page. MySpace and The Age of Rockets? Sounds like a movie!

Swan and Rose

For my beloved friend Swan and her beloved daughter, Rose. Two amazing women in a long line of amazing women, continuing to illuminate, educate and improve the world with every breath they take.

Gravity

Freedom

The Secret Library

I added a little more color, shadow and depth. I also added a black mask to this and posted that version to my sketchbook blog. I love painting these little cozy womb-like environs.

Children's books have many safe little realms like this: Peter Pan's hollow tree, Narnia's coat filled wardrobe, James' giant peach.

We are creatures of comfort. We need cozy! And ice cream!

In The Secret Library, watercolor

This is as far as I got today... some watercolor, some color pencil.

Hmm. A skull and a crystal ball? What are these foxes up to? What is the little book the little fox is reading? Homework? A play by Lillian Hellman, perhaps? Maybe it's an underground comic (they are underground, after all!)
And what is down those stairs behind that secret panel?

I hope you're liking seeing this picture grow. On paper as in life, we never know what we will find when we set forth. The Earth curves under us, tempting us forward.

More soon! Chris

In The Secret Library, pencil

First pencil! Click for larger view.

Who are these foxes, anyway? More soon... Chris

Sequel: In The Secret Library

I had such a good time painting "Down In The Hole"- and got such nice letters and feedback from y'all, that I am doing a sequel painting, "In The Secret Library". Here is the first sketch, scrawled on the endpaper of a Sudoku book... I will post more as it develops.

Thanks! Chris

Down In The Hole

Darker, moodier, spookier, as promised!

"All colors are the friends of their neighbors and the lovers of their opposites." Marc Chagall

Irish Patchwork

My favorite hat, from Hanna Hats of Donegal, Ireland
No two are alike, just like people and isn't that the way it should be?

Carroll gave this to me and not since Linus loved his blanket has a person loved a clot of cloth like I love this hat.

Work-in-progress

This is far, far, far from done. It's going to get real dark, moody and spooky. It started out to be a mole but now he's looking more like a badger.

Inspired by the great James Taylor's song "Down in the hole"

Camp Hazen

This was my first published drawing. I was 11. I sat in the woods at Camp Hazen and drew this chapel in pen and ink. It always bothered me that the rock at the foot of the tree looks like a cabbage. Somehow this drawing ended up being used on the camps brochures and Christmas cards. My folks were so proud. It's not a very good drawing, but it's a very good memory for me.