Wonky and wobbly

It's been something like 12 years since I really did any illustration, and even then, it was always for fun, never for an actual client. Recently, I've been working on an illustration project with a real-live client for a mother-daughter seminar about girls and puberty. My illustrations would be a big part of the slide presentation that the audience is focused on, a la Al Gore and An Inconvenient Truth.

Doing these practice illustrations has been a really interesting experience. I've had to tweak my usual style to suit their tastes, since they want cartoony and appealing to pre-teens. I've also had to find ways to be fast since the dealine is crazy short -- something I've never managed to be when doing my super-detailed children's book illustrations. The experience has been like working a muscle that's never really been challenged before, and it feels good. I'm still feeling awkward, especially around color and painting, but it's feeling better with each try.

Here are a couple of new pieces. You can see how the style is evolving to be looser and more cartoony. The rest are up on my new blog (jinapaikillustrations.blogspot.com).

Sportsgirls


Getting Teary

New Blog

I have taken the first step towards my new life as a freelance whatever. A new blog specifically for my illustrations. I only uploaded what was at hand and a few random sketches for a possible project.

http://jinapaikillustrations.blogspot.com


It's a start.

Playing Around

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Random Finished & Ongoing Projects

It's 8:30, and i'm still in the office. I don't want to go home. It doesn't feel like home right now. It feels foreign. S and I had a huge fight, the same one that feels unresolveable, and now I wonder if I made a mistake in marrying him. Not so much about the subject of the fight but about how he fights. Ugly, dirty and vindictive. To the point where I pull back and try to be calm and reasonable, but all that means is that I'm taking all my anger, fear, sadness and shoving it deep down inside. And my body is starting to ache from the strain. Not to mention how tired I feel emotionally.

Directions

One one of our first nights of our honeymoon in Turkey, we arrived in the middle of the night in a little, hilltop village. We dropped off our bags at our hotel, which was at the top of the hill, and walked around to explore by moonlight. As a way of finding our way back, since who knew how hard it was in the dark, I laid a trail of breadcrumbs with my digital camera. At every juncture, I took a picture of my hand pointing in the correct direction.

Shaky as these pictures are, I love them for their cleverness, practicality, and excitement. I see the joy of exploration, a mix of fear and exhilaration. And it's like the string that brings me back home.

Wouldn't it be amazing if we had this kind of internal pointer for everyday life. Make a left after college and a sharp u-turn after your first job. Don't head down that dark alleyway of corporate America but take the squiggly path of artistic expression. If you had this, you could actually take in what's around you instead of worrying about which path.

Peace of Mind

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Now that this year is starting to come to an end, it feels like a good time to bow farewell and prepare for a new beginning.

This weekend, I set up a creative space for myself in the apartment. I've been talking about it for a while but never got around to it..with the wedding and everything else that's happened this year. I've been complaining about how I don't feel settled in this apartment, even after all these years. That I don't feel connected to the space. So when I come home from work, I can never just relax, let go, and just center myself. The shared spaces that S and I have don't work to center me, and neither did any of the various little corners that I tried to tuck into now and again. Finally, I hope this one does it. (I know S hopes, so, too, since he has to move his stuff around everytime I need room.)

So now I have the biggest room in the house, the best lighting, and the most seclusion. It's like i have a mini-studio apartment to myself again. I almost don't feel like I deserve this and I'm pretty gentle in the space still. Like what I do doesn't matter enough to be so greedy. Strange, my moments of low self esteem. It's been growing these days. Again, strange. And dangerous. I have to pick myself up or it'll get ugly.

But this space is so precious to me. With a corner for my art, a comfy chair for knitting or reading, a futon for spreading out with books, a tv, and plants, plants, plants. Oh, and my electric kettle to make tea.

Tra-la-la

Getting that tired feeling again like I need a retreat. After the whirlwind of this last year, it's time to regroup and re-energize. Renewal, revival, re-emerge.

Action, action. Because I'm all about too much thoughts swirling and that's the path to anxiety and worry. So action.

1- set up my artist space.
2- ummm.....

Well, at least I know what step 1 is.