Artache this Sunday!

Hey campers!
This Sunday (November 13th) Aaron and I are going to have a booth at Vermillion Gallery's monthly art market "Artache" in Capitol Hill.

We are showing/selling all new work! I am showing work from my latest series "Scary Monsters and Super Creeps"

and Aaron will be showing selected pieces from his Gardenism series and his portraits of the ficticious "Numbers" family.

Come check it out! We'll be there from 3-8pm!

Vermillion Gallery
1508 11th Ave
Seattle WA 98122

Thanks! Hope to see you there!
jx

My first digital picture book!

Hey picture book enthusiasts!

I wanted to let everyone know of a website that just launched today that I am a part of called uTales.com. uTales is a brand new website where you can access digital pictures books for kids of all ages. You can purchase the books individually for download or subscribe monthly to the site to have access to all of the books on the site. All of the books contributed are written and illustrated from people all over the world too, which is really cool. The books can be read on your computer, iPad and iPhone. uTales contributes portions of each book downloaded to the charity Pencils of Promise, a wonderful organization that builds schools in developing countries.

I have one picture book currently up for download called “What Are You?”  

The book is about when two unlike things meet, one wants to know what the other is. But "what" something is doesn't necessarily tell you "who" they are.

You can find it in the Learn section.

So check it out! It supports a great cause and there are some amazing books in there!

Thanks!

Jessixa

www.utales.com

www.pencilsofpromise.org

Illustration Friday: Fuel

When I think of fuel, I automatically think of food. I love food and I love drawing food. And I know for a fact that monsters love food too! So this little guy out of my monster work asked me to draw him eating, his most favorite thing to do.

Illustration Friday: Scattered

Here is a sketch I did for Illustration Friday this week. I'm getting it up pretty late, but I was having a hard time focusing on something that wouldn't involve bugs scattering. I finally came up with this image a boy hitting a pinata. It's a cute sketch and could become a really nice finished piece. I like the contrast of the gray and the color.

Halloween sketches

In reshaping my portfolio, I've been drawing different things than I usual. And in doing so I have inadvertently drawn a lot of Halloween themed things. I just love Halloween and it's coming out in my drawing uncontrollably. Am I secretly writing a Halloween picture book? Maybe so! Here are some of my favorites:

Illustration Friday: Contraption

Here's another piece from my latest exploration. I'm really getting into combining pen with watercolor in this new way. I keep drawing these weird little monsters and I'm not sure what they are wanting from me. It's like David Bowie says "Scary monsters, and super creeps keep me running, running scared." I'm not so much scared as curious about this world they live in, I keep uncovering things about it. Like this guy, he is a software developer. I'm not sure what he's developing, but he's having technical problems.

Yeti fever!

I thought I would post this recent illo that I did on inspiration of my friend Steve's request for Yeti's for our gallery wall at work. I work at a design firm in Seattle called Hornall Anderson and we have a wall in our office that we use as an internal "gallery" called The Kathleen Turner Overdrive Gallery (if you've seen High Fidelity, you'll get the reference). It serves very much like a gallery where our curator, Steve Quenell, announces a new theme every month and then we have an opening of the gallery every First Thursday. This month's theme is Yeti's because Steve is addicted to them. So when I heard this for some reason I though instantly "Yeti Jamboree." Makes perfect sense to me. I actually did this piece first then went on to make the illo that I posted earlier in the week for Illustration Friday. I'm really stoked about these hairy critters! They are done in watercolor and pen. And I think going to one of their parties would be awesome. It even gave me a good idea for a children's book...I hope you enjoy!