Awards and other things I am proud of

Through the years I've won my share of honors. I've won space in award publications like CA, The One Show, Print and How. Regional awards have come my way as well...Hatch, Caddies, The Women's Ad Club of Rhode Island.

But I think the thing I am most proud of is that I've made a living doing art. And in the process I've helped a lot of people tell their stories and show off their wares. That's not a bad way to spend your time.

And there are always opportunities to do more, help more and maybe collect another trophy.

The Mona Lisa and her power to surprise

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It amazes me that the Mona Lisa still has the power to surprise.

This February 21st, the newest...and oldest Mona Lisa copy will be revealed. "The Mona Lisa of Prado" is set to go on display after recently being restored.

It was the restoration process on a copy of the storied Mona Lisa painting that lead to this latest Mona Lisa discovery.

In the storage vaults of the Prado Museum, this Mona Lisa copy has occassionaly gone on display, but attracted little attention because the background around the painted lady was painted black. No one knows why this was done to this image.

Two years ago, restorers ran some tests on the Prado painting. Underneath the black coat of paint, a Tuscan landscape was revealed. X-ray tests further determined that the painting's surface showed signs of beign altered during the same timeframe as the original. Leading experts at the Prado and the Louvre to conclude that this copy was painted in Da Vinci's workshop in Florence. And most likely painted by Leonardo's student, Francesco Melzi.

What is lacking in the copy is Leonardo's sfumato painting technique. Plus Mona Lisa's eyebrows, missing in the original, are present here in the copy. What is also present in the copy is more detail and vibrance. This Mona Lisa appears 30 year younger then the original. Experts attribute the difference to the deterioration of the original.

This is a remarkable find. Giving us a glimpse of what the painting might have looked like when it was first painted at the beginning of the 16th century.

Why Valentine’s Day is Better then Christmas

There are abundant reasons to champion Christmas as one of the best days of the year.

The parties. The presents. The festive decorations… No doubt it’s a great way to end a year. But Valentine’s Day trumps Christmas in a few significant ways.

For me Valentine’s Day is the first celebration of the new year. Yes, of course there is the New Year’s Day event. But for me, New Year’s has always been lumped in with holiday celebrations of the year just past. It marks the conclusion…the end of a string of holiday events. Technically, I concede, it is there to mark the beginning of what is to come, but on an emotional level, New Years gets lumped into last year.

February 14^th is our first opportunity in the newish year to collectively celebrate.

It’s the first significant day in the new year to mark a day with special rituals. Make dinner plans. Buy flowers. Tap into romance and sentiment. Or fold a red paper square in half and cut out a heart-shap

ed card.

And though I’m not a huge participant in this national ritual, I am touched that the first big event of the year is centered around love. I think that’s a great way to start a new year.

In celebration of this year’s first celebration, I’ve built a heart-filled card of my own.

It’s a bit over the top. But I think that is in keeping with the sentiments of the day. More of this work can be found in my etsy store, at www.judylittledesigns.etsy.com.

Have a happy Valentine’s Day.

Mona Lisa found

Recently found these two ads that have used the Mona Lisa to help promote their respective companies.

I do delight in these discoveries. Always curious to see where the Mona Lisa is going to pop up next.

When is doodling Art?

The intersection point between artwork and doodle can be found in the works of Keita Sagaki. A young, and very patient Tokyo artist that has been obsessed with cartoon characters and graffiti for most of his life. I say patient because his works takes months to complete. His “Last Supper” rendering took almost a year.

A student from Fukashima University, Keita’s drawings are made with a .38mm pen. Working without a net, he draws directly onto the surface without a draft to guide him. Thousands upon thousands of intricate cartoon like characters are interwoven to recreate classic artworks and landscapes.

His “Mona Lisa” was drawn in 2008. It measures 72.8 x 51.5cm.

Textures and tones are made up of battalions times bazillions sketches of cartoon faces, people, animals…some fantastical and some real, and all very bizarre and creative.

Check out his website: http://sagakikeita.com

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December 13, 1913. Mona Lisa Rediscovered.

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On this day in 1913, Italian artist Leonardo da Vinci's the "Mona Lisa," perhaps one of the world's most famous paintings in the world, was rediscovered by Italian authorities after it had been stolen on August 21, 1911. The painting had been stolen by Louvre employee Vincenzo Peruggia, who, as an Italian, said after the fact that he thought the piece should be displayed in Italy. Peruggia was caught trying to sell the painting, though he might have gotten his wish, at least for a while. The "Mona Lisa" was shown all around Italy before being returned to the Louvre. Peruggia was hailed by countrymen for his patriotic crime and served only six months in prison.

There is a documentary about the theft, entitled "The Missing Piece".

Information about the film can be found at http://monalisadocumentary.blogspot.com/ and http://www.monalisamissing.com/The_Missing_Piece/WELCOME.html

THE MAKING OF A HANDMADE CARD

Thank goodness. The tools now out there are starting to catch up with our imagination.

All the digital devices (computers, cameras, video cameras, smartphones that capture images…), all the software (Photoshop, Illustrator, Google Sketchup, Corel Painter…), all the outputting devices and services (inkjet printers, Blurb, Shutterfly, Zazzle) …

All of this is now at our fingertips. All make the making of handmade works possible for anyone.

Now I’ve been making things all of my life. And I’ve ended up making my living from making things. As an Art Director/Graphic Designer/Illustrator I’ve made things on a grand national scale. But I will always enjoy taking common materials and making uncommon things. Things that have my own unique voice and style.

Using some of the tools that are out there for the creating of handmade items, I thought I’d reveal the steps I took to create a handmade card for Thanksgiving.

First I had to figure out what image I wanted to create. What could I make that had my unique style and what did I want to say?

I came up with the notion of Thanks & Giving. A simple expression of what Thanksgiving is all about. Being thankful for what we have. Giving what we can.

Next step, open up Photoshop and poke around my typefaces. Comping up roughly 30 different looks, using a mixed bag of typefaces.

I settled on 4 Thanks & Giving comps and printed them out. Then went through a lot of tracing paper to not only redraw the letterforms but also sketch out the cross-hatching that I wanted to incorporate in the interior of the words.

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The drawings were scanned. Cleaned up in Photoshop. Imported into Illustrator for further refinement. And brought back into Photoshop where the files were layered, blended and composed. And re-layered, re-blended and re-composed a few more times till I settled on a look that pleased me.

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Still, I’m not done. The words needed a backdrop. Fortunately, I had scanned in some old painted textures I had created several years ago. More noodling ensued until I found a resting place where everything seemed to be working together.

How many hours did this take?

A lot. This is not an approach I’d suggest for someone wanting to make a quick piece of art. But it is a way to make something that is completely your own.

This process resulted in a card that I have inserted into my Etsy online shop. Which can be found at www.etsy.com/shop/judylittledesigns.com.

While there was nothing quick about this process, it still amazes me that I can concept, design, illustrate, execute and distribute to the world, all from my little home studio. How cool is that!

HAPPY HALLOWEEN!

Wanted to share some images I created for the scariest day of the year. No I'm not talking about Election Day but Halloween.

Last years festivities involved a creepy nighttime walk through neighborhood woods. People had carved out pumpkinsa and lit the trail with these illumnated pumpkins. It was a huge amount of fun. The next day, I took my camera and shot these pumpkins in their wooded setting.

This year, I took those images. worked them in Photoshop and Illustrator. Added layered text with some hand drawn images. Mixed in blends, glows and my own secret ingredients. And these images are the result.

Enjoy. And Happy Halloween.

ART MATTERS!

I was having dinner with a neighbor this past Saturday. During the course of passing the butter and dishing out soup, we talked about budget cuts on art programs in area schools. Mid-ladle, I was asked, "Why does art matter?"

Taken a back, I wasn't quick to answer. What was behind this question?

Was he challenging my life-long profession? Or was this a genuine inquiry?
To maintain dining civility, I opted for "genuine inquiry".
But now, how do I set about answering this query?
Why have I invested most of my adult life in the Arts?
Why has this pursuit been important to me?

My first response was very flippant.
"Art matters VERY much to me. It pays the bills." Then I set about talking about what a life in the Arts, specifically in advertising and design, has done for me. I talked about how I thought working in the Arts had made me smarter.

Yes, I said smarter.

Working for all sorts of industries, I get to learn about all sorts of industries.
How they work...or aren't working. What is their process and what are their tools. I find out how many people does it take… their roles and duties…the skills required…and how they engage their consumer. Basically, how do they do what they do and why? And what is the problem I am tasked with solving… why is a solution important?

Next, I look into the industry as a whole. Who is doing the best work? How is the consumer engaged? What works, what doesn’t?

After the research, I get to do the "art part". And the art part means I get to think up a vast array of angles to satisfy the problems.
Print. Broadcast. Web. Social Media. Viral. Displays. Interfaces.
Everything from hang tags to global launch.
Everything is important.
Everything needs to be figured out.
Which means everything needs to be concepted, designed and crafted, while also keeping a lookout for ways to keep the client and their community viable.

I think that's important work.
Art being used to solve problems and encourage growth.

I am learning something new every day. I get paid to be curious, poke around, build new things, partner with talented people to implement ideas, and I get to do this again and again and again.

Would I have gone into the Arts without a foundation in art in my schooling?
For myself, I also had a keen interest in the natural sciences.
Without an Arts Program I would have no doubt ventured into this discipline.
And I suspect I would have been content in this pursuit.

But a life in the Arts has built a life that exceeds contentment.

The next day, I returned to the question.

Do the Arts matter?

I sat down to write. Writing for the next couple of hours, this is what I concluded.

Yes. Art does matter.

- It makes us think.

- It develops focus and increases attention. Art hones our observation skills.

- It gives us problem-solving tools.

- It can challenge us.

- It can lead us to self-discovery...cultural-discovery...world-discovery...nature-discovery...

- Viewing it or doing it, art can make us very happy.

- Art allows you to explore. Increasing our enjoyment of the real world... and the world between our ears.

- You don't need to own, create or buy art, in order to benefit from it.

- Art can make you uncomfortable. In a PC, wear-your-safety-belt, follow-the-printed instructions kinda world. It’s not bad being uncomfortable occasionally.

- Art has the power to transform.

- Art can inspire.

- It can reveal insights into our history. It tells our stories.

- Art encourages creative thinking. And our world needs more creative thinkers.

- A love of the Arts means you are open to a lifetime of discoveries.

- The Visual Arts work in a realm outside of words, mathematics and analytical reasoning, while it also can work inside words, mathematics and analytical reasoning.

- Art can evoke or re-create real experiences.

- In art, its OK to take risks.

- In art, its OK to express the impossible.

- Quality of life improves with the addition of art institutions in a community.

- Art matters very much to the artist that has devoted their entire life to this pursuit.

- Art offers different explanations of our world.

- Being surprised is an unexpected result from art.

` Art has the power to heal.

- Art brings people together.

- Art is an outlet.

- Art helps us make sense of the world.

- Art is a universal language, while also being a very personal language.

- Art occupies that space between heart and mind.

In this inquiry as to whether art matters, I feel I have only scratched the surface, because art touches every aspect of our lives.

Every aspect.

Perhaps because art is so all encompassing, we have taken it for granted like the air we breath. But what is more essential to our personal and global development and preservation, then creating?

Re-drawing type with a capital T

For the past year I've been working on re-drawing the alphabet.

I wanted to create new letterforms from odd bits and parts. So I’ve set about breaking apart, rebuilding and gluing back together shapes of letters from old type specimen books to build new letters. Old letters are selected and scanned. In Photoshop I break apart, squish, cut out then apply virtual glue to put things back together again. The result is then redrawn with a felt-tipped pen.

This new drawing is scanned and placed into Photoshop where I clean up the blobs and the uneven strokes. Illustrator takes the file and it gets further refined. And then its back to Photoshop, adding a mixture of layers and blends. In essence I am breaking and rebuilding and gluing back, several times before I am happy with the result.

The letters still retain their meaning. A’s look like A’s. B’s are still B’s. But I think there is a greater complexity to the shape. It’s not a reinvention so much as making it an old letterform more 2011.

I'm really enjoying the process. Delighting most in the magic that happens with mixing up blend modes, throwing in a mask or 2, and reorgainzing the layer order.

Below are a few of the results from this play.