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WOW, I'm awful at posting...

Just so you know, I haven't died, I do have some sketches, which I will post as soon as I can scan them in. Been super busy, even though it is technically Spring Break, and I haven't wanted to spend my precious free time cuddling with my scanner in studio... (It's under my desk, which makes scanning things a tich uncomfortable...). I'm not so great at sketching every day like I should, nor at learning Italian. I won't be as prepared when I get there as I was hoping to be, but what I have done will have to do.

On the plus side, I can now say that I'm a vegetarian... "Sono Vegetariano"

And Count to ten (whoopie... :/)

Comunque, Arrivederci
Goodbye for now.

What's this?

So... While doing research for an history paper I stumbled across THIS in the front of a book...

I thought "Is that what I think it is?"

So I googled Frank Lloyd Wright's autograph, which gets me this.

And this, as of November, 1953, the year the book was published. (click to enlarge)

That looks promising.

But blue ball point pen doesn't seem like Frank's style... were ball point pens even around in the 50's?

So I googled that, too. Turns out they were. In fact, a new style came out in 1954, which lead to a huge surge in popularity. 1954 is probably around the time this would have been signed... and Frank loved new spiffy technology.

I think this is what I think it is... unfortunately, there's no way to verify if it's real or not. It's either a good fake, or the library has NO idea what it has...

Only one question left: do i "lose" the book and pay a fine... or do I just return it...

Map

I'm absolutely awful at geography, so I thought I'd make a map to orient myself to Italy and the surrounding countries. Apparently, I can't draw, either, because Italy is actually on a slant, not straight up and down. And my scanner is slightly too small, so it didn't get it all scanned in. But here it is, anyway. Watercolor over pencil and ink.




P.S.
I had no idea that Switzerland (which is cut off in the picture, coincidentally) was right above Italy. I don't know where I thought it was, but not there...

Aquatic center

If you're wondering what the last six weeks of my life looks like, this is it! There are more drawings, but my computer is being stupid and won't let me access all the files. If you want to see the final, final, let me know!

Watercolor Palettes(!)

I finally bought the kit for the Rome Prep Seminar from the bookstore today. I didn't want to a t first, because I already have most of the materials. But I couldn't find a suitable palette online. The kit cost $78. Why? The palette. Without the palette, the kit was worth $30...

I had no idea that they cost so much! Sure, they make crappy plastic ones, just like everything else, but it needs to survive living in my backpack for 2 months... hopefully more.

They even make some out of bulletproof glass (!). The description said that those palettes allow the paint to remain in solution, and therefore you can tell how it will look on the paper. I call BS, but still. That one was $59.99.

Since tubes of paint are $4 a pop, and brushes and apparently palettes are ridiculously
priced as well, watercolor is one expensive sport.

Passport!

My Passport came in the mail today! Yay! The picture is absolutely awful. I don't understand the point of requiring picture identification if the picture looks nothing like the person in real life...

Anyway, I am NOT getting anywhere with this studio project... I'm stuck, stuck, stuck. This project just isn't exciting me for some reason. So... given my recent obsession with fish, I thought I'd take a break and try out my water-coloring again.




Meh. It's ok. I haven't had much time to practice, and it's really pigment-heavy. That and it's just in my practice sketchbook and not on watercolor paper, which makes a HUGE difference. I kind of want to do the renderings for this final project in watercolor, but I'm not so sure now...

Anyway, nose back to the grindstone!

Ciao, A Piu Tardi!

Piazza Assignment/ Sketches

I forgot to mention that the other day, we got our piazza (rough translation: "plaza") assignments for Rome. Each student is assigned 2 of the smaller piazzas to study and analyze during our stay.




Mine are Santa Maria Della Pace, or "Holy Mary of the Peace", the name of the church that sits on the piazza, and Largo Febo, (the red dots connected by the blue line in the picture). The oval pizza nearby is Piazza Navona. The White oval in the farther-zoomed picture is the Pantheon.

If I get time later I'll post the street views from Google Earth.

Also,
Here are some quick (5 min.) sketches from the other day. Drawn from photos...




and... some fish. Well, what used to be fish anyway. I'm using the skeletons as a strucutral analysis for our current Aquatic center project. No fish were harmed in the making of these sketches ....