Do you recognize Christopher Lee? I finished this book so I could read it at Oregon Country Fair in 2022. I was really scrambling to get this done, literally working on it in between classes, rushing over to draw and color as soon as my students would leave for lunch. It was fun to share the stage with poets at Chez Rays stage at OCF and so touching to hear their words. Grace, Sage, Marcus, and Jorah are inspiring. Here I am doing comedy at Spectrum in between drag queens for Drag Brunch! It’s always fun performing there. One sweet mother and daughter team wanted to give me a tip!
the poem is “a rumination on death” and the audio version of it can be heard here. I played guitar and did production, but my good friend Craig Brookes played bass and added drums and helped with production. It also has good friends contributing to the background noises and shouting parts.
Lots of other poems and comics and art by students and adults. I feel so grateful blessed thank you Bree!
Surf’s Up season 9 episode 2Just the cloudsPainting in some dark wAterAdded the rocks with a palate knife and the white fluffy foam on top of the waves, you can almost hear it!
As an artist we go through phases where we might condemn some art as being tacky, commercial, vapid, and then we may come around eventually to enjoying it. That’s how I was for Bob Ross’ work and so today, at the age of 39 I painted my first Bob Ross style painting. I have seen children paint beautiful pieces following along with bob ross. He’s so gentle and funny in a subtle way. I can really see how he became so popular, it isn’t just the art: it’s the cute things bob says as he paints that make the show watchable.
“Island in the wilderness” season 29 episode 1
I was gifted a set of leather Acrylic paint and a set of bob ross brushes for Christmas so I’m trying them both out for the first time here. Bob Ross paints with oils, but that requires you to use paint thinner, and I already have MANY tubes of Acrylic paint.
The major difference is oil paint dries much slower, so when bob said paint on the pink in the sky, then the blue, and then put a touch of paint thinner on your brush and blend them, my paint had already dried so I couldn’t blend them anymore.
Also he said to scratch the paint away with a knife sometimes and I couldn’t do that either. My bob ross brush set even said on the packaging “for use with oils only: do NOT use acrylic paint with this brush.”
I thought it would be fun to use an airbrush to do the sky. Maybe I’ll try that with my next project, get some lovely gradient blending that wayThe fan brush was used to paint these vertical background trees. In mine they look like they have been hit with a forest fire that has burned of their branches.Next I painted in the water reflection and some foreground treesNot bad… but I left some pink in the background above the mountains and I thought the tree on the far left had too much light tone in its trunk, so I tidied that up and put some more in the water: too much contrast between the green reflection and the sky blue water Leaving a bit of white in the background makes some interesting mist . The sky looks more orange here on the phone than it does irl.
So there you have it. A bob Ross style improvised landscape. No matter what your art style is, if you’re going to draw figures or dragons , it would be nice for them occasionally be in landscapes. Even if your art is usually abstract, it can be rewarding and fun to follow along a guide as they do things step by step. After following along 4 or 5 of these, many people could “improvise” their own. It could be fun to Follow the directions but use all “wrong” colors. Or to have students film their own “how to paint” guides.
Perhaps the first appearance of a “holodeck” or “danger room” in a work of science fiction, Ray Bradbury wrote “The Veldt” in 1950, it originally appeared as “The World the Children Made” in the September 23, 1950 issue of The Saturday Evening Post. He included it in his book: “the illustrated man.” I got to see it once as a stage play at the University Of Alaska Fairbanks Theater Dept. I’ve always loved this story, and with the help of some talented friends, I put it together based on the episode of “x Minus 1” #holodeck #dangerroom #thenursery #scifiradio #raybradbury #greatestsciencefictionwriter
Featured in the cast:
Jonathan Miller as George
Ariel Hicks as Lydia
Nicholas Price as Dr. David McLean
Narrated by Andrew J Laniohan.
Eli May Salerno as Peter
Cora Paris Hanson as Wendy
Sound effects and music by Isaac Paris
Some sounds came from YouTube, or I made them. Others from freesound.org or the Apple GarageBand library. Song at the end “Pauline” by Isaac Paris.
SPOILER ALERT
There were a few different versions, some of which imply the parents really do DIE. I referenced the original, mostly stuck to the x minus one episode, but I did edit a few lines, and allowed my actors to improvise a little.
If you’d like to read it, its FREE online here Do you think the story is stronger if the parents actually are eaten by holographic lions?
I took a walk recently on a hike in Southern Oregon’s Redwood forest. The trees are so tall and beautiful and everywhere is covered with moss. Its breathtaking and beautiful, and being the day after Thanksgiving, we had the trail almost completely to ourselves.
While walking, I took many photos of the trees and logs, burls and growths. I saw some mushrooms and some lichen. I thought of how the blank page or canvas in front of an artist can be so daunting, and thought I’d demonstrate how an artist could take photos (by themselves, or by others) and look in them for faces or figures.
Image description, trees, roots, moss and ferns from the Oregon Redwoods Forest
I’m sure if you look at these photos you’ll see shapes and values, but can you use your imagination and nudge those into faces or figures? Take a moment and really look at these before you scroll down and see my drawings. Your interpretations can be completely different than mine.
Image description, a spooky wizard with a cloak whose face is concealed in shadow with his arms raised and a glowing black orb above his head. A cackling witch holding a wand with long springy green hair.
here is a Goofy Muppet version of Totoro.
this burl resembled a cute spider’s face to me, he is even stepping forward toward us.
If you see faces in clouds or the natural grain of wood, you aren’t alone: but you can focus on it: meditate on it, to help fight “writer’s block.” It’s kind of like playing “Exquisite Corpse” with yourself, or is it with the wood spirits? I believe Leonardo da Vinci wrote about this phenomenon and it was part of the inspiration of the German Surrealist Max Ernst. Do you know of any other artists who have written about this phenomenon?
I am a big fan of fantasy art such as the illustrations for Magic: The Gathering. I suspect that sometimes those painters are inspired by nature to give them ideas for composition. Any game that you immerse yourself in and spend time with hundreds of pieces of art is going to leave an impression on you. I’m so grateful for the game and the company who makes it for employing hundreds of artists and bringing thousands of new wonderful beautiful works into our world.
I recently learned that the surrealists sought inspiration in this way. here is an example of a Max Ernst piece, and a grain silo that was his inspiration.
Sometimes I even see an art “wrong” and don’t interpret the piece correctly. This can be a complete shock when you “see” it right or someone points out what it’s supposed to be. Does this ever happen to you? Here are two examples of Magic The Gathering art that I interpreted the wrong way, I saw the first one as facing the right and not the left. The second, i thought the characters arm was her face and she was pen headed with a lacy streamer coming out of the top of her head going to the right.
I love silly Halloween novelty songs and horror soundtrack music. Checkout this weeks episode of the retro cocktail hour.
I wrote a song on my album about horror movies and horror tropes. Check it out here,
It was real fun to put together, I scrapped a set of lyrics that I had put together about being an undead person trying to find a date, and based it on a Richard Sala interview and a horror film protagonist who has fallen for a honey trap, I joke that it’s from Shaggy’s perspective. After I saw “ house of the devil.” I put in some theremin and creaking door and pounding sound effects too. Ryan Schmidt provided the drums and played some of the synths in the rhythm too. I hope you enjoy it!
I had the pleasure of hosting a show this last summer. Owzla asked me if I would host and I gladly played the role of MC, and brought my theremin and invited people to play. Owzla always puts on such a great show! This is an example of what you can do with passion , volunteers and not a lot of money! We estimate that 85 people were in attendance at this show. Grey matter jugglers we’re fantastic 🙂 I’m available to host shows usually, just ask!
Art City Eugene hosts an event called BEAM, this is the 3rd year
This year I submitted an original Animation. This was made with putty, some was the classic “silly putty” and some was “crazy Aaron’s thinking putty” It was just put on bodies I cut out of magazines and took long timelapse movies of them as they melted.
This last year I’ve made several pet portraits using markers, paint, and ink. all of these are based off photographs. I will be offering this service to a winning bidder for an auction to raise funds for Green Hill.
Isaac and the Awkward Situations 