Sketchtravel

Moveable Art Feast. Sketchtravel is a simple but awesome concept, really. Pick 50 artists and send the one book to each in turn wherever in the globe they are, have them do artwork however they please on one page and pass it along to the next one on the list. Created by Daisuke Tsutsumi and Gérald Guerlais, the book project has been coming along, traveling from Paris, New York, Japan and is now in San Francisco. I have it now.

The distinctiveness of this sketchbook is that artist will not have to send a sketch, a drawing or a painting to a publisher : instead, a real sketchbook will travel from one artist to another during one year.
So, step by step, invited Artists can be inspired by what previous artists have done before in the Sketchbook.

It's not only about skills and abilities it's also about creativity, ideas and friendship. The original sketchbook will be exhibited at the Arludik Gallery, Paris. It will finally be sold at auction for a Charity Association, selected by the artists.

I love the case lavishly constructed by Daniel Lopez Munoz, who is not only a master artist but is handy with tools, too. The book pages are already adorned with amazing art (I'd post some but that will ruin the surprise for all of you, right?). Quite daunting for me to now add my work in this same line. Check out the roster of artists involved here.

And lookee here! There's a short clip of a movie Gerald and his band of talented friends over in France made. Whoa! This is awesome! And ad for a book? A book not even completed. The French rocks! Check it out.




This is so amazing! I'm going to France for the first time this July and hope to see a lot of Paris. I hope to bump into many of youse guys whom I correspond with it over there. I don't know a lick of french but I hope sign language and grinning a lot will help. I will indeed by traveling and sketching over there, so there, that ought to bring it all home.

Oh, and I do have to finish my page before I leave. Heh.


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Sketchtravel Video Commercial
Sketchtravel.com
Sketchtravel Blog
Daisuke Tsutsumi
Gerald Guerlais

Sketchtravel: Around the world through 71 artists's worlds

EPIC. Dice gave me the book back in 2007. And now the project that seemed so far off is done. It's been a long journey for Dice and though I wasn't there it's almost as if I can see how it all culminated. And who was the final artist on the book? Sketchtravel TV, the end of the journey...

The book, as in, THE ENTIRE book, will be auctioned off on October 17, 2011 in Brussels. I know, one person gets to walk away with this one book. Amazing. I won't be there but I wish them all good fortune. It is for a very good cause. Who's in it, you ask?

This traveling museum contains the personal visions of 71 exceptional illustrators, animators and comic book artists, including artists such as Bill Plympton, James Jean, Rebecca Dautremer, Glen Keane, Frederick Back, and Hayao Miyazaki. Initiated by illustrators Dice Tsutsumi (Japan) and Gerald Guerlais (France), the project will culminate in an auction of the original book in Brussels on October 17, 2011. Proceeds from the auction and royalties from the book's publication will be donated to the international literacy non-profit, Room to Read.

My participation in all this is just as a silent partner who watched as Dice and Gerald did all of the heavy lifting. But I did manage to document it back when I was years younger and had better time management skills. Check that out here

My congratulations to the entire team and all the artists involved. May good luck and angels watch over you all.


Sketchtravel website

Sketchtravel Blog

Room to Read

Sketchtravel handoff!

Alley-oop! The handoff happened weeks ago really. We got to take the picture only last week when Dice Tsutsumi started at Pixar. He took the picture with Enrico's fish-eye lens. Enrico already finished his weeks ago. He got the book after Lou "Linguini" Romano. Here's their hand-off.

That sealed it. The deadlines keeping me from the book is done and this window of relative quiet won't hold for long. I had to do the drawing quick. Dice says he would love to have it by next week. Yikes! I have a thumbnail rough of an idea I want to do , but will it work? What if I mess it up as I attempt to make it for real?

Stay tuned.


Sketchtravel Blog
Sketchtravel
Enrico Casarosa
Lou Romano

Sketchtravel: Page colored and done

Above image is cropped but it links to a larger view. See? It takes a while for me not to be all shy about showing bigger images but I come around.

PENCILS DOWN! Well, you have to stop, push away from the drawing board and say, "That's it! Anything I can do to this from here on will have to be conjecture."

As always I am liking the work more and more the longer I stay away from it. Dice Tsutsumi and Daniel Lopez Muñoz saw it first as I was scanning it for my files (it goes away, see. I'll not see it for a long while). They were very nice and made me feel real good about the work. Artists, we're forever chastising ourselves for not being better and better every time out of the gate. Or is that just me? Shrinks are expensive, fortune cookies are free.

Anyway, my thanks to all involved and the book is now about to be handed to the next person in line. Dice will arrange the photo shoot of that hand-off. Onward!

Sketchtravel
Sketchtravel Blog

Sketchtravel: My page in progress

The finished pencil page. Color will be added.

Backstage. Deadlines are great motivators. I had the one weekend to finish and that was it. Things will get busier, what with the Italy and Paris trip just around the corner. And I'm wary that the idea I had might just turn into mud as I try to realize it. The window of two days got whittled into one day, then into an afternoon. Actually a handful of hours.


Marker study on a pad of Muji newsprint from Japan

Start already! I had a thumbnail I worked up weeks ago, even before Enrico had the Sketchtravel book. I like it, it should work. Next was to do a rough on tracing paper to work out the composition.




That rough done, it seemed that it could hold together. The meter is running. Oops, we gotta run! We're due at Pixar to welcome our close friends to a Ratatouille screening in the best screening theater in the east bay. The sound in the Pixar theater is just truly amazing. You are forever spoiled for any other theater experience. Well, after leaving our guests there I really should be getting back to my drawing. But, well, you gotta have coffee, right? Off to Peets on Piedmont Avenue.



I used a coffee press for the composition but this coffee urn had so much character, so in it goes

They have a collection of antique percolators and coffee urns. I've taken many photos of these over the years but I don't have time to hunt through my un-tagged photos in my computer. I took a snap of one that catches my eye. Then I was thinking, hey, I'm a little sore from working out last week, when was the last time I had a good steam? We schedule a steam in the early evening--just to relax the anxious drawing brain.



I also collect these large wood block letters, likely used for headlines, and I thought it looked neat and complimented the urn. Seemed like fun, so in it goes.

Back to work. Oh, look at the time. I trace the drawing onto the page. I can't see the page too well, I should go outside to the back patio to draw. Natural light. Okay, now I can draw it for real. Pencils, HB, 4B, 6B. I'm careful not to smudge the page with my hand. Oh, fudge, look at the time. Honey, we gotta go. Time for the steam!




Ahhh, that made me sleepy. It's an hour later. Man, I gotta hustle. The light is dying in the backyard. I watercolor the coffee urn with a round sable and let the colors puddle and dry on their own. Takes time. I run inside to finish coloring.

Then it's a lot of staring at it.



After a great deal of squinting I grab the pastels to unify the whole thing. The focus of the piece is pulling to the left. It has to be all about Nina. That's what the pastels do. I do a lot of retouching the pencils and chase down some smudge I made of touching wet color. It seems to be holding together, but I do the diligence of touching it up here and there. By the time it's time for bed I will have resolved to wait till daylight again next day to truly judge it.

The finished piece in color to be posted tomorrow.