Obscura Estetica

I am participating in an exhibit along with Kristilyn that we have named Obscura Estetica at the Millenium Restaurant, 3094 Washington Street, Boston (Eagleston Square in JP). We're having an opening reception on Thursday, March 14, 6.00PM-8.00PM, so feel free to stop by! The restaurant is nice and informal and has good food. I will exhibit pages I illustrated for Dave Kender's The Ragbox, chapter 5 ("The Salon"). If you can't make it to the opening reception, the pictures are up now and until March 25, so you can check them out!

What else is new? I have stuff for sale at Society6 in case you are looking for some prints, phone cases, and even throw pillows, cards, t-shirts and hoodies. Here are some of the items you can find there:

Buildings, Business Cards and Beacon Hill.

After almost ten years working at a big law firm in Boston, my better half, Josh Gardner, is starting up his own practice as a plaintiff's lawyer. Naturally I designed his business card. Josh rented an office in the beautiful Beacon Hill neighborhood, right downtown, and wanted an image of his new building on the card. I went up there one weekend and sketched his building and its immediate surroundings on Mt. Vernon Street, right behind the state house. I really love drawing buildings and houses, so it was a fun assignment for me. Back home, I finished up the drawing with ink and instead of the usual bristol board, I used a type of paper that I had bought at the art supply store previously: Border & Riley's #234 Paris Paper for Pens. It is super smooth, of high quality and I love it (though quite pricey, so it won't be for everyday use, that's for sure)!

I leave the web design to the experts, though. Freelance web designer/illustrator/cartoonist/editor and fellow member of Boston Comics Roundtable, Roho, is in charge of the web site's design and maintenance, and I will post a link to it as soon as Josh officially opens his practice (to visit Roho's blog and see his portfolio, click here).

Do you want a picture of your office building/house on your business card? Instead of a generic-looking drawing, the illustration will still have the characteristics of my usual style. Send me an email for info on rates, turnaround time and rights of usage!

Made With Love

This looks very much like a Christmas whatever-it-is, but it is actually a belated birthday present for a really good friend of mine. I know that she likes pink, floral and angels, but she pretty much has everything when it comes to decorative things, and is actually trying to get rid of stuff, not accumulate more stuff. However, she did need an address book, and instead of just giving her a plain one, or choosing a pattern, I decided to make her a DIY one-of-a-kind book. I bought a regular black Moleskine address book and put together a cover mixed media picture using gesso, acrylic paint, a glossy angel, a washer, molding paste, a rubber stamp, Mod Podge, glitter, an old stamp, some bits of patterned paper and some glittery paper. The image consists of layers of paper, gesso, fabric, paste and paint, sealed with a couple of layers of Mod Podge.

As is the case with a lot of mixed media pieces, this cover is also put together with pieces that have been found and gathered up from various places. I bought the glossy angel from a museum gift shop in Denmark, where they came in little sheets of 8-10. In Norway we call them glansbilder, and when I was a kid, most Scandinavian girls collected them. I had a box of old ones that my mom had collected when she was a kid, but who knows where they are now. I have traveled and moved around from country to country so much that my belongings have been scattered everywhere. I am not sure if anyone collects glansbilder anymore. This angel was, according to sheet, made in West Germany (!), so maybe they haven't been produced for a while? When I moved to Britain in the late 1970's, I was surprised that nobody had even heard of these glossy paper collectibles. When I see them now, I realize how nostalgic they are, a bit like those sweet little figurines that people collect, or Christmas decorations, for that matter. If this had not been a present, I would probably have put some punk/goth influence into the image, if nothing else then just to temper the sweetness of the angel.

The washer was an object I found on my bedroom floor that day. Who knows where it belonged. Some of the lace on the left side was from a whole roll that I bought for 10 cents at a tag sale. The other lace originates from a baby shower decoration that I found out on the street on recycling day somewhere in Brookline. I don't remember where the shiny silver-colored ribbon came from, probably a present or something. The old Syrian stamp was in a ready-packed collection of vintage labels and stuff from Paper-Source, and I grabbed a few pinches of glitter from the kids' arts & crafts box to sprinkle over the image as a final touch.

If I had had more time to do this, I would have made the book myself rather than buying a Moleskine. That would have made the gift far more unique. Also, notebooks and sketchbooks don't have to be expensive, so a customary decorated one can be made pretty cheaply for anyone who is creative and either doesn't have much cash lying around this time of year (who does?), or refuses to buy into the overly commercial aspect of the holiday season. Regardless of what goes into DIY gifts, they are usually made with love, which factory/sweatshop-made products definitely are NOT. If you don't have time to make your own gifts, then visit one of the many holiday crafts fairs this season. Here in Boston, there is the Holly Fair in Cambridge, and Bazaar Bizarre at the Cyclorama, this upcoming weekend. There you will find a lot of neat and unique crafts made locally and with love...and you'll probably find me there too, at either one of those places on Sunday, manning the comic-book table with fellow members of the Boston Comics Roundtable!

A bohemian on Newbury Street

I made this piece (above) with ink on bristol board, then worked with the toning in Photoshop. I had started it a while ago, and originally envisioned it in full color, but that's not how it worked out! No surprise, really, because I love working in black and white. The sketch (below), however, turned out to be quite vibrant once I added color to it. I mainly used Copic and Mepxy markers. The scene is Newbury Street in Back Bay, where I spent some time sketching at the beginning of fall. I love to walk around this area and look at the buildings with all their galleries and boutiques, and all the stylishly dressed people walking around in heels, chatting on their smartphones, or walking in groups, heading for a club or a party. Sometimes I bring one of my numerous walking-tour books of Boston with me, and learn a bit about the apartment buildings--many of them old mansions--as I roam around. I love this area, but it is a bit like a bubble. A mix of the grandiose, past and present, and the corporate and fast-paced. And I don't feel entirely at home here, the streets are too clean, and most of the people on the street probably don't belong to the neighborhood either, maybe they work here, but they live elsewhere. On this particular night,  I watched the street light up its windows and street lamps as dusk fell. I sat down and sketched, but most people walked so fast, I could hardly sketch them fast enough before they disappeared around the corner. That was at the beginning of fall, when there was still some warmth in the air. Now it is winter, and freezing cold, but I shouldn't let that stop me from sketching outside. As they say back in the old country: There is no such thing as bad weather, just bad clothes.

Magnus and Jenner! They're here!

Finally! The children's book, Magnus and Jenner, written by Kim Girard and illustrated by me is available at amazon and at the Brookline Booksmith in Brookline's Coolidge Corner! Also check out the book's website here. Magnus and Jenner will make its way to more independent bookstores in the greater Boston area and I will also bring copies to sell at MICE (Massachusetts Independent Comics Expo) in Porter Square, Cambridge, next Saturday, 09.29.12. I'll have half a table at MICE, selling my minicomics as well as copies of Magnus and Jenner. My next blog post will be about MICE and the comics I'll bring there, so check back again soon! In the meantime, read the Boston Globe article about MICE, posted on BCR's page on Facebook.  The photographer was walking around taking photos at our meeting last week when we all sat down to draw cartoons of mice for MICE.

Voyage Fantastica

This is my very latest illustration, designed by Troy Minkowsky to accompany his steampunk story, Voyage Fantastica, a brilliant adventure story about a boy genius and a cast of unforgettable characters.

Based on Troy's descriptions and mockup-version of the poster, I put this illustration together using a mixed media page as a base (old pages from a book, plus gesso and acrylic paint). I drew the stage part, including the characters, air ship, island and ocean, with ink, then colored it in with watercolor pencils and acrylic paint before I cut it out and stuck it onto the base page. I rubber stamped half of the stars, and then I scanned the whole thing. Because it was a large piece, I had the worst time trying to get it scanned using an oversize color scanner (not a flatbed, but the ones you feed the image into) on short notice. Some places would not let me do it myself, either because that was their policy, or because their scanner was broken. Since I was leaving for Denmark the next day, I didn't have time to wait the few days it would take the places to scan it, so I ended up scanning it in pieces on my own little scanner, then patching the image together in Photoshop.   I used Photoshop to create the rest of the image, including the altered clip-art horses, the color adjustments, ornaments, fonts and the rest of the stars. The original artwork is therefore very different from the finished illustration, as it remains very "unfinished."

As you can tell by earlier blog posts, this is by no means my first project with Troy Minkowsky. Another piece of good news is that Troy's version of the Hansel and Gretel fairytale, which I illustrated earlier this year, has been selected for Gurukitty's next anthology, Once Upon a Time, and will likely come out at the end of this year/beginning of 2013. More on that later!

Another piece of information: my drawings at the Brookline Town Hall will stay up for one more week, as the next exhibitor in room 103 has scheduled to put up her work on August 7th. In this way, there won't be a gap in the continuing exhibits on the Town Hall walls. So if you still want to see the drawings, but just haven't gotten around to it, there is still time!

Mixed Media Orchids From Denmark (With Love)

I just returned from a quick trip to Denmark. I am going to post some sketchbook pages from my travel-sketchbook, but before I do that, I'll share this mixed media piece that I did over there, and that my father will now have to find a frame for and add to his (not-so-small) collection of his youngest daughter's creative expressions. Like most parents, though, he appreciates his children's' work (unless I include him in my semi-autobiographical comics) and always displays it around the house. 

I had forgotten how beautiful Denmark is in the summer. Most of the days came with warm sunshine, but without the extreme heat and humidity we get over here. The inspiration for this piece was my father and stepmother's orchids in the big living room window with all the sunshine and blue skies outside. My parents' houses are full of plants and flowers, and in their gardens and greenhouse, there are tomato plants, cucumbers, herbs, roses, berry bushes, fruit trees, and plenty of brightly-colored flowers. All meticulously cared for with love. And here I am, someone who can't even keep a cactus alive, and I have no patience for gardening and plants anyway. Instead, I inherited my creative urge from both of them, and prefer to draw flowers rather than care for the actual things (though, to be honest...I don't draw or paint an awful lot of flowers either). 

The background is made of cut-outs from local newspapers from the Sallingsund area, pasted on bristol board with gesso and paint mixed in with it. I drew the flowers with pencil, painted them with watercolor and redrew them with ink. The zipper on the upper left hand corner is something I found out on my father's porch, and nobody could figure out who had lost it. I think it must have been my friend, Lis-Anne, who came to visit a few days earlier. Lis-Anne: if you are missing this object, you now know where to find it!

Steampunk-inspired illustration

This is my first steampunk-inspired illustration. The foreground is done with ink and watercolor pencils on bristol board. The background is a manipulated photo of the BU Bridge, that I took this summer on one of my excursions to Cambridge.

Projects

There are exciting things waiting to happen in the near--or not too far off, at least--future. Around March, Brookline writer Kim Girard plans to publish her children's book, and it will be full of my black and white illustrations. I can't say too much about it now, except that it is a lot of fun working on this project, and that it is an awesome story!

I have just been accepted to exhibit my drawings (mostly black & white comics and illustrations) at the Brookline Town Hall for a month in 2012 (probably May-June), so that will be fun too! I have to go through my submissions and weed out the darkest pieces, though, because since this is a public space, the images can't be too explicit or disturbing (and a lot of my stuff, I have realized,  is either dark, bloody or topless)

I still do illustrations for Spare Change, and the last one appeared in the last November edition. It was a portrait of Gary Johnston (aka John Doe), which I drew sometime in September or October. He was a very impressive and interesting person, and I enjoyed sketching him as he worked on an article in his "office" as he laughingly called it, in Central Square. Another illustration that I just finished last week is due to come out in one of the next editions, but I am not going to post it here until it has been in the paper (so buy the paper!).

I signed up for an account on the website Behance, so be sure to swing by and check out the projects I post there.

Gothista: Alternative Fashion Illustration. A project that I am not doing for a client, but just having a lot of fun with. Plus, I could use a lot more color in my portfolio!

Idea for a graphic novel set in Copenhagen.  Thanks to Copenhagen based photographer Thomas Christensen, who takes awesome photos of his city, and whose bird's view photograph I used for my top panel reference.

Spare Change illustration of Gary Johnston.

Line Art & Illustration is Open For Business: www.lineolsson.com

My portfolio portfolio website encountered some technical difficulties, but they are resolved, and here it is: www.lineolsson.com

Above are the images I am using for my business cards. No, they are not pathetically flattering & unrealistic self-portraits! ( I wish...:-)

Bad Hair Day? These Ladies Can Help...Chapter 5 Of The Ragbox!

Finally...or almost! Chapter 5 of Dave Kender's graphic novel, The Ragbox will be out soon, and there will be more on that at this year's MICE. I really took my time illustrating this chapter, since I've been pretty busy this last year, but I did enjoy every minute of the process.

The Ragbox is unique in the sense that a different artist illustrates each of its chapters. Kender published the the three first chapters in one volume, but printed chapter 4 as a mini, as will be the case with chapter 5. You do not have to have read the first volume to enjoy the subsequent chapters, as they also stand alone as slices-of-life stories, but it is fun to compare the different illustrators' individual style.

Kender has matched illustrators with chapters that would specifically interest them, and I really enjoyed drawing the people (stylistas, both young and not-so-young) and the setting (dilapidated hair salon) of this part of the story. I am not quite sure why, as I don't really follow fashion trends (I'm much too cheap to pay the price of designer stuff ), and don't spend much time in salons either (once or twice a year, just to get some peace and quiet, and because my hair has reached the point when it's so bad, it's not even funny). However, I do love looking at stylish people, and all the going ons of the salon are sort of fascinating. Also, my artistic mentor in the 1980's, combined his studio with a hairdresser salon in the basement, so I guess I have sort of spent time in that environment after all...that's an entirely different story, however, that I'll tell you all about later. Maybe. For now, get your first four chapters of The Ragbox at MICE and familiarize yourself with the characters of this neighborhood (which is loosely based on San Francisco's Mission district). To read more about The Ragbox, click here. For information on MICE, click here.

Enjoy!

Spare Change Illustration

Recently, I had the opportunity to do an illustration for the Boston alternative newspaper, Spare Change. With this assignment, I really got the feel of what it is like to do creative work under a very tight deadline, and I must admit that such pressure tends to work well with me. I spent about an hour and a half sketching Marc Goldfinger, part-time vendor and writer for Spare Change, during his interview with freelance writer, Micah Stahl. It was a nice, warm day in Cambridge's Central Square, and time flew by as I filled my sketchbook pages with observations. I love to draw people in person, rather than from photographs, and especially while they are not paying attention to me, but focused on a conversation with someone else. This situation draws out a person's personality that I then try to capture in my drawing. I also like to bring the surroundings into the portrait, in this case the area outside the 1369 Coffeehouse. To me it seemed like a nice, busy place that I could have spent the whole day in, had I not had to rush home and take care of kids and their school pick-ups, park playdates and karate lessons (yesterday, however, a Spare Change vendor complained that I had made Central Square look 'too nice,' since in his opinion it was the worst #%*!! neighborhood in town! :-)

In-between picking kids up from school, packing for a weekend trip, etc. I had to draw the illustration with ink, based on my pencil sketches, then scan it, clean it up in Photoshop and send it off by around 7-8 PM. Thanks to my lovely friend, Sowmya, I was able to make it, since she brought my kids over to her house for a few hours to play with her son.

Hopefully, I will be able to do more assignments like this one. In the meantime, I am working on the Open Fire! project (see previous blog post), and as the July 1 deadline for that one comes closer, my productivity seems to go up!

Dreamers

This is a pen & ink drawing I made the other day, inspired by one of my photos from Copenhagen last fall. Tivoli is an old amusement park smack in the middle of the city, a beautiful and magical place or a kitchy tourist trap, depending on your outlook. I tend to go for the first description myself, although the quiet (yes, a quiet amusement park in the middle of a city!) atmosphere with its million little lights, brightly colored flowers and fairy-tale feel is an illusion. It is definitely a place for daydreamers, which I've tried to capture in this picture.