Draw everyday for a year/ #draw365

On a random Saturday in December 2013 I made this New Year's resolution: Draw more! Draw everyday for a year! Draw for 5 min a day, or for 5 hours a day, just draw. So, 2014 is my year of drawing, of filling empty sketchbooks and using long forgotten art supplies.

Every week there's a different theme: sometimes it's silly, sometimes hard, and sometimes super fun. I thought of that initial love for art, when you draw everything around you; from a leaf in the park to a tube of paint on your desk. That initial wonder for seeing the world around you in a different way and putting it on paper.

It's not like riding a bike. With drawing it feels more like: if you don't use it you lose it. Almost a month in now, getting back to loose and accurate drawing is frustrating and being rusty is a pain making me wish I never stopped drawing in the first place. My drawing professor once told me - you have to be willing to make 100 bad drawings to make 1 good one. I guess this year I will make 365 drawings, and if I can make 4 good ones, the quantity will be right.  I managed to talk one a friend into this plan, so now I cannot give up and quit halfway through. I am held accountable and I'm putting it out there so that I do not give up. Doing something you love for 30 min a day should be a joy, not a New Year's resolution.

Margaret's Senior Portrait Shoot

There is something about high-school seniors that fills you with hope. Their lives are ahead of  them, as they are about to break free from their parents and of course the cliques and misery that is high-school. They are filled with so much energy and youth, so much potential; so many things to capture while shooting...Or perhaps it's my nostalgia for college, and wishing I was in their shoes.

Margaret rocked these!
These are some of my favorites.

Weddings. How planning one takes over your life...

Planning a wedding as a designer, especially as one obsessed with details, is simply a curse. I never dreamed of the perfect wedding, but I got so wrapped up in the madness that the rest of my life took a break. Before I knew it I was doing hand calligraphy on all my invites, and not just for a few guests like I had originally planned. My dining room table was a black hole for supplies for months, and eventually my living room turned into a jungle that was impossible to walk through.

I was not myself, and as proof pink -a color I am not fan of- ended up being one of our main colors. A color I constantly wanted to match to a Pantone since I kept getting Pepto Bismol pink, rather than blush. Designing a monogram and sketching a few pages of our initials made me seem like a schoolgirl in love covering my notebooks in my crush's name. I was not a bridezilla in the sense that I made other people's lives a nightmare, it was my own life and it was all on me.

A free generic wedding website won't do for a designer, and since they are awfully ugly I played around with a Wordpress theme, one that I'm still updating post wedding [ found here ]. Basically anything that can be designed - so pretty much everything - you can't help but try to work on. Despite scrapping most of the DIY projects, those, and Pinterest,  took over my life. I was surprised I got sucked into all of it, but it was nice that in the end guests noticed. I got compliments on all details and even on my hand addressed calligraphy as soon as the invites went out.

I questioned the necessity of it all constantly, and if the lack of sleep was really worth it. This pressure was created because in my mind, people expect designers to have beautiful weddings, that stand out in some way. I've seen weddings of my old design colleagues and was blown away by the details, but now I'm wondering how much sleep they got during their planning period. There were so many signs to make and so many things to spray paint gold...

Now that's it's over, I can get back to life without wedding planning, and just organize the aftermath. I am never tying another bow in my life! (I must've tied over 500). The day was perfect, and the visuals were not bad, but of course I can tell the signs I made at 3 am. Below are some images of the invites.

String drawing

The other day I had to dye some string and started drawing marks with it while it was still wet. That's how this drawing started. It follows the paths created by the string and it was all left to chance.

I was born in the most unhappy place on earth...

"Once upon a time there was a little girl and she lived in the most unhappy place on Earth...". According to Eric Weiner and his book, it's how my story would start, that is if my life was a fairytale.

Recently he wrote a book titled The Geography of Bliss in which my homecountry (Moldova) was rated the most miserable place on earth. He makes valid arguments for people's unhappiness, but those who jump to Moldova's defense make some counterpoints, or at least give valid reasons why the country is in its current state. I could write a lot on this delicate subject; not attacking mister Weiner's opinion but probably supporting it, at least partially. Then again perhaps being raised in that country I am already doomed to be a cynical pessimist and overall wet blanket. A family friend used to always ask: "Why do you have that sad look on your face of an exiled princess on the Black Sea?" Perhaps the sadness is already engraved on my face.

I've been thinking a lot lately about identity and culture. The problem with Moldova, as with many other former Soviet Union countries, is that our people had their identity stolen from them, and they no longer know who they are as a nation. It's a very long convoluted history that takes time to explain, and a problem my generation won't solve. However, it's not a dump, it's not under some sadness spell, and there are some happy people going on with their lives unbeknownst to them that they should be miserable. There are some very intelligent people, some very talented people, and some beautiful ones (despite mr. Weiner's statement that men don't take care of their appearance and women wear raccoon makeup).

I only grew up with two kinds of ice cream flavors (vanilla or chocolate) and didn't have peanut butter or cream cheese, but those were the least of my problems. I've had conversations with people about my background and recently I got this reaction: "wow, your childhood sounds awful, why are you such a nice person?" Maybe most of us from Moldova learn to be happy with fewer things, and learn to be kind when life finally gives us a break. Perhaps because in the end, despite our condition, we won't give up. We cannot chose where we are born, although we can choose to leave. Our parents raise us right and fight hard as hell to give us a better future working with what they have. And for that we are grateful, not unhappy.

Somewhere in my photo archive there are a lot more images, a lot probably even bleaker than these, and a lot more cheery, but  no need to go down memory lane. Just a snippet...

1. A partial view from my apartment right before the rain when the crows are going mad, so you get the morose feeling
2. My grandmother's house, after the chickens have escaped from the back
3. A tractor in the village

Why do people in MN talk about the weather 24/7?

When we jokingly call it MinneSNOWta we aren't kidding.
The reason Minnesotans talk about the weather nonstop is because it feels like half of the time it's trying to kill us. Winter ate spring this year, plain and simple. The following photos were taken April 19, when we thought we had the last snow storm of the season. In reality it happen much later—mid May—when most of the world was enjoying blooming trees and fresh green grass. At this point I have so many "Winter Storm" photo folders it's all a big deja vu, so pretend this is the last snow storm of the year.

Easter Coloring Book

I illustrated (and designed) my first coloring book!

Was that on my bucket list? Yes it was, without me realizing it because it sure felt good to get this done. From sketching stage to illustration, to design and production, this was a lot of fun.
It's a little sad without color, but the characters are happy—as most children's books characters are. I recently received the Prismacolor pencils, so a special thanks to my art "benefactors" they were finally put to use as I colored a few pages. I'm hoping to get some pencil illustrations done soon, since they are just great—no crayons for me!

This is very different from my usual style, peppy and simplified, with a very different line quality I usually work in. However, the product and audience dictates style and direction. It shows you that an artist (or at least this one) can easily adapt beyond their usual style.

So you can finally see the busy bees on the cover!
There are more images, a preview into character development, and the full book on my website.

You can also see it live here where I'm credited in the "Behind the story."