Hello, and welcome to my newsletter! The primary focus of this letter is to share what is happening with me art wise, but I also like to share some personal things since I believe these things have a way of shaping the art that I create.
Family life
Talk about a rough year! After experiencing a fall in her home, my mom’s health took a turn for the worse. She had to be taken to the hospital to make sure she wasn’t injured. She was fine, just a bit bruised, however her major problem was mobility, so she was sent to a nursing facility to regain her strength. Unfortunately, as she was never able to regain her strength, her health continued to decline. She passed away a couple of months later in her sleep. I was sad to have lost her, but glad that she didn’t really suffer.
During my mom’s memorial service, it was nice to see and hear from all the people whose lives she touched. She was very generous with her time and money. Her thinking was to give if she had the resources and not to worry about getting anything back in return. Things have a way of taking care of themselves when needed. She made a huge difference in the lives of many. I miss her greatly.
On a happier note, at the beginning of this year my wife and I celebrated our 30th wedding anniversary. Sheesh, I don’t feel old enough for that! We kept our celebration pretty low key with going out to eat and getting a few practical things for the house as a gift to each other. Getting married in January makes it hard to find good places to vacation, but we might go somewhere this summer as a belated trip.
Family life
Talk about a rough year! After experiencing a fall in her home, my mom’s health took a turn for the worse. She had to be taken to the hospital to make sure she wasn’t injured. She was fine, just a bit bruised, however her major problem was mobility, so she was sent to a nursing facility to regain her strength. Unfortunately, as she was never able to regain her strength, her health continued to decline. She passed away a couple of months later in her sleep. I was sad to have lost her, but glad that she didn’t really suffer.
During my mom’s memorial service, it was nice to see and hear from all the people whose lives she touched. She was very generous with her time and money. Her thinking was to give if she had the resources and not to worry about getting anything back in return. Things have a way of taking care of themselves when needed. She made a huge difference in the lives of many. I miss her greatly.
On a happier note, at the beginning of this year my wife and I celebrated our 30th wedding anniversary. Sheesh, I don’t feel old enough for that! We kept our celebration pretty low key with going out to eat and getting a few practical things for the house as a gift to each other. Getting married in January makes it hard to find good places to vacation, but we might go somewhere this summer as a belated trip.
Healthy stuff
It’s been almost 2 ½ years since my heart attack. So far my health has been pretty stable. I still get a little bit of anxiety, usually when my blood pressure isn’t what I think it should be, but I have learned to take things a day a time and not stress too much. I am still consistent with eating a healthy diet, but I still am waiting for the junk food cravings to go away like people have said they would. Sometimes I would just love to have a couple slices of pizza. I guess I need to give it a little more time for the cravings to go away. Perhaps another 10 years.
After nursing myself from a few injuries, I finally completed my first marathon, which is a run that is 26.2 miles (hey, I find that a lot of people don’t know what a marathon is!) Let me say, that is a long way to run! And even though I finished, it wasn’t pretty. I felt great for the first 5 miles or so, but after that I started to feel pain in both of my knees. By mile 15 my knees were forcing me to walk. No matter how hard I tried, I couldn’t get myself to continue running. There were times that I almost called it a day, but I ended up walking across the finish line in just over 6 hours. What a long day! I haven’t been able to run since then because my right knee still won’t let me. I am hoping that I can get back into running by summer time. If I can least run 5 or 6 miles at a time then that would be great. Thankfully marathon running is not a requirement for being healthy.
Art
With all the family events occurring over last year it’s been difficult to make much progress with my art. However, I finally have a good start with my graphic novel. I have the entire story roughly outlined and I’m almost finished with the first chapter- that’s penciling, inking, lettering, and coloring ten pages of panels. Being that it is a sci-fi zombie story I am hoping to have the story completed and available to the public by Halloween of this year.
I have also started my abstract art series. I’ve been putting it off for way too long. I think part of me is insecure about creating and sharing this type of art because even though abstract art has been a part of the art world for many centuries, it still doesn’t seem to be accepted by the general public. It seems everyone has an idea of what art is even though they never can explain what it is. Regardless of what people think, I am jumping in with both feet with this series with the hope that it will resonate with somebody.
Since March of last year I’ve been attending a drawing group at an art studio called The Catalyst. I have been aware of this group for a long time and finally decided to give it a try to see what it’s all about. The group is led by an artist who demonstrates different techniques and approaches to drawing, mostly portraits done with charcoal. It’s been a lot of fun to just draw for the sake of drawing and spend time with other artists. I have no plans for my charcoal drawings other than working with a different medium than what is normal for me and to refresh my skills in the fundamentals of drawing. I find mastering the fundamentals is a lifelong pursuit as an artist.
With self-promotion as one of my weaknesses as an artist and illustrator, this is the year that I am going to get the ball rolling. I have a good amount of work that I can use throughout the year to get printed and sent out to prospective clients and I have a bit in the savings to make it happen. I am hoping to increase my income significantly by the end of the year. If I can’t get things going by next year I may have to get a day job, which is not a bad thing, but it’s not really what I want, especially since I have no idea what else I would do.
Thanks for taking time to read this newsletter. I haven’t decided if I want it to be an annual publication or if I will send it out a few times during the year. I guess I will play it by ear.
Till next time,
Be creative!
D