Model Behavior

"Art can never exist without naked beauty displayed." - William Blake

In the meantime, the Beginning Drawing class is, eh, drawing to a close for the semester. Here's a couple quick demos; the first a one-minute gesture, and the second is a ten-minute sketch from the model.

Posted here are snapshots of both original sketches; used up some white matte board left laying around the department studio - makes for good, sturdy material and recycles what otherwise would be wasted after cutting out 90% for a matte. I actually like the original drawing almost just as much as the "finished" image: the organic spontaneity of the underlying graphite is preserved. After taking a digital picture, it's then adjusted for brightness & contrast in Photoshop, then exported to FreeHand after being converted into a vectored image. Then follows a couple hours tweaking or deleting individual points and slight modifications including compositional arrangement. The end result is a very expressive line, much livelier than the crude Sharpie. Not that I don't appreciate crudity.




Besides printing out a few PDFs to get the models a copy (they rarely get to score any art from these sessions, and don't get paid anywhere near as much as this job actually is worth), I now have some images that'll get tossed on the compost heap in the mental studio awaiting further inspiration or funding (there is a distinct causal relationship). The one is a fairly decent portrait of the anonymous model, but the several gestures are abstracted enough that strictly from a design standpoint they are pegged for rebirth in as woodcuts and/or embroidery - two back-burner projects I swear I'm gonna get around to this winter. Right...
Soon as I'm done with this next batch of funnies...

"If you see somebody running down the street naked every single day, you stop looking up." - Stevie Nicks

More on Stereotypes

"There was a time, not very long ago, when cartoons in the White press were everything but a laughing matter to Blacks. Too often, their sole purpose was to demean Black people by portraying them either as pathetically primitive jungle creatures or grotesque-looking, dialect-muttering buffoons. Thanks to the dignified, non-stereotypical portrayal of Blacks by racially aware Black cartoonists and the relentless pressure from Black protest groups, the once widespread practice of disseminating racial insults in the guise of humor is largely a thing of the past." - From: “Crusaders with Pen and Ink - African American cartoonists” Ebony, Jan, 1993

As an appropriate follow-up to the last Ink & Snow post, the above panel from the Cleveland Call and Post is generating some heavy controversy and attention in both the press and on a couple cartooning websites. The paper isn't backing off whatsoever; the cartoon has done it's job insofar as shaking the tree, and now a whole can of worms has started to crawl across the web in response. Some very interesting and valid points are brought up alongside the usual trollish nonsense by the clueless. What causes an awful lot of cognitive dissonance in folks is when they discover that the cartoonist is himself black, which in theory might preempt some criticism by mainly deflecting the charge of racism, but that in turn brings up the ethical fantasy that we live in a colorblind world where everyone is equal regardless of race, gender or sexual orientation, right? Right? Shouldn't we as a country be beyond this by now? Yeah right. Does the fact that this was published in a largely black newspaper that serves a mostly black community and deals with a black person somehow immunize it?

From a brief bio on the creator over on We Need To Stop:

"Walt Carr, 63, might be a candidate for the mainstream press. For years he drew gag cartoons for Ebony magazine and the old Negro Digest (later Black World) while he worked as graphics department chief in the federal government. After he retired in December 1989, he began self-syndicating his cartoons, and today has five black newspapers as clients."

I'm reposting my original comment from the related thread over at The Daily Cartoonist here:

"Have to defer to the insight of Chris Rock (“Shoot the Messenger”) here – great routine and commentary on this topic. Certain comedians from certain segments of society have the right to go where others can’t: John Callahan can make fun of folks with disabilities, Aaron McGruder and Keith can make fun of black culture, Alison Bechdel with lesbians etc. and so on. That’s their prerogative, and if I or anybody else who doesn’t like it just has to deal with it, maybe even learn something about yourself in the process by confronting stereotypes.

That’s why I have a special thing for whites, particularly male heterosexuals, in my editorials, since with my biased perspective I tend to notice that they’re the group responsible for most of the rampant stupidity around me. In fact, pretty much every time I’ve ever gotten slammed for being racist in a panel, it’s usually by disaffected, even jealous, white folks who jump at any chance to vent their impotent white anger, usually from fear at losing their privileged position. That kind of ignorance is usually funny, until it gets into the really sad or creepy/scary comments, like some examples displayed here on this thread.

And this is also why editors are gun-shy about running controversial panels like this – seems that they are the ones who get pilloried instead of the artist: Walt Carr seems to have been around long enough and experienced enough to know what (and why) he’s doing. I looked around but doesn’t seem to have a web-presence, be nice to have him weigh in here.

Like any decent editorial it at least motivates discussion on the issue, or in this case, multiple issues. Being “one of the group” doesn’t necessarily automatically shield the cartoonist or their work from criticism, and they have the same shortcomings as anybody else and aren’t immune from making bad judgment calls either. The best work out there and what I admire the most in other cartoonists is when it transcends stereotypes and makes fun of universal human conditions, but those are rare, and harder to do than picking on people who are different, or maybe just the same as me."

I'd also add that in my experience some of the best pieces from the summer cartooning class are penned by members of a particular segment of society or subculture than effectively have creative license to make fun of their own people. Whether it’s from an Alaska Native, someone who’s gay, an autistic person, a deaf person, a blind person – I’ve had a wide diversity of backgrounds attend - I make a distinct point of encouraging them to draw cartoons that make fun of their respective groups. Even if I don’t get the joke, see the humor, or disagree with the content, my role as an instructor in those cases is to emphasize understanding of sometimes complex issues from different perspectives, and discuss concepts like context, individual and societal responsibility, and respect. But that doesn’t mean muzzling potential controversy or stifling creative expression by avoiding taboo topics – it’s a tricky balance of classroom and professional diplomacy.
As a practicing cartoonist I’ve certainly been guilty in the past of totally blowing it, by not being politically correct but just stupid and insensitive. But the risk of coming across as an offensive idiot is an occupational hazard, deliberately provocative or not. Forgiveness is probably not one of my personal assets, since a significant motivation for me to even pick up a pen in the first place (in the case of editorial panels) is to criticize what I perceive to be, in my own damned humble opinion, the shortcomings of someone or something else. That stands (or in my case, sits) in contrast against the desire to share in a simple laugh with a dumb joke, though pushing the boundaries of what constitutes good taste is a subjective and psychological aspect better left to another post. Fortunately I’m grateful for not only the chance to publicly display the good with the bad along with the ugly, but to work past mistakes and keep trying to do better with each drawing nomatter what the cause.

"Discussion in America means dissent." - James Thurber

"Anglanaqvaa"

The cabin crockpot is stuffed with onions, Alaska-grown potatoes and carrots, and deeper down, the side of corned beef is bathed in beer and mulled apple cider... working at home is extra nice on this winter day when the kitchen is only six feet away...


Much as I love to bitch about this place, there are the times when I wouldn't live anywhere else: riding the bus last night I was sandwiched inbetween some dude with an ginormous fox hat that kept nuzzling my face with every bump in the road, and right behind me a couple folks were talking in Yup'ik. Turns out they were a couple UAF students from Kwigillingok (or maybe it was Kulvagavik, or Kongiganak - one of the villages south of Bethel, eh). Well I just so happened to have my sketch book out with a fresh doodle of an editorial panel about a story in today's newspaper where another hunter from a notorious 2008 case plead guilty to "wanton waste." From the Anchorage Daily News:

"Eight men have been charged with wanton waste, failure to salvage edible meat, or both after troopers say they found at least 37 caribou rotting on the tundra outside Point Hope in the summer of 2008."

Now the original case is horrible - that kind of behavior is truly sickening and sure doesn't do any actual, real hunters any favors in the court of public opinion. But sure enough, like flies drawn to a rotting carcass, the racists jump at any chance to come out of the virtual woodwork and begin pillorying the Alaska Native community on comment threads.

Hence the gentle reminder just who the champions are when it comes to throwing it all away...

I know I'm a bit of a curmudgeon around the holidays - seeing all the greed and waste upsets my delicate sensitivities. After all that cheesecake anyways...

Oh and the post title & panel caption came from my querying the two guys on the bus on how you would say "hypocrite" in Yup'ik - turns out the translation of "someone-who-says-one-thing-but-does-another" was a bit too long, so we just went with "funny" instead. See the custom phonetic spelling in the above scan from sketchbook if you want to practise saying it under your breath.
I had originally intended to have the parka-dude off to the side in the cartoon, but was edited when the left>right dialog flow didn't make any sense. Plus it was a distracting and confusing element - something to be aware of when one is already dealing with a hopelessly obscure issue. But then in a last-minute reversal I stuck the verbage back in as a caption, for what it's worth.

And after submitting it, my editor misread it as a commentary on the habit of some folks around Fairbanks that use the public dumpsters to illegally dispose of their unwanted game. In fact he was eating some of the moose his neighbor had saved from such a fate - but I think I'll stick with the crockpot.

Profession: Cartoonist (DVD)

“I've spent my whole life working in a medium that was regarded with contempt largely because of historical reasons.” - Will Eisner

You really can't overstate the influence of legendary artist Will Eisner in the artform and industry. His work on both the comics page as a creator and publisher, and as both an author and teacher in the educational realm was and remains the ultimate standard of professionalism, pushing and promoting the genre to previously unrecognized heights. In honor of his contributions and achievements to comics, the Eisner Award, one of the highest awards in the genre, is named in his honor.

Two of Eisner's books, "Comics and Sequential Art" plus "Graphic Storytelling and Visual Narrative" still remain two of the top five essential, must-have nonfiction guides for any aspiring talent. It should also be required reading to study some of his many graphic novels and comics: from collected anthologies of his classic "The Spirit" and longer works such as "The Building" and "A Contract With God."

The original documentary was filmed first in 1999 by Brazilian artist Marisa Furtado de Oliveira, then when translation of the new version had begun in 2005, Eisner passed away. Image Entertainment began American distribution in December, 2008, and I finally was able to rent a copy locally just this summer, buying a copy for classroom use immediately thereafter.

From a Newsarama review by Steve Fritz:

"An American/Brazilian collaboration, this doc is divided into three key parts; Eisner’s roots and his work on The Spirit, his middle career and move into graphic novels and, finally, a solid analysis of his distinctive graphic style and importance to the industry/artform."

From Diamond Galleries' Scoop review:

"The first of its kind to do so, this three-part documentary dives deeply into Eisner’s life and career, featuring the cartoonist himself demonstrating his talent and technique. Interviews with comic legends, including Art Spiegelman, Bill Sinkiewicz, Denis Kitchen, Jerry Robinson, Ann Eisner, Angeli Guazzelli, Lailson, Mauricio de Souza, Ota, Ziraldo, Jano, and Francois Shuiten are given."

Throughout the interviews Eisner stresses the crucial importance of storytelling in conjunction with good art, and emphasizes the "universal language" of the medium in relating to common human experiences. The wide-ranging needs of the discipline call for pursuing diverse and eclectic knowledge in many fields; architecture, sociology, psychology, physics etc. and especially the study of movement and anatomy - in his words "expressive anatomy" to clearly communicate a character's emotional state to the reader by non-verbal means. If there is one mantra of Eisner's I took away from this movie, it had to be the statement "nothing is done accidentally," which speaks to the level of attention to detail in backgrounds, environments and props, to say nothing of guiding the viewer by deliberately directing through use of symbolic, visual elements. Formal conventions of the craft are discussed such as the perception of time, working with light & shadow, theory & technique and also establishing dialogue with narrative devices such as balloons and lettering.

There is considerable attention given to Eisner's fascinating personal history, including his stint with the Pentagon creating military training manuals and for industrial design, and the film also examines his landmark educational experiences at the School of Visual Arts. With an intimate and casual style of conversation he gives us insight into the practical business side of things such as the habits of responsible professionalism that were as much of a part of his success as his skills at being an exceptionally talented and classically trained artist.

The only drawback to this film is the extremely annoying and clumsy distractions of the animated sequences: the irony of rudely interrupting the narrative flow of one medium (film) while it's talking about the inherent significance of another (sequential art) with a completely different and comparatively weaker third (animation) seems like muddying the water with needless and ineffective flash that diminishes rather than strengthen the films message and delivery.

“All professionals should teach at some time in their career because they are obliged to pass on what they have learned.” - Will Eisner

Eisner describes his process of first writing the narrative, then creating a dummy book with roughs so as to pace out not only individual panels but also the compositional layout of pages, and then begins the penciling and finally the inking
For me personally, the absolute highlight of this film is the chance to actually watch Eisner draw: given that he passed away at the age of 88, he is shown in the documentary at 82, still able to crank out a page a day. Seeing up close the hands of a master working with his brush is inspiring even if it's not in person.

This documentary should be shown in any cartooning and comics class, and I rate it just after two others that I usually put on in the background during open-work sessions: "Independents" by Chris Brandt, 2009, and also the 1996 Al Hirshfeld documentary "The Line King."


An excerpted 3-minute clip from "Profession: Cartoonist" is up on YouTube, and copies of the documentary can be ordered (along with dozens of his other titles and additional samples of work) through his official website. Everyone, regardless of experience or skill level, will learn something from Eisner's work and enjoy this very special film, which is an outstanding retrospective of one of the giants in the field, and a tribute to a true master.

“As for me, I am in pursuit of excellence. I have no time to get old.” - Will Eisner

Zen

Actually, the more I think about this particular posting, the more I see the appropriateness as it relates to the shift in focus in the Beginning Drawing class. The obvious parallel is in introducing gesture drawings during the final two weeks while working with models: capturing the spontaneity of movement and representing the essence of form was the motivation behind creating this original series of sketches more than a decade ago.


While working in the production department at Trademark as a silkscreener (as opposed to a later stint in the graphic art dept.), I experimented with reproducing my original field sketches as serigraphs. After scanning the images they would be printed out as a positive and the burned onto a high mesh screen, and finally editioned onto Japanese hand-made (ex: kitikata) rice papers. These all culminated into a solo show at the now defunct Into the Woods Bookshop in 1999, which was an excellent setting to display these pieces, the perfect alternative venue in which to showcase works that also happened to perfectly reflect the ethics and ambiance of the business (most of the pics in this post were taken from that show).


The original images came from a long drive up the haul road with my photographer girlfriend in the depth of winter: we spent time around the last stand of spruce trees before tundra takes over the landscape, and it was during an intense near-white out from high winds with extremely bitter sub-zero temperatures. In fact we kept attracting the attention of pipeline service people who would pull over to check on our health and welfare, as obviously there had to be something wrong to be out in an hostile conditions.
Nope, just a coupla crazy-ass artists.


I remember I would have about two or three quick strokes with the brush before the ink would freeze (Diane's shutter also kept freezing up after a few shots) so we kept retreating to the cab of the pickup to thaw the art, our gear and ourselves out. The challenge behind encapsulating the cold, lonely beauty of the subject matter in such an environment was an almost total absence of context: the sky blended with the snow and left these isolated, almost abstracted spruce tree forms being blown by the arctic wind. While I filled a big sketchbook with page after page of gestures based on this road trip, only a relative handful were successful at imparting the experience, with only one, this particular piece, being the best.


The comparatively long odds of scoring the perfect sketch remind me of when I was a former philosophy major: I was given a copy of perhaps one of the oldest and definitely one of the best texts on art, the "Mustard Seed Manual of Painting," which was a pivotal resource for my artistic development at the time. In one of the sections, "The Book of Grass" I think it was, it was pointed up the necessity of doing hundreds and hundreds, if not ultimately thousands of gesture drawings such as these so as to statistically increase the chance of a "happy accident" - an improvisational, spontaneous, unconscious and purely reactive creation that appears under your brush without any deliberate guidance. Art as a Verb, not a Noun; a process and a part of life:

“Process”

• Process, broadly, is a series of actions and reactions.
• It is a way of interacting with materials in a way that allows for an open conversation and an unknown outcome.
• It is a working method. It is an approach to creating work.
• It is the opposite of thinking of an idea, and following the idea through with no alterations or amendments from conception to realization.
• Process means you make room in your work for ‘happy accidents’ or interruptions; for example, in printmaking, there is sometimes ‘found writing’ on a print plate where an accidental, or unintentional scratch has occurred.
• Process can be a way of generating ideas; for example, you might not know what to write about in your essay until you’ve begun to write it, and the words begin to suggest form and content.
• Process means sometimes getting de-railed or redirected by drips, holes, sloshes, scratches or tears, or the way paper moves, or how metal bends, or in what way cement dries; it means being open to what materials might suggest the next move to be, leaving the materials a generous amount of space to direct the work.
•Process is a way of encountering otherness, a way of dialoguing outside of oneself.

Years later a local Buddist group, the Cold Mountain Zen Center, appropriated the image for usage on a tshirt design, this week I actually got one mailed to me, and love the simplicity and power of the image. So does Bird-Dog, who suffered through the indignity of another impromptu model shoot.

Sourdoughs (Smells Like Frontier Spirit)

One of the fringe benefits in this occupation is you get to nourish the inner child, which means never really growing up, and nothing ever get old. Maybe that's the flip side of being immature; if you look hard enough you can always find some redeeming virtue to being juvenile, I mean "young at heart." Also it helps justify spending valuable time doing something for no particular reason.

But being in your forties and still laughing at fart jokes, I mean, c'mon willya?


Sigh ... add another one to the edit pile...

"Almost everything you will do is meaningless, but it is still important to do it." - Mahatma Gandhi

"Heartbroken"

Lost an old co-worker and friend this week: the story broke late Tuesday night, and I read over the on-line article, but details weren't made known until the next day when I learned about who was involved after reading the paper my girlfriend brought home late in the evening. Felt like a sucker-punch to the stomach - as I wrote on the comment thread for the story:

"I had the good fortune to work with Kathy many years ago at Dateline Copies, and remember most how her big, beautiful smile and great, huge laugh would always fill the room. She taught me a lot about patience and being gracious with customers, even under stressful situations, and always treated folks and co-workers with such wonderful warmth, intense intelligence, inspiring curiosity and uncommon understanding. She will be sorely missed in this community, and many of us wish peace to her friends and family during this time of grief."

I also went to UAF with the other victim, the son, and given his involvement with the music scene at the college radio station, he was a peripheral part of the art-circle that hung out on campus. We haven't talked in a few years other than the occasional path-crossing, and the same with his mother - though we waved at each other in a parking lot just last week.

The whole thing is just horrible, and the escalating violence and random shootings in this town is depressing.

And once again I found myself more than a little disturbed at the new depths of depravity on display over at other, related News-Miner comment threads. A surefire way to get my attitude up is reading the vile shit spewed by anonymous cowards who, besides not having any class or personal sense of shame, flaunt their pathological need of getting off on hurting people who are going through loss. I might be an insensitive idiot with some of my editorial panels, but at least I won't be remembered as some asshole who made fun of the recently deceased. Even if they're pretty low, one must maintain certain standards.

All I can say is that there is help out there if you know anyone who might need it. I've been lucky to have had friends and family be there for me in my own sordid past, and I probably wouldn't be alive today if it weren't for their intervention.

24-Hour Crisis Line: (907) 452-2357
Women in Crisis Counseling & Assistance: (907) 452-7273
Narcotics Anonymous: (907) 452-7372
Alcoholics Anonymous: (907) 456-7501

Two versions here, one for print (B&W) and the other for posting - only difference being the "Police Line" tape, the yellow arguably as strong a symbol as the words.

Yappers: Palin/Beck 2012 (updated X2)

Along the lines of the chorus of crickets from the rabid fan base over Palin's recent violation of the US Flag Code (feigning faux outrage over sexism instead), there'll be equally deafening howls of protest at one of the holy triumvirates in conservatism showing his unadulterated true colors. Glenn Beck, leering along with Limbaugh and O'Reilly at Palin's second coming, dropped his Vapo-Rub for a second and put this uppity woman in her place:

BECK: I don’t think things are hoots. I don’t. I don’t think it’s a hoot. I would never use the word hoot, and I respectfully ask that every time my name is brought up she would stop using the word ‘hoot.’ [...]No, no I’m just saying — Beck-Palin, I’ll consider. But Palin-Beck — can you imagine, can you imagine what an administration with the two of us would be like? What? Come on! She’d be yapping or something, and I’d say, “I’m sorry, why am I hearing your voice? I’m not in the kitchen.”

"I was just thinking, what, I'm going to take a back seat to a chick?" Beck quipped, to laughter from the studio. "Go shoot a bear, make some stew, I'm hungry in here."

Well, so much for the honeymoon, and scratch one name off the V.P. short-list.

Palin, who has been a vocal, outspoken supporter of Beck in the past and having "great respect" for him, will now no doubt add another name to the blacklist of eager media whores vying for her attention. That this gang is a bunch of misogynistic, racist bigots who aid & abet extremist "patriotism" with their rhetoric of lies and hate is well documented, but it never ceases to surprise those who lie down with dogs when the mask of opportunism slips, and it turns and bites the hand feeding it.

And I've always been curious at the cognitive dissonance required in cheerleading someone who goes against dogmatic biblical injunctions; one the one hand you have the Timothy 2:12/Corinthians 14:35 crowd, which stands in righteous opposition to a woman who repeatedly and in no uncertain terms refuses to "sit down and shut up." Reconciling a fundamentalist position with a contemporary, liberated woman's role in society takes a bit of impressively selective hypocrisy.

But now that's change we can believe in...

*Update: Well, that didn't take long - see, it's a joke. Ah. Works for me.
*Update II: Panel cross-posted @ Mudflats - welcome folks, always glad to see more muck trackers! Also take a sec and vote for Mudflats over at the Blogger's Choice Awards, it's been nominated for "Best Political Blog" !

“He calls it like he sees it, and he's very, very, very effective” - Palin on Beck

Frozen Food

“If it is any use to know it, I always try to write on the principle of the iceberg. There is seven-eighths of it under water for every part that shows. Anything you know you can eliminate and it only strengthens your iceberg. It is the part that does” - Ernest Hemingway

Another image from the old folklore book that set the mental wheels in motion: a watercolor by artist George Halm illustrating a fable about a whale being frozen 250 feet up inside an iceberg . My take on the scene is'nt too far remixed from the original composition, just done more or less in my own style. The caption took some mulling over: running the gauntlet of stock gags about tip-of-the-iceberg, frozen food, iceberg lettuce, global warming etc. but after chasing the funny-tail around and around for days of idle punning, I ultimately made the decision to leave it blank and just let the drawing stand on its own.



Story of my life - sometimes ridiculous situations really don't need any more explanation. Okay, nevermind: more like I always change my mind and think I gotta add just one more thing...

"Who bothers to cook TV dinners? I suck them frozen." - Woody Allen

Cheesecake

"Some people like to paint pictures, or do gardening, or build a boat in the basement. Other people get a tremendous pleasure out of the kitchen, because cooking is just as creative and imaginative an activity as drawing, or wood carving, or music." - Julia Child

It's that time of the year again, when the cabin is filled with both the beautiful winter sun and infused with intense, rich aromas from marathon baking sessions. Every available square inch of countertop is covered with ingredients and implements, temporarily topping the normal compost heaps of books, notes, artwork and doodles.

Baking specialty cheesecakes has been my other point of pride ever since working as a waiter for a couple of years at what was at the time one of the only two premier restaurants in Fairbanks, Two River Lodge. The co-owner, Stasha Troutman, was a true goddess in the kitchen, making the staggeringly diverse nightly offerings on the dessert tray, which was the customary and ceremonial highlight at the close of each meal. One of the prized possessions on my cookbook shelves in the kitchen is the butter and batter-spattered copy of "The Joy of Cheesecake" she gave me as a parting gift when I retired from waiting tables. Being such a shameless advocate and acolyte I would consistently outsell all the other servers in dessert sales, and was tasked with training new waiters on the fine art of merchandising the dessert tray to customers. Part of what makes for effective marketing and motivation as an artist is the same confidence and conviction you need as a waiter; walking up to a group of relative strangers and selling something solely based on your recommendation is much easier when you honestly believe in the product. I've proselytized (and prostituted) myself out enough by now to know the difference between sincere belief and the tired, old sales-pitch I often hear from other practitioners, teachers and students alike.

"Find something you're passionate about and keep tremendously interested in it." - Julia Child

As with a love of good music, I often mull over the close parallels to teaching and making artwork with cooking. There are times I even bring in either the 5-string banjo and/or springform pans as props on opening lecture day to emphasize the required patience and discipline in drawing. From an earlier post:

"And again, remembering to put student's efforts into the context of this being a beginning level class (which I've made abundantly clear doesn't excuse poor workmanship) but is an overriding perspective. This class is almost like a "Cooking In The Kitchen" one: I teach the acquisition of skills in a classical, traditional, linear sense; begin with the basics and gradually build up a tool-box or pallet of abilities, techniques & media that the student can eventually use to literally draw from when approaching and solving the visual problem of how they are going to tackle any chosen subject. So when someone gets frustrated at not being able to reproduce exactly what things look like in a realistic manner, one assumes that they cannot draw and give up, not realizing that it is a simple skill like learning how to cook – it is a only a matter of learning what tools to use and how, being familiar with and comfortable in a kitchen, and following the recipes until you have it memorized and are confident enough with your experience enough to begin experimenting."

Improvised this year with a novel idea to use Pilot Bread as crust and adding Irish Cream liqueur on one cake, and pushed the envelope even more as far as dangerous levels of coffee and dark cacao in another. Like a lot of painters there's multiple pieces in various stages of creation: a couple for trying out new ideas and a couple pies for both safety and tradition's sake - leaving room for the inevitable shit-happens. The evolving parameters of expected quality require constant fine-tuning, as even a reliable formula can have unexpected and unexpected results, and like each time I pick up a pencil with a thought in mind every drawing's different in its own way; even if it looks the same as the last, it's an original unto itself. And also this Thanksgiving I pulled off a rarity in a pristine, unblemished cake without the usual cracks or gaping fissures across the surface; usually this doesn't matter since most get slathered with a sauce, but for the first time in years I left it naked. Reminds me of the past several days spent wrangling over an appropriate (and hopefully funny) punch-line to caption an upcoming panel - it was pointed out to me that, duh, it didn't need one.

I love the comfort, intimacy and connection with using some of my mother's old kitchen tools and recipes, plus the familiarity and ease of knowing right where everything is. I'm reminded of watching some woodworker and mechanic friends of mine in their shops tinkering away with tools worn smooth with many long hours of usage. Then there's the almost maddening amount of time spent disciplining oneself to stay true to the letter of the recipe by not opening the oven door until it's time, and gradually, methodically cooling the oven down until it's safe to crack open the door and then let it cool some more, then letting the cake cool on a rack to room temperature, then chilling and letting it set for at least a whole day before devouring. This is like waiting for a cartoon to run in the paper sometimes weeks after drawing it, or when waiting for the opening reception to a show - not knowing the ultimate reception of your creation can be a quiet, mild form of torture. Still, I do so enjoy just looking...

"It's so beautifully arranged on the plate -- you know someone's fingers have been all over it." - Julia Child

Left: Triple-expresso Mocha + biscotti crust
Right: classic Jay's Famous Cheese Pie
Front & Center: "Bush Cake" - White Chocolate w/vanilla bean & Irish Cream + Pilot Bread crust

It's hard to find something as basic and primal when filling simple human needs as feeding other people (nevermind the other); eating and enjoying art means sharing our passions and mutual pleasures that fill those empty, hungry spaces inside as well. Aww geeze, enough of all that - time to eat!

Let's close this post with some more inspirational quotes from one of my heroes, Julia Child:

"If you're in a good profession, it's hard to get bored, because you're never finished - there will always be work you haven't done."

"You must have discipline to have fun."

"Life itself is the proper binge."

"Noncooks think it's silly to invest two hours' work in two minutes' enjoyment; but if cooking is evanescent, so is the ballet."

"It took architects years to get established, to show that they weren't just artisans, and that's what I hope will happen with gastronomy. For some reason people don't consider cooking a serious business, but it's like any discipline, and it's a passionate and fascinating one."

"The only real stumbling block is fear of failure. In cooking you've got to have a 'What the hell?' attitude."