Ustyme launch and my illustrator debut

The new children's book publisher, ustyme, launched on September 25th, and with it, was my illustrator debut. Since March, I have had the tremendous fortune to illustrate three of the books in the ustyme library. Below are some samples of the illustrations I created for Edward Lear's The Owl and the Pussycat, plus my original thumbnail sketches:

The Bong Tree © 2013 Kendra Shedenhelm

The Piggy-wig © 2013 Kendra Shedenhelm

It's Love. © 2013 Kendra Shedenhelm

The Wedding Feast © 2013 Kendra Shedenhelm

Initial thumbnails/storyboard for The Owl and the Pussycat

Ustyme even included my Owl and the Pussycat illustrations in their launch video: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7CNXnYhfYf4. Their app is free, and the books are available for download at about $.99 to $1.99 each. The ustyme team has been amazing to work with, and I hope that anyone that has the technology will give this app a try.

To see my selected illustrations for Edward Lear's Nonsense Alphabet and the Old Lady Who Swallowed a Fly, please visit my new online portfolio at http://kendrashedenhelm.com/.

We are leaving Brooklyn this week, so I went to The Painted Pot on Saturday night for the last time.

My son and I have been going to this local pottery studio since he was about 18 months old. He's glazed piggy banks, mugs, bowls, light switch covers, and several other gifts for the family. Oddly, though, I never really participated. I just watched, admired and supported him, but I didn't create anything myself. However, after my wonderful experience painting with the Empty Bowls Project, I really wanted to paint by myself this time.

I started with several layers of glaze, and after some drawing and re-drawing, I ended up with this bird. I loved making this painting. I can't wait to see what it looks like when I pick it up this week. I'll be sure to post it. Stay tuned.

Geometric Patterns

After I saw this call for geometric pattern submissions at print & pattern, I began sketching a variety of shapes. I soon realized that many of my shape combinations looked a lot like my old ghetto blaster. So I made several.

I'm not sure what I'll do with this quite yet, or what color combinations would work best. Suggestions?

Little house sketch

A quick sketch today, while my son played at the playground. My little imaginary house...

I took myself on a little date yesterday to my favorite place on the planet: Central Park. I couldn't stay long, but I did have a time for a quick sketch.

The Global Talent Search

Yesterday was the submission deadline for the much-anticipated Lilla Rogers' Studio Global Talent Search. As a recent student of her Make Art That Sells course, I was automatically enrolled in the contest. All I needed to do was make the art.

First, I must say that I am huge fan of the artists Lilla represents, and to be among them would be an absolute dream for me. A life-changing, enormous deal. After recently taking her class, I can see why such amazing talent would want to work with her. I can't remember feeling more inspired and encouraged by a single person. Lilla has an immense gift. She is a Wow.

The Talent Search assignment was to create a 5x7 journal cover with a playground theme, also including the word "journal." While preparing my submission over the past two weeks, I felt intense pressure, because I so deeply want to be a finalist, and my biggest battle was allowing the joy of art-making to make its way into my work.

On the last day before the deadline, many thanks to my almost-five year old son, I was able to do so. Created with watercolor, ink pen, graphite transfer and a bit of digital collage, this piece is called "Vintage Playground, Rocket Memory," and is based on a memory from childhood in Omaha, Nebraska. I feel that my joy really came through.

My non-type variation is below, followed by two different styles of lettering for 'Journal':

Drawing again

As recently as a year ago, I told a friend that I just didn't love drawing anymore. I remember feeling sad about saying this, but since I haven't drawn much in the past 10 years, I felt it was probably true.

Five weeks ago, however, when I started my amazing class with Lilla Rogers, I found myself not only loving it, but craving it. I began carrying a sketchbook and an ink pen again, everywhere. I have been drawing the shapes of the hardware in a subway car, my shoe laces, my son's face as he plays iPad. I have also begun drawing from my imagination, which, outside from my childhood, I don't do much of. And this is where I've begun to find some unexpected joy -- in my imagination. How cool of a (re-)discovery after all these years.

For this week's assignment (the last one of Part A), we focused on the gift market and created a zipper bag with a "lush" or "hyper-lush" design. Popping colors, florals, fantastical or dreamy subjects, lusciousness. Because I enjoyed my first assignment so thoroughly, I decided to also draw this design with a black pen and an 8.5 x 11 sheet of printer paper. I scanned it in, added color, and moved the elements around. The first image here is the one I submitted, but I really loved creating the bottom two as well, so I thought I'd include them here.

Painting again (Welcome back!)

This week's assignment for Lilla Rogers' class was about wall art, with a focus on collage, paint, layers, and text. Our color palette was limited to neutrals, plus the colors of our birth sign. I'm a Taurus (May), and my colors were green and yellow.

I'm a somewhat messy artist, but because I've been working out of our bedroom, I don't go nuts very often anymore. But this week, I did not hold back, and I pulled out art supplies that I haven't used in years. It felt tremendous to just sit down and paint, and to smear around so many layers of oil pastels that my finger nails were caked with the colored oil for days. I kept saying to myself, "Welcome back."

Hand lettering

This week's assignment for my class with Lilla Rogers was about children's books. Everyone was to create a cover or a spread for Hans Christian Andersen's tale, The Snail and the Rose Tree, with character development and hand-lettering as our focus.

Although I pretty much choked on developing my characters, I spent a ton of time on hand-lettering. I absolutely love illustrations with hand-lettering, but I never felt I'd be very good at it, and I found this part of the assignment to be extremely rewarding. I've already incorporated some of the lettered styles I created into my current children's book illustrations, and it felt great!

A bit of what I made this week:

Pods and plates

This week's assignment for my class with Lilla is about Home Decor, and we are focusing on pod-types of plants and dinnerware sets. I'm still not sure what I'll go with, but here are some possibilities. If you'd like to weigh, your comments are most welcome. (:

Over in the Meadow submission

Outside of some freelance work and being Archer's mom, I've spent most of the past three months illustrating books for a new children's book publisher. I've said this about a million times lately, but it really is a dream come true.

It was my teacher, Mark Mitchell, who notified my class of the call for illustrators back in February. I read the submission guidelines and got to work. About a week later, and with crossed fingers, I sent these two pieces in. Over the next several days, I refreshed my email's inbox about 500 times, hoping for good news.

That email did arrive, and it's been a scary-wonderful experience since.

A long lost painting found. Thanks, Bobby.

A couple weeks ago, I received a friend request on Facebook by someone I did not recognize. I generally try not to answer those, but I accepted right away. I was annoyed at myself for doing so, and I decided to keep an eye on his posts for any chicanery.
Yesterday, I had this sudden urge to check my Other section within my Facebook messages (which I almost never do), and I had this message:

Hi! So I'm pretty sure I bought gigantic painting of yours. It's about 6 ft tall, and it appears to be of a man that looks not unlike Norman Mailer, sitting in a flannel shirt, with a cup of coffee. He looks to be sitting in front of a computer, and the word "The" is below the computer, as in "...New York Times"...did you paint this portrait? If so, I love it! Who is that guy? Is it Mailer?
If you didn't paint it, I still love it.
Thanks!
Bobby

I was FLOORED. All caps.

Back in 1994, I had lent a painting to a local Chicago restaurant. I moved to New York in 1995, and I just didn't take care of my loose ends. I failed to inquire about it, the restaurant closed down, and I never saw that painting again. I have always kicked myself for letting that happen, as the painting had represented a shift in my student work, and the actual painting of it was a very meaningful memory for me as well.

And then this message one day on Facebook. How amazing.

Now I know that it wasn't trashed, that my immature inability to call that restaurant before I left in 1995 didn't result in complete regret, and that there is a person out there that would not only pick up that painting, but he would search for me, just to let me know that he had it and liked it.

It was quite a day for me yesterday. Meaningful in so, so many ways. Thanks again, Bobby, for seeking me out. I suspect your life will be full of creating little miracles for people.

It's critique night with Giuseppe Castellano!

Tonight is critique night!

In March, my wonderful and generous illustration teacher, Mark Mitchell, made arrangements for a critique session with award-winning illustrator and Art Director at Penguin US, Giuseppe Castellano.

Giuseppe created a mock assignment for our class, based on the very first Hardy Boys and Nancy Drew books (Giuseppe also oversees the imprints of Grosset & Dunlap, the original publisher for both series). He gave us very specific guidelines to follow, and encouraged us to treat this as an actual submission. The class was excited and enthusiastic, and everyone worked diligently to get the assignment turned in on time.

After reading through The Tower Treasure, it was the road leading up to the tower and the yellow jalopy that stuck out for me. I used my Brooklyn photographs and a couple of watercolor paintings to digitally collage my cover. It's been a couple of months since I created this, and I can now see many things I'd do differently, but I really can't wait for this critique. I'll let you know how it goes!

When in doubt, cut it out

This past week, I spent much of my time focusing on my characters for a children's book project. I had a stack of drawings and paintings in my bedroom, as well as various digital attempts on my computer, but I still could not "find" my characters.

Then I remembered my new mantra: When in doubt, cut it out.

I immediately grabbed a stack of my texture paintings that had already been scanned and filed on my computer, and I began cutting shapes. Within a few minutes, I'd assembled this little owl, and I played with his eyes and wings. I gave him different expressions, imagining things he might say, and I had a little photoshoot session with him.

Although I went on to make my character with a completely different style, it was this cutting process, and puppet-making process, that cleared my mind and helped me to animate my character.

Print submission, week 1

It was an intense week of art-making, and I feel pretty fantastic as I wrap up this Sunday evening. I was recently hired to illustrate another children's book, so alongside submitting the new book's character study, I also had a pattern assignment due for Lilla Roger's class.

For the pattern assignment, I've been sketching, painting and collaging mushrooms and dishes for several days. Though I was thoroughly enjoying myself, I just couldn't decide which style or color palette I wanted to go with for today's deadline, and I was beginning to worry if I'd be able to get my assignment done on time. But I ran across a yellow/orange color scheme yesterday that immediately reminded me of childhood naptimes and Omaha, Nebraska.

Back in the 70s, when I was very young and living in Omaha, my mother found me a high-poster bed frame and dresser at a garage sale. She sanded them and painted them both a bright mix of yellow and orange. She bought me a bedspread and curtains with a graphic print of a little girl, who wore the same bright yellow and orange clothing, and there was some brown and green in there too.

My final print submission is of course dedicated to my wonderful mother. Thank you for creating such a magnificent and memorable bedroom (and childhood) for me!

So many mushrooms

For my birthday in May, I gave myself the amazing gift of a class with Lilla Rogers. I'll describe more when I have more time, but WOW. I would have paid the entire five-week tuition for just what I've experienced this week. She's an incredible teacher. I have drawn with freedom this week. Hours and hours of drawing, like I did when I was a kid. Here are a few small sketches of many...

Birds at Starbucks

Several weeks ago, after a quick trip outside of the city, I stopped at a Starbucks near Penn Station, before heading back to Brooklyn. I grabbed a water, an egg, found a seat, pulled out my sketchbook, and began drawing birds. Minutes later, a woman sat next to me and seemed to want to talk. I was annoyed by this at first, because I am like that, but I quickly snapped out of it, and had myself one of the most delightful and memorable conversations to date.

She was an artist (when she was young, she studied under Joseph Beuys), a teacher, a mother of three (all grown), a divorcee (twice), a cancer survivor, and an incredibly passionate person. She spoke fast and with tremendous sincerity, but she was also jovial and free-spirited. We spoke for about an hour before she left for the Beatrix Potter show at the Morgan Library.

This was one of my sketches while we sat together. He is now forever linked to her and that awesome hour at Starbucks.

School Bus Scratch

Yesterday, I sold another School Bus Scratch tee in my Big Bridge Studios Skreened shop, and it reminded me of how many designs I've created over the past few years that were based on Archer's toys. I realized, for the very first time, how much being around toys, and watching my son's joyful interaction with them, has inspired my own playfulness. It is quite possible that the infamous "scoo buhs" (below) is responsible for kicking my creativity back into gear, and reminding me that creating is actually a lot of play time. Thanks School Bus!

This design was hand-printed on my little Gocco machine, while Archer napped, and was one of my first offerings in my Big Bridge Studios Etsy shop.

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Mother's Day collaging

One of the my favorite parts of working with so many cutouts these days, is the unexpected interest of my son. As I'd mentioned in this puppet show post, Archer and I have been using construction paper for spontaneous art-making a lot lately. On Mother's Day, I began noodling around with my scissors and the various envelopes from my birthday cards. As I'd hoped, once I began cutting shapes, Archer's interest was piqued, and he began participating too.

We assembled various things with the scraps lying all over my desk, and then I eventually went back to work on my book illustrations. To my surprise, Archer did not immediately go back to watching his Mario Bros. instructional video. He instead grabbed crayons and more scraps, and created this raccoon and a Mom puppet. I did add the eyes and nose to complete the raccoon, but the Mom was entirely his own assembly. Check out the shoes!!

A Painted Pot Mother's Day

I have been going to the Painted Pot for almost three years with my son, but I have never once painted anything. I guess I was intimidated by the unforgiving free-hand painting. My expectations for myself were too high, and I couldn't bring myself to risk it. Seems so strange to encourage my son to grab a brush and go nuts, yet I did not even try.

After participating in the Empty Bowls Project, however, I was ready to enjoy myself and just go paint. So for Mother's Day gifts for Archer's grandmothers, my husband, Archer and I went back to the Painted Pot. This time, I painted! Mine is the shaker with the birds. I can't wait to go back again.