Could use your vote!

Here is the artwork I entered for Round 2 of the Lilla Roger's Global Talent Search. For the brief we had to create an animal character for a child's tee.

I would really appreciate it if you could vote for my bear and share this link!! Thank you for your time and support. This is an amazing opportunity for me to get a major boost for my illustration career.

Click here to vote: http://lillarogers.com/wp-content/plugins/lilla-rogers-gts/viewimg.php?img_id=2090&post_id=18132

Voting ends Friday.

Submitted

How nerve wracking and exciting at the same time, pressing the SUBMIT button for my round 2 entry to Lilla Rogers Global Talent Search. So many amazing artists and illustrators entered the competition this year and I feeling so thrilled to have made it into the top 50 out of 999 entries. 

I so loved the theme for both this round (which I can’t reveal at this time) and the first round which was "mini terrariums". I have always been intrigued by Secret Gardens, Private Little Worlds and the terrarium theme gave me a chance to visit that childhood intrigue. After researching terrarium jar shapes and materials, I decided that a lone mason jar would take center stage in a nocturnal setting with light hitting a lone orchid and ladybug inside and light reflecting on the outside of the jar would define that intrigue.  

The image was created in Photoshop from a sketch and painted using custom brushes.

This experience has been a wonderful, a wonder to me, just like my memory of the long, hot summer nights growing up in St. Louis MO, catching fireflies.

Highlights from MATS class

Wall Art (limited color palette)

Include Favorite Beverage

Wall Art 

Holiday Card

Bavarian Themed Party Paper

Scrapbooking Page

Editorial (map of the town I live in)

Assignment Bootcamp

I recently enrolled in another class from the fabulous http://lillarogers.com and our first project was to design/illustrate a phone cover based on a Cuckoo Clock theme. I have so enjoyed working on this project from the sketching and concepting stage all the way up to the presentation stage. I got a little carried away and worked up four different images. They all represent me but stylistically are a bit divergent. I feel that the image with the fox and moon probably best represents my style, but I can sometimes get carried away by the process and I never know quite where it might lead me. Not sure if this is good or bad yet.

Here are my covers:

MATS Blog Tour 2013

After too many years of standing still in both my professional and personal life I have recently made the decision to get proactive and make the changes to market my work better and extend myself more to make a difference in my community. In the past, I would have just day dreamed about taking those big steps but now I am acting on those day dreams.

Recently, I have become a BIG SISTER (through the Big Brother and Sister program in my community) to a beautiful 10 year old girl, who is super bright and sooooo creative. A favorite outing for us is to go to the public library, find a fun space and get out our pencils and paper and start to draw. I am so glad I made this connection. I really appreciate how hard this agency works to match up folks and I definitely see a mini me, in my little sister. I hope that my mentoring will make a difference in her life, I know it definitely will in mine.

Creatively, I have made big changes too, after years of freelance work that never fully utilized my illustration and art skills, I decided to make a concentrated effort to market myself better and strengthen my illustration skills as well. 

I feel that I am off to a great start. After reading a friend's FaceBook post spotlighting her friend and amazing artist/illustrator Emily Balsley's journey to making it into the top 6 of the Lilla Rogers Global Talent Search 2013, I was instantly intrigued and had to visit Lilla's website to check things out.  Almost immediately, I signed up for her e-course MAKE ART THAT SELLS (Part A) and I am so-so glad that I did. I have not only gained new insights into current markets and opportunities for the creative entrepreneur but I learned to see and think differently about my art in a much better way. 

A huge bonus to the course is the amazing community of talented creatives, MATS (Part A) alums, that have connected through the course and have stayed connected through the course FaceBook page. We post our success stories, questions regarding projects, creative pursuits and more. It has been so wonderful to find this community, that from day one has been so inspiring and supportive.

Today I am participating in the MATS Blog tour along fellow alumni Andrea van Dalen and Ohn Mar Win.    

Ohn Mar Win

Andrea van Dalen

Check out their blog posts and also check out the Blogs of my other classmates listed in the sidebar to the right. :)

Oh yeah, I just wanted to share my excitement over a recent edition to my backyard, my NEW Studio! It was a long time coming but so worth the wait. I can't wait to set up my work space inside and "Get Crackin".

Some of my MATS-A Class Projects

My projects from the Make Art That Sells E-Course,

taught by Lilla Rogers

Project 1- Bolt Fabric Design

Project 2-  Home Decor (Plate Design)

Project 3- Children's Book Art

Rabbits

I tend to draw a lot of Rabbits. 

Here are just a couple of them.

Sweet &

Savory