Mad Tea Party

Another piece for Ten Paces and Draw's artist swap. This one was especially fun for me. I can't help but love drawing/painting hair and decorative details. Check out all of the original sketches and other pieces here.

Images of My Summer

I chopped my hair off and dyed it red. The initial dye was a little on the orange side but has since calmed down a bit. I drew this soon after the great hair adventure, without even thinking. Apparently my subconscious thought it was a bit orange as well.

I attended a month-long classical painting workshop with William Whitaker in Brugges, Belgium. While there I ate much chocolate, waffles and frites. It was lovely. I'll post more about my stay there very soon...

We moved. In the process I found a few old images I'd totally forgotten about. Most of them aren't worth showing, but I was rather pleasantly surprised to find this one. I remember disliking it before, but looking at it again there are some things that I rather like about it.

the birds

Once I was sitting on a beach in Seattle, when all of a sudden a flock of seagulls flew over my head and, while my head was turned, a seagull dropped a bomb right on my ankle...which also splattered on my pants and purse.

Gross.

I still like birds though. This piece proves it! It's a gift for my sister and still a work in progress but should be done soon.

Wacom tablets are F-U-N

Last week I made an important purchase: I BOUGHT A WACOM TABLET! Hooray for technology! I've been wanting one for a while now and finally bit the bullet. Let me just say that bullet has been well worth it.

To celebrate, I drew the silly images above. They're a bit different than my normal style but I figured what the heck, why not branch out a bit? My personal favorite is the elephant. I couldn't help but giggle as I drew him.

Print Sale! 4 days left...

Looking for some snazzy artwork to spice up those bare walls? Look no further. I recently opened up a print shop online and am offering 20% off prints through Saturday the 26th! The current prints are shown below. 

 If you see something you like, simply:  

1. go to my etsy shop

2. choose a print

3. use coupon code OPENYAY3261 at checkout

Easy beasy! If there's a piece that isn't up there that you'd like a print of (maybe you saw it on my blog or website), then just email me at leslie@lesliedukeart.com and I'll get it up there in a jiffy.

Prints, Prints, Prints for Sale!

Recently I've had a few requests to purchase prints of my work. Well my friends, thanks to the wonders of technology (and my recent use of the ever-popular world wide inter-web) you may now purchase prints online! Just follow these 3 simple steps:

1. Go to my etsy shop.
2. Peruse through the images.
3. If you see something you like, order it!

Easy right?

Ready for the best part? Now through Saturday, March 26th receive 20% OFF on any print! Just enter the coupon code: OPENYAY3261 at checkout.

Isn't technology the greatest?

ps - If there's an image that you'd like a print of but don't see up there, then just send me an email at leslie@lesliedukeart.com and I'll get it up there in a jiffy.

What are YOU afraid of, eh?

My newest illustration blog! Check it out here.

This blog is dedicated to illustrating the rather ridiculous nature of irrational fears. Fears like sharks coming out of walls and "urban bears" chasing you down crowded streets. Every week I'll be posting a new illustration that depicts an irrational fear. Each fear will be completely genuine, which means I need people like you to send me your irrational fears. Email me your fear at leslie@lesliedukeart.com. If your fear is chosen you'll see it posted online and receive a free print. Consider it a thank you from me.

So what are you afraid of? It's time to get those irrational fears out in the open!

Silhouettes

A simple image for a book of memoirs my grandma put together:

Newness

Something new: the poster for BYU's fall opera The Magic Flute. I actually liked the drawing a lot better than the finished product. Also, I discovered a newish look while going through the process of this one. I'm going to experiment; exciting.

Work it, work it, RE-work it

I gave this one a face-lift. Why? Because it needed one...and because I may or may not be a perfectionist.

Aaaaas Yoooou Wiiiish!

Here's a new one. It's for the play As You Like It by William Shakespeare. Whenever I hear/say/read "as you like it," an echo-y version of Wesley's voice yells "aaaas yooooou wiiiiiish!" in my head. Strange.




The director of the play is taking a different spin on Shakespeare's original. It's more of a contemporary/refugee/Russian-esch non-romanticized theme. In the play, Rosalind, the protagonist, dresses up as a man to hide her identity. I tried to convey that Rosalind has two identities in the illustration.

I used a completely different process on this piece, one inspired by my idol Sterling Hundley. First I bought plastic packing tape, put a layer down on masonite board, painted on top of it, placed another layer down, painted on top of it and continued the process until I was satisfied. Then I peeled layers of the tape off using my handy-dandy utility knife and sandpaper. Then I painted on top of the whole thing, leaving sections I liked alone and occaissionally peeling off more packing tape or adding on another piece. Talk about liberating, scary and WAY FUN.

Mawrriage Theatewr Postewr

Here's a recent illustration for BYU's production of Blood Wedding. The lace on the dress was my favorite part to do, probably because it's a pattern and it just so happens that I love patterns. Go figure.

Now This is Real Life

It's finally come, the end of my final (real) semester as an undergrad. I say (real) because next semester I'm only taking 6 credits, which are bookbinding and frame-building. Brutal, I know. So basically, I'm free of (real) school! I'm actually graduating and becoming a real person, what a lovely thought. All I can say is it's about time.

Here are a few pieces from the my last (real) undergrad semester EVER:

piece for "A Thousand Cranes" poster

piece for "Tartuffe" poster
(wasn't actually used; oh well, at least it can go into my portfolio)

The Past Few Months of My Life

This semester I worked like mad on my BFA show. The idea for the project started winter semester 2007 when a couple of us decided to pull some grant money together and head out to New York City that summer for internships. This then evolved into a mentoring project that included two other illustration students plus our professor as a mentor. We stayed in New York City and interned with illustrators for a month and a half. Ten of those days were spent with our professor going around the city gathering influences by sketchbooking, painting, taking photographs, going to museums and visiting illustrators. These pieces are the final product of that experience, and the actual exhibit includes work done by each participant.

In this series I focused on food and the people that eat it in the city. One of my main goals for this series was to push my process and further develop my style. I experimented A LOT throughout this series with color, texture, line, media and painterlyness. Overall, I feel like something is working. I'm really excited to keep going down this vein and developing things even further, oh it's been so much fun!

Right now I only have two pieces photographed, and the other two are currently hanging in the exhibit so I won't be able to post them until later next week. If you're in Provo and want to drop by the exhibit, it will be up through December 14th in the HFAC B.F. Larsen Gallery (the main floor) at BYU.

"Lunch at Cha Cha's"

"News for Company"


"Lunchtime Mechanics"

La Fin

The opera poster is finished. Good feelings for the most part.

I was recently commissioned to do a piece of the Christ child and Mary. They wanted it to look along the same lines as some of Da Vinci's "unfinished" drawings. It was a fun experiment involving graphite, gouache, ink and my cousin and her baby as models. Good times.

Winter Craziness

Here are a few illustrations from this past winter semester, both new and reworked. I feel like the semester was overall fairly successful, especially since I have started experimenting with a look and process that I'm excited about. The piece for A Little Princess is another experiment done in basically the same process as the piece from the last post. It's mixed media again, with acrylic, ink, gesso and charcoal. There's something about mixing media that makes me happy inside. I almost feel as if I'm reconnecting with my childhood when I would mix fingerpaints, playdough and crayons together to create something awesome.

Rapunzel

Book cover for A Little Princess



yoga magazine article



magazine article

Recent Developments

The past few days have been crazy-busy and fairly sleepless (big thanks to my mad procrastination skills). It seems as if some good came out of them though.

These are both illustration assignments, the first Rapunzel and the second a nappin' cowboy. I used acrylic ink with acrylic paint on both illustrations, and on the cowboy also added a touch of goauche (pronounced "gwuash," took me forever to figure that one out...).

This acrylic ink stuff is fantastic. I just bought the sepia-colored acrylic ink and LOVE it like the child I don't have. Everything I've touched in the past week has been covered with the stuff because I can't keep my hands off of it. The inks come in lots of different colors, which means I will be buying many more bottles of this beautiful stuff. I think the cadmium red is first on my list...

Another One Bites the Dust

So fall semester is officially over. Crazy. It was without question one of the busiest, craziest, strangest and most stressful semesters of my life. Ironically, the work that came out of it was the most promising so far. I say "promising" because my work still has a long way to go before it reaches the level I'd like it to be, but it's getting closer.

One of my focuses this past semester was developing a personal style. I experimented a lot with pattern, solid shapes, line and washes. Some of the pieces came out all right while others are better off as firewood. Overall, I like the direction my work has taken and am really excited to develop it further next semester.

These are just a few of my pieces from the semester. I still need to do a little quality-control on them, which is my project over the break. Even though they're not perfect I still wanted to put them up here. I'll post the completely "finished" versions up here once they're, well, finished.

Yet Another Awkward Stage of Life...

Well here I am a senior, and halfway through fall semester already. It's a rather surreal feeling. In less than a year and a half I will be graduating. The student life I have known since kindergarten will abruptly end, throwing me into the cold, heartless world with only my skills and wee portfolio as weapons. Sounds like an incredible adventure if you ask me.

In my very first class my professor told us that we would each be adapting the class assignments to fit our individual market direction. Not a bad idea eh? The only problem is that I want to do everything from books to set design to editorial to gallery work. Each market has a different feel to it, meaning that your style should as well. The trick is adapting to these markets without losing your personal identity. This leads to another problem: I haven't settled into my style niche yet. Not having found my "artistic niche" kind of makes me feel like I'm going through another awkward stage, only this time I'm 21, I have straight teeth and I can talk to boys without feeling nauseated.

That being said, here is a sampling of work from the semester thus far:

Big Bad Wolf as Grandma for my "portfolio development" class

Four hour head study



Landscape from my plein aire painting class

Two hour head study

Four hour head study

Two hour head study.

Two hour head study