To combat the winter blahs, I’ve been making this little paper garden in one corner of my kitchen. The shapes are cut out of little tempera paintings (also see here) I make when my son and I paint together. I make a couple of new cutouts each day. Looks like it will be expanding out of that corner soon.

Tried to take my own advice with this one: I spent a bit longer on it, and also quit while I was ahead. Collage in sketchbook.

Ink on tracing paper and transparent tape over watercolor in sketchbook.

Ink on tracing paper over watercolor and colored pencil, in sketchbook. Of course it’ll disintegrate tomorrow, but occasionally it’s fun to just embrace ephemerality and tape stuff together until it looks like something.

Not a comic, but trying out different ways of drawing the same panel. My original idea was the bottom right, with just one touch of color. Then I tried making the trees more gestural (drawn faster), making the color areas more stylized, etc. Ink, watercolor, collage in sketchbook.

Collage, gouache, ink in sketchbook.

Improvised with leftover paint on the palette, leftover bits of painted paper. As I went along I tried to work with something other than my usual colors and techniques (e.g. floundering around, then trying to pull everything together with ink). Gouache and collage in the sketchbook.

Another sketch built around some collaged-in bits of my son’s painting. Collage and gouache in sketchbook.