Season's Greetings 2012!

This year, it was nip and tuck if I would find the time to prepare a cartoon for my Christmas card. I started this tradition and then using the resulting drawing to make Christmas cards, several years ago, so I feel I must keep the tradition going!

"You can skip the 'James Bond' routine, Nick! I know it's already the 27th."

I did manage to pull it off; family members and some overseas contacts get the hard copy version and then I share online with everyone else.

This year's effort was rather inspired by all the old - read Sean Connery era - James Bond movies a friend and I rented. (We rather became purists and deemed those made after the original 4 or 5 to lack the sense of humor of the early films.) (Although we thoroughly enjoyed 'Skyfall'.)

As always, the art work was done in oil pastels on paper, then shot digitally and reproduced.

Oh, in case you're wondering about the decor in the Clauses home, you have to consider that it reflects the level of budget they have to work with, given that Santa only works one night a year!

Have a very merry holiday season!

Copyright Deborah C. Sawyer

BRA i.d. a.k.a. Hello! I'm Your Bosom Buddy!

After last year's entry in the UB Artful Bra fundraiser, I came up with several ideas for the 2012 event and eventually settled on the bra pictured. Much as with my 2011 entry, this one is a pun!


The title is: BRA i.d. - and, as the title suggests, the decorative elements are all made from braids.





In other words, it's a visual pun and I partly chose to go with this because braids are fairly easy to make and are also pliable. I had first thought I'd make the braids out of hair - artificial of course - but found that even artificial hair would be too soft for construction purposes.

Also, as I had a lot of wool in my treasure trove of supplies, I decided to make wool braids and multi-colored ones at that.



For the "i.d." of the title, I raided my copious collection of name tags from all the conferences I've attended over the years - see, it pays to keep stuff! - and made a tag saying "Hello! I'm Your Bosom Buddy!"

Along with some photos of my own entry and the artist herself (me), I'm also showing the display area and the location.












Once again, this year's bras are on display at the Center for the Arts at UB on Maple Road in Buffalo, NY. The Center for the Arts even comes equipped with its own lake out back!!

The final photo is of the calendar featuring this year's bras and sold to raise funds for cancer research. In a new development, we were offered the opportunity to dedicate pages in the calendar and so I've dedicated the month of June to my mother. June is her month of birth and she is a breast cancer survivor.

You can contribute by either bidding on one of the bras or by purchasing the calendar, which costs $10 each.

http://wings.buffalo.edu/org/artfulbra/

Copyright Deborah C. Sawyer

A Plant's Eye View of The World, Part 4.

When I painted Number 4 in my series, "Evil Greens: When Plants Get Mad!", I was thinking about the segment of the population that  - maybe - takes the purity of what they eat just a tad too seriously.

I also had in mind a segment of the population that I've heard men refer to as "The Birkenstock Brigade" - hey, I'm just repeating what others have said!

In this painting - The Sprouts Strike Back! - someone is about to start cutting her sprouts to make bread  - and the sprouts have decided they've had enough! They don't want to be cut!

I'll leave it to your imagination what the outcome of this event will be...

As with all 6 panels in this series, the painting is 24" x 36".

Copyright Deborah C. Sawyer

Corporate Cliche #1

Corporate Cliche #1

Some time ago, I started a new series of paintings, drawing inspiration from my career in what's known as "The Corporate World". And, yes, at times, it is a world apart!

This canvas, entitled "Corporate Cliche #1" is currently on display at the Burchfield-Penney Art Center in western New York state.  The overall title of the show is The Artists Among Us and it features over 600 works by local artists or people with ties to the area. As I lived in Buffalo for 7 years, I qualified.

Corporate Cliche #1 is painted in a slightly different style to my usual precision-focused work and it certainly gets away from the cartoon style I often favor.

The artist at the opening

(I'll leave it to the imaginations of viewers to decide which corporate cliche I'm referring to.)

Opening Party - very well attended!

Burchfield Penney is housed in a fairly new, quite stunning building on Elmwood Avenue in Buffalo. It's a bright, light space and there's a gallery shop and rooftop terrace among other attractions. As well as The Artists Among Us exhibit, which runs into August 2012, there are works from the permanent collection also on display.

Burchfield Penney - rear view

For details about hours etc. call either 716/878-6011 or go to www.BurchfieldPenney.org. Burchfield Penney is also at the north end of the "Elmwood Strip" where there are lots of restaurants, boutiques, etc.

Partygoers enjoying the rooftop terrace

Copyright Deborah C. Sawyer

A Plant's Eye View of The World; Part 3

Hmmm... What would the world really be like if all plant forms could fight back...?

When I look at this painting, I sometimes think of that song "He's a Lumberjack and he's - not-so - OK..."

Evil Greens: When Plants Get Mad - Treacherous Trees

This is the third in my series of oil paintings, Evil Greens, and this one is titled "Treacherous Trees".

In it, I show the trees subtly fighting back against two lumberjacks, one by gently lifting its root to trip one of the guys and the other by lowering a branch to swat the second lumberjack.

Otherwise, the setting is perfectly sylvan and benign!

My Evil Greens series is done on canvases of roughly 2ft by 2.5ft. I originally conceived them to hang somewhere like a dining room, as they make great conversation pieces.

Copyright Deborah C. Sawyer

A Plant's Eye View of the World; Part 2

In the first of my postings about my Evil Greens series of paintings, I illustrated how dandelions may feel about being cut down so callously.

Now, it's the turn of the rose bushes to share their thoughts.

The second in my series "Evil Greens: When Plants Get Mad -Vicious Roses" continues my exploration of alternative views, showing what happens when a zealous gardener goes out to prune the rose bushes. (Prune? What makes you think that doesn't hurt?)

In this case, the bushes fight back, terrorizing the gardener!

Some of the details in this painting can only be seen 'up close and personal', the scratches and blood trickling down various parts of our lady gardener for one.

Just a little something to think about, next time you are heading to the great outdoors...

Copyright Deborah C. Sawyer

A Plant's Eye View of the World; Part 1

One of the hallmarks of my art is presenting what might be called "alternative views". That is, the world as seen by species other than human.

I've often thought, with all the hue and cry about animal welfare plus the belief, by some, that we should stop eating meat and stick to vegetables, that the viewpoint of plants is not really being considered.

After all, plants are alive too! They are able to respond to light and sense what's going on in their environment.

It was in this vein that I painted a series of six canvases with the overall title of:

Evil Greens: When Plants Get Mad.

The first in the series is subtitled: "Defiant Dandelions".

In this work, I take the view that, maybe, dandelions don't like being cut when the lawn is mown. Maybe, just maybe, they can decide to take a stand for themselves...  As a result, the homeowner is in for a shock, thrown literally on his ass!

In future blog posts, I'll add the other five paintings in the series.

Copyright Deborah C. Sawyer