Cats and Bags

It's true!

I'm working on the first of two Zita the Spacegirl graphic novels for First Second Books!

This is actually what I've been spending most of my time on here in Gravagna. These days I'm swimming in sketches and thumbnail pages and learning just how challenging writing and drawing a long-form comic can be. I've gone through several drafts of the story so far, tearing down, building up, finding the weakest story elements and either making them shine or destroying them. The process bears an uncanny similarity to sculpting and painting.

Though my "internet life" is kind of sketchy at the moment (connection speeds in the Apennines are slow), I am going to see if I can set up the old Zita the Spacegirl Site to blog my progress.

In the meantime, here's another nice announcement of the project at Good Comics for Kids.

And to top off the comics news, a nice Review of Flight Explorer.

THREE CHEERS FOR COMICS!

The Passing of Another Summer

Today I ate a tasty apple.

And I missed America.

So here's a picture of a typical pit-stop on the Bohemian Highway:



Well I feel like an old hobo, I'm sad lonesome and blue.
I was fair as a summers day -now the summer days are through.

You pass through places and places pass through you,
but you carry them with you on the soles of your travelin' shoes.

-"Littlest Birds" The Be Good Tanyas

Workspace II: the Studio

Things I thought I'd Never Do: Paint a still life. But, thanks to visiting artist, Henry Wingate, now I have:





The figs were plucked from the tree near the house. The basket wraps around a wine bottle and was probably made by Anna's grandfather (we found it in an old cantina).

Most of the paintings I've worked on lately have been small pieces painted on wood panels. I had never considered painting on panel until some friends left me a small stack of them after a visit. It's a different feel from canvas, a little slicker and without the give of mounted fabric, and I almost like it better. It's certainly nice for small pieces.

I've read that originally oil paintings were all made on panel but that, in Venice, where there is a lot of moisture in the air, the panels started to warp. Stretched canvas was the solution to the warping and later became the norm.

Edit: I managed to get a better picture of the figs, so I've replaced one of the pictures in this post. And I removed the picture of my messy worktable. Gotta keep up appearances.

Workspace

I've been working in two places lately, "the office" or "study" and "the studio room." The office is where I've been doing most of my drawing, writing, scanning and e-mailing (and blog updating). The studio is where I've been working on messier projects that involve clay or paint. It's a large, wonderful, unfinished room across from the house with nice big windows and a good view of the church bell tower.

Here is a picture a few of my recent projects hangin' out in the studio room:



As you can see, the little madonna and child I've been working on is coming along. The Madonna's left eye is really hard to get to and, subsequently, it hard to make it look quite right. Yesterday, by accident, while trying to maneuver that little space, I knocked the Christ Child's head clean off the statue. How are you supposed to react to something like that? Even after I had repaired it I kept thinking "what have I done?"

Git R' Done