Sculpted a ladyfish for a friends Mother’s Day gift! I had a lot of fun with her, especially sculpting and painting the scales and fins.
Can’t quite tell in the photos, but the paint is lightly sparkled. Woo!
Made a Grumpycat Pen-holder for a friend. Woo!
Normally, I feel that whenever I answer questions here, whatever perspective I have to offer will suffice, but this one left me with a laundry list of opinions, most of which conflicted with one another. While it would probably be most expected for me to think that art can change the world, and it’s other professions that serve a more tangible purpose that would look down on art as a career choice – if I’m being honest, my gut feeling was that me deciding to become an artist and continuing to be one IS incredibly selfish and narcissistic. Even when I engage with people considering following a similar career path, my words of encouragement boil down to “I love what I do, it fulfills me immensely”. From artist to artist, that’s exactly what you’d expect, but suddenly I considered the possibility that all of my artistic “advice” was just perpetuating a cycle of selfishness – encouraging people to pursue things only to make themselves happy. Having an impact on the world was never even a consideration, I just… like making things.
Is what I do, is what all artists do, just for themselves? Are we really just choosing a path that puts a smile on our faces when we should be picking careers that tangibly assist people? I was at a loss. I knew that I lacked the proper perspective to answer this question in full on my own.
Thankfully, two of my brothers happen to be in fairly interesting careers that contrast my own as an illustrator: a Doctor and a Rabbi. While we sat around a coffee table in Manhattan eating Thai food — my niece running around in circles holding a Superman action figure, and my 6 month old nephew smiling in a dapper baby outfit while he happily filled his diaper – I broached the question to see what two people who respectively save lives and save souls, would have to say about this. However, unlike myself, they almost immediately dismissed it as absurd.
The narcissism and selfishness was one of the first things they tried to dismantle — saying every profession, no matter how seemingly noble by label, attracts people who do it entirely for themselves, a doctor being no exception. I argued back saying that in these instances though, regardless of the reasons FOR pursuing these practical professions, a doctor still saves lives.
Next on the chopping block, they dissected the notion that artists have no real impact on the world. There were a slew of very expected and easily rebuked statements thrown around. When I told my Rabbi brother that the impact he has on his congregation and community is deep, profound, instantaneously noticeable, and that I don’t have a damn clue whether anything I’ve ever made has affected anyone, he was just his usual humble self and in denial of that fact. But my other brother said something that if there were ever a statement that gave any sort of real answer to a question layered with so many existential onion rings, I felt this was it. He said, and I’m paraphrasing here, “Sam, just look at history, Doctors, Engineers, and Scientists are the people who have an impact in the world and matter the most? If anything you could make a strong argument that these are the professions that are extraneous. Art pre-dates medicine, science, and engineering by very wide margins. Art has grown and expanded exponentially throughout history, it has transformed language and sold belief systems to entire nations. I gain more from looking at a beautiful painting or listening to good music than I ever do from how something is engineered. I mean even on a really basic level of what I do, without artists, what the hell would us doctors learn from? You have no idea how much the field of medicine relies on illustration.”
I didn’t have an argument for that. It was historically sound.
While I’m not sure that I have a definitive answer to your question, after filling my perspective and knowledge gaps from my brothers, I will say this: It’s a slippery slope to say that artists don’t impact the world. Art’s effects may not be as tangible as the aforementioned career alternatives, but it’s still around, broader and more widespread than ever, permeating ever facet of our human-made world. Its effects may not be as quantifiable as how many years a Doctor has kept a person alive, but as most doctors will tell you, quantity of life is not nearly as valuable as the quality of it, yet their job demands that they deliver the number over the experience.
Art demands nothing, we just make it. We express, we depict, and we rage on whether or not our impact can be put into numbers.
I spent a day up in Maine painting a Family Tree mural on a friend’s wall!
I’ve never painted a mural for someone, so it was especially exciting that they wanted me to paint my most favorite subject, a tree. The roots have the names of the parents and grandparents, and the branches have pictures of all the children. There’s around 100 leaves, and it was painted with basic house paint and a bit of acrylic. It took about 17 hours, and is around 7’ x 15’!
I wanted to brighten some friend’s day, so I spent an entire Friday alone making these little poops.
You can print out your own papercraft Grumpycat here, but I decided to completely draw them based off the layout. Fun!
I’ve spent the last few months working on some awesome Sculpey figures!
I have a lot of fun making these guys! There’s a lot of work that goes into them, and I find I lose myself completely while working on em. They’re made with wire and tinfoil on the inside, and sculpted with Super Sculpey. After baking (sometime’s three times total,) I sand them down and gesso over the hardened clay. I then use acrylics to paint them, and varnish with matte medium. I usually use yarn for the hair and details. The small heads take about 20 hours or less, and the giant Pirate Business-Card holder took me *70* hours! (Let’s just say I was able to watch Extended Edition of Lord of the Rings, Season 1 of Girls, and almost two seasons of Roseanne WHILE working on the Pirate.)
They make awesome little personal gifts that you can’t get anywhere else :)
For the Halloween season, I decided to be Daenerys! I had help from a friend to make the costume, and then I made a Drogon dragon egg out of Sculpey and acrylic paint. I ended up wearing the costume to New York Comic Con and King Richard’s Faire, where I ran into other amazingly dressed GoT fans. Ironically, I never got to wear it today, on actual Halloween, because my plans were scrapped :( Sorry Salem!
My friend Ashley is Melisandre! We’ve got a picture up on the Game of Thrones tumblr page.
My Baby Sloth illustration got into Creative Quarterly 29! Out sometime during winter.
This is the first time my art will be published, and that’s super exciting for me :) I was definitely overdue for some good, positive things to happen to my life. It’s a huge confidence booster, as well as being motivational. Gotta pick up that pencil again, it’s been quite a long time.
Finished art for the Illustration Master Class, 2012.
This assignment (we could choose from a few different stories) was to come up with a potential book cover for the story “Cairn in the Slater Woods” by Gina Rosati. It was interesting to walk through the classrooms and see all the different interpretations of the same story!
The plot follows a group of teens into the woods where they meet a red-headed babe-ghost surrounded by dangling bottles in the trees.
Wish I had pink hair again :(
(Source: kimbuhler.com)
* Concepts, sketches, underpainting, digital color comp.
This was my process for creating my newest painting, Cairn In The Woods.
This project began in my Illustration Master class back in June. I was definitely struggling with the image while I was in class. I didn’t prepare myself with enough concepts, sketches and reference photos, and I always went back and forth with my decisions on where to place objects, expression on the face, colors, etc. I need to learn to be more decisive on why I paint what I paint.
I learned soooo incredibly much while doing this painting. Especially while we were at IMC, I learned just how specific I need to get my references to be. If I had known then what I know now, this painting would be 10x better. I’m excited to do my art from here on out with everything I took away from that class. From the beginning sketches to the composition, to the underpainting.. a lot changed in every phase. I want to become more confident in my earlier sketches and comps and keep it consistent till the final image. There was suppose to be lots of revising on these images, but my sketches NEVER look like my finishes. Gotta work on that!
While we were at the IMC, I would get so intimidated whenever I walked around the classes and saw people oil or digitally painting badass dragons, knights, waterfalls, battle scenes… and I was just painting a cute girl’s face. Next year, I’m going to push myself to do something totally different and out of my comfort zone when it comes to the assignment. And yet, when I got home and got away from everyone’s amazing artwork, and took a second look at my painting… I really liked it! Funny how just taking it out of that intense setting made me see it in a completely different light. I got really good feedback on it once I brought it home, too.
In the end, I’m really happy with the finished painting. It’s definitely one of my best pieces and I can’t wait to see my next painting after this one. I know it’ll be so much greater than what I’ve done previously, just based on my knowledge from IMC alone. I’m currently comparing this painting with another acrylic painting I’ve done from October 2011. Just in 10 months my skill and technique has grown a significant amount. It’s good to see progress! Can’t wait to see what I do next!
(Source: kimbuhler.com)
Kiwi!
Inspired by my trip to my favorite country on the planet, New Zealand.
May 2012.
(Source: http)
From June 8th until the 16th, I was out in Amherst to take part in the Illustration Master Class.
My teacher at MassArt, Scott Bakal, mentioned this class back in Fall of 2011. At the time, I was going through a difficult period and feeling lost and hopeless in every aspect of my life… but IMC sounded like a really intriguing and fun opportunity. In all honesty I’m not sure I would have signed up for the class if I hadn’t been going through that hard time, but I knew I needed to do something good for myself; to push myself out of that funk and try something new. I am so grateful that my experiences back in the fall led me to the IMC: I almost think it was fate that bad things had to happen in order for something good to come!
Leading up to the IMC, I was freaking out juuust a bit. I had graduated from Massachusetts College of Art & Design, but it wasn’t an easy road for me these past four years. I was nervous about this class because not only are the teachers some of the most talented and world renowned artists in the world.. but many of the STUDENTS are as well. Where on earth would my cute little animal paintings fit in the big scary world of epic dragons and space-battles and realistic hot ladies?! These were just some of my thoughts.. but again I let my insecurities get the best of me.
—-
The week consisted of getting to know almost 100 fellow students from all over the world, that also happen to be professional artists that have been in the industry for years. There were some children’s book illustrators, concept artists, recent art school graduates, and extremely experienced painters. Everyone was at a different level, but everyone was treated with the same respect. It didn’t matter if you were still in college or had been working in a world famous game company for 20 years. Every single person there was willing to talk, help out, critique or exchange tips and tricks. There were no egos.
I’ve never been surrounded by so many people with that much intense passion for art. It was intoxicating being with so many people who live, breathe and eat it all up. Part of me feels like art school was a bit.. soul draining.. and most people around you in school will likely not do art after graduating.. as statistics say. But to see so many success stories in one building… how could I not walk away from that inspired and hopeful? Everyone was so friendly and cool, and it just made me so excited to be a part of this community! I completely feel as if I’ve just taken my first step through the door that will be my career and future.
On the first official day at the IMC, we set up our studios and easels, and had our sketches (based on a few sci-fi/ fantasy stories that were given to us) critiqued by our teachers: Rebecca Guay, Iain McCaig, Brom, Greg Manchess, Donato Giancola, Irene Gallo, Boris Vallejo & Julie Bell, Scott Fischer, and Dan Dos Santos. If you check out these links, you will quickly realize how AMAZING these people are, and how intimidating it must be to show them your art, let alone speak to them! But they were all warm and welcoming. After critiques by these ARTGODS, we went back to our studios and reworked the sketches. For the next 6 days, we worked on the sketches until we started painting. Every day, the teachers would all walk around the studios giving helpful tips and advice to make our images and techniques better. By the end of the week, most people were nearly done with their paintings.
Two or three times a day, we would all pile into the lecture hall to hear each of the teachers speak about their career. It was so humbling to know that each and every one of these master illustrators wasn’t just born with this intense talent. Talent is not something you are born with.. you work for it. A sentence as simple as that was really the smack in the face I needed. To hear each of their stories about how they got to where they are (none of these stories was a simple success story, there were hardships and letdowns) was just so inspiring, and would immediately make me want to pick up a brush and start painting. I filled pages worth of notes and hopeful phrases given to us by the teachers. I walked out of that lecture hall knowing that as long as I stay dedicated, motivated, and try my hardest.. I can get there. I can do this. The lectures opened my eyes to see the path I would love to follow. So much work needs to be done in order for me to get there, I know.. but it all seems so much clearer to me now, and I’m excited for it!
We were also treated to lectures by THE James Gurney, an AMAZZZING children’s book illustrator Adam Rex, and Blizzard Art Director Doug Gregory. During the nights, there would be impromptu lectures or demos by any number of the teachers, who would be painting in their studios. We also had a model session, and were taught lighting tricks and mounting sketches to boards. Sometimes, we would just go to a diner at 3am for pancakes. We were constantly learning and soaking up new information while being surrounded by amazing art. Visual sensory overloooad!
On the last day at the IMC, we had an open house where people from outside the class could come and check out the art. The teachers were selling books and signing sketchbooks. We all went to a bar down the street, the High Horse, and continued to sign sketchbooks aaas well as drinkytime! By the time I went to sleep at 4am, the teachers were in the dorm lobby still signing and sketching in sketchbooks while everyone was partying or dancing with all 100 of their new friends.
I had heard amazing things about the IMC, and every single thing I heard was correct. I have never walked away from something with so much inspiration and hope. I have a plan for the next year, and many new goals I want to accomplish.
I will be back at the IMC next year, and I simply cannot wait.
—
Fun Story Time!
And just so you know how nervous I was to meet Iain McCaig:
He created the original character designs for Padme Amidala in Star Wars: The Phantom Menace (among other epic characters.) I remember seeing those sketches in art books when I was 9 years old. And if you know me personally, you know how much I LOOOVE love Natalie Portman. I fell in love with her during the Phantom Menace, because I just freaking DIED over the makeup and costumes. So my new-found love of crazy makeup and incredible costumes.. eventually led me to LOOOVE Cirque du Soleil.. which if you know me personally..you know I’ve traveled to two countries and seen almost 30 shows, met performers and was inspired to create art because of the shows (on top of the fact that these experiences weren’t cool enough.) Creating that art led me to art school. And now back to Natalie Portman.. I would draw her stupid pretty face ALL THE TIME. I LOVED IT. This too helped me become a better artist.. and led me to art school. Thanks, Natalie Portman’s face. SO, here I am today, a babyillustrator… all because Iain created these gorgeous designs for a huge hollywood movie back when I was 9 years old. Thanks, Iain!
(Source: kimbuhler.com)
Personal Tumblr
Alright folks. I know I’ve been smothering your Newsfeeds, Tumblrs and Twitters lately…
KimBooBoo is now my personal Tumblr, for me to post cute animal pictures and be dumb. Weeee!
