I have finally escaped the urban ant-heap of Metro DC and am on my way south to Tennessee for two weeks' vacation. I am currently in Staunton (pronounced "Stanton"), Virginia, staying with friends in their palatial house. I am glad that some of my friends have done well for themselves, especially when they're so generous to me. I'll celebrate the New Year quietly with them tonight. Then I will leave 2007 behind.

There's plenty to do in 2008. I hope that I'll be able to show you new projects right here on this Pyracantha Website. There will be new art of all kinds, from tasteful architectural portraits to fantasy and science fiction and surrealism. And also, I am returning to my mathematics and physics. I found that I missed them, though the six month break was a necessary rest from it after six straight years of study. My vacation reading includes "Trigonometry for Dummies" and I have even brought with me a calculus lecture DVD.

I think the most important thing I did in 2007 was learn to use Photoshop and Adobe Illustrator as artistic media. I have been doing a large amount of web-gawking at digital illustration. In fact I am doing so much looking that I have not done any work myself. After all, they're so good, why should I try to do anything? In a world with myriads of competent digital artists, why should I bother to do my modest work in that same medium? I won't be illustrating for movies or games or book covers, at least that I can foresee. But as I look through all this commercial and personal work by the digital artists (see this site for plenty of examples) I see a kind of sameness to it all, in color choice, composition, and subject matter, which I am not bound by since I do not have to follow commercial assignments. So I hope to create something more individual than the excellently rendered but run-of-the-mill dragons and warriors and babes.

One of the great advantages of digital illustration and "painting" is that it takes up no space other than that of a hard drive. I won't have a stack of unsellable boards or canvases in my dwelling, nor do I have to take along a big studio full of paints if I want to illustrate outside my usual place. And if I don't like what I do, I can simply delete it. If I think that you will not want to see it, I can keep it hidden in the byte cave where only I will enjoy it.

I'll have internet connectivity for most of my Southern journey, which is planned to take me through Virginia to Chattanooga and Nashville, Tennessee, and then possibly to Asheville, North Carolina, a place I have never been. I hear there's lots of arty and fun stuff going on there. But for now, I wish all you Electron Readers a happy New Year 2008.

Posted at 7:48 pm | link