cardinal, serpent, and revised elephant

Hello Beautiful People!

I took a little break from the studio for the past few days, but will make up for lost time this week as I complete the artwork for our deck of cards! I'm just about done with the animals for our heart/water cards, but today I'll catch you up with the few stragglers from our other suits.

First, I have our last bird for the spade cards--a red cardinal who will grace the 7 card. He's on a skateboard and sporting some fashionable attire for his ride.  

The rainbow serpent will complete the clubs/imaginary animal cards. Here's my take on this animal most familiar to Australians.

And last, I have my remake of the elephant for the ace of diamonds. I mentioned before that my original elephant was too horizontally-oriented for my tastes, so I remade it with a more upright position and accessory. Rather than a pencil, he'll have a flying fish sushi roll on his back. Look out for the pencil in one of the remaining dozen cards I'll release in the next week.

Back soon with the hearts!

sneak preview of hearts critters!

4...3...2...A....and funded (?!?!?)

Hey Beautiful People!

There's still a few hours left in my Kickstarter campaign, but I have a hunch that we've got a card deck on the way. Here's the last update I'll do while the campaign is alive, but don't worry--I'll be back to continue to update you as I spend the rest of the month creating the red cardinal for the seven of spades, the Rainbow Serpent who will adorn the six of clubs, and the majority of the water animals for the heart cards, including seahorse, giant tortoise, beaver, koi (considering changing this....will ask for feedback,) angel fish, ibis, alligator, iguana, otter, penguin, lobster, and kissing fish. 

Here's the last few critters from the diamond suit:

The four of diamonds is the fox, as seen in my video. I want to do a super close-up of the face on the actual card, showing that fur and feathers can be friends.

The three of diamonds is the armadillo shooting photos. 

Our two card is a very girly leopard. 

And the Ace card is one of my classic elephants with a huge pencil on its back. I'm actually considering remaking it so it's elongated--I squished it for the sample card to see how it fit into that rectangular format and would like to continue to play with that with an actual sculpture.

I put together a finalized sample of the uncut sheet to wrap this Kickstarter campaign up. I plan to fine tune each card after the photo shoot, particularly to make sure the suits are all consistently sized, and I'm also thinking they should be a tiny bit smaller. Taking the time to do this mockup is something I've done with my two books and it helps me tremendously as a reference point when doing the daylong photo shoots. (click on image to see it larger)

Thanks to everyone for your financial support of this project, your kind messages of encouragement, feedback of all sorts, participation when I asked for brainstorming assistance, and patience with me as I tackle the technicalities of a new format for my work. This is the fourth summer Kickstarter project I've embarked on and it's really improved my normally solitary studio practice. 

Take care, and I'll check in later in the week and show you some studio scenes as I work on the final fourteen in our menagerie.

9...8...7...6...5!

Hello again beautiful people!

Ready for a few more critters? I thought so.

The nine of diamonds is the knitting sheep. Since I'm not a knitter myself, I asked my friend Kristin to whip up a little sample for the card image. Thanks Kristin!

The eight of diamonds is a happy hiking bear, complete with walking stick. (Valderi, valdera-ha-ha-ha-ha-ha-ha-ha)

The panda plays us a little ditty on the seven of diamonds, accompanied by the accordion playing pig on the six card.

And our friend the gray squirell has made us a tasty apple pie. So sweet.

Don't forget, you can get a high-quality 8x10" print of any of these card images by adding $15 to your current Kickstarter pledge! 

I'll check in again tomorrow before the Kickstarter campaign ends to reveal the final four critters I made for the diamond cards.  Hoping you have a swell Sunday!

48 hours and counting.....

Hello Beautiful People!

I'm back again as we wind down this Kickstarter campaign to introduce you to the court cards, otherwise known as the King, Queen, and Jack of Diamonds.

First, we have the triple weiner threat - I will crop out the third weiner in the playing card, but couldn't resist having it in the original sculpture. Shhhh.....it will be our little secret!

The queen of diamonds is what's been lovingly dubbed by one of my Kickstarter backers as the Magritte cat. I decided to echo the rainbow pattern of the tail in the toenail polish. Here, kitty kitty!

Last, I bring you the badger who will be the Jack of Diamonds. Not much to say about it, except that I love pears.

And, hey, why not also show you the cow I made for the ten card in this suit. I was originally going to put those bunny slippers on the squirrel, but you'll soon see what I did for that figure. I'll be back tomorrow with a few more cards, and then on Monday right before this Kickstarter wraps up, I'll give you the rest of the diamond cards plus the revised uncut sheet that has all but 14 cards designed. If you haven't pledged yet to grab a card deck, the clock is ticking down! And if you have pledged already, don't forget if you want to add on any extra decks, uncut sheets, or prints for the exclusive Kickstarter prices, you need to adjust your pledge in the next few days! 

Thanks everyone for your support!

Dalecarlian Horse (and friends)

Hey Beautiful Person! 

A lot of topics to cover in this update on my playing card deck, so let's get right to it......

I'm finally ready to show you my version of the Dalecarlian Horse I created for the ten of clubs card, but first a little pre-story: When I was researching the history of the horse, I found some images of how they were made in the factory and wanted to try it out. I ended up with four blanks that I decided to paint with a pattern that blended the Bicycle rider deck and the patterns found on the original Dalecarlian horse. At some point I'll put them up for sale on my Etsy site, but my priority now is on finishing the deck. Here's a sneak preview image of how they're looking so far.

For the deck, I had to do my own version of this classic Swedish equine, so I decided to have the horse painting the pattern on its own body. The card will have a cropped version of the entire horse shown here, but for the card box I'll create a real stool for him to sit upon, rather than the paint jar. 

I also did some rough mockups of the card animals I've made so far, just to get an idea of how the deck is looking. I plan to have these guys professionally shot and fine tune the suits and numbers, but this is the general idea. 

In five days' time, I'll have the diamond animals completed with only 14 left to create after this Kickstarter campaign ends. I'll update you in a few days with some of the completed animals, but here's a teaser of the works in progress. 

Last, but not least, I have decided to take on the challenge from one of my backers to add a rainbow serpent into the imaginary menagerie for the club cards. I was swayed by the comment that this would bring all world continents into the mix, plus I didn't have a snake yet! Thanks to everyone for their suggestions!!!