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Just thought I’d write a little note about tonight’s “Regent Fiesta,’ specifically the ‘mystery art’ sale in which I’m participating. It’s a pretty neat idea. 100 local artists were invited to participate and given a canvas and frame of a predetermined size – not unlike Toronto’s ‘Square Foot Show’ at AWOL Gallery (http://www.awolgallery.com/square_foot/) – with the one rule that they could do ‘anything’ they wanted, as long as it was within that frame. It’s not an auction; all pieces are priced at a flat $50, which might mean a good deal if you should happen to find a painting there that you really love. The ‘mystery’ part of things comes into play in that none of the artists are allowed to sign their work, which does add an intriguing kind of flair to things. Is that so-and-so’s artwork or is it another artist trying on a different style? You just won’t know unless you buy the piece, flip it over and find out.
Here’s the full flyer:
As for the cause behind this fundraiser, supporting the Regent Theatre, which is, specifically, trying to raise funds for a new digital projector, I’d say it’s a worthy one. As a teenager growing up in Picton, I would frequently complain that the Regent Theatre was mostly closed, opening its doors only occasionally for the odd event. It was really not cool – seeing a movie is a pretty typical activity for any young person’s Friday night, but my friends and I had to travel all the way to Belleville or Kingston just to see… well, anything. Uphill both ways, in the snow. I remembered days from early childhood, before the theatre closed, when families could enter the Regent’s beautiful Edwardian entrance, make their way down that strangely sloping floor and take in a one kind of cinematic wonder or another. For me, it was the place where I first saw many of the animated Disney movies – which are somewhat responsible for me ever wanting to become an artist/cartoonist in the first place. It was either that or join the Rescue Aid Society (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VN1W5iq4724).
After it all closed, it was a dark time indeed. I won’t further elaborate on the hardships I endured as a movie-loving teenager; all I will say is that NOW, things are much improved. Not only is the Regent Theatre currently a place where moviegoers can take in anything from new family films to classics to artsy indie stuff to the latest blockusbusters or romantic comedies, but it’s simply an integral part of keeping Picton’s Main St. alive and hopping and fun and cool. As you can see, it’s not just a place for movies, but rather a community centre. Here’s a picture (below), taken just a few weeks ago; not only does it show me dressed in wedding clothes, but you can see the Regent’s marquee behind me, advertising a diverse array of events: “ALL CANDIDATES MEETING,” “THE LARRY GARNER BLUES BAND” and even the wedding I was attending. This recent County Live posting for upcoming events shows that such diversity is typical for the Regent: musicians, opera, theatre, author readings… http://countylive.ca/blog/?p=12138. It’s a happening place, and it needs community support to stay alive.
So that’s what tonight’s event, The Regent Fiesta, is all about. When I was thinking about writing this note, I’d planned to suggest you head on out and take in the art show; however, that’s not quite possible unless you already have a ticket – apparently it’s all sold out! Instead, I’ll be content just making a case for supporting the Regent Theatre, and the arts in general, in Picton, or wherever you should happen to live. If you’d like to donate to the Regent Theatre’s current digital endeavour, you can do so through their box office: http://theregenttheatre.org/Donate.htm
If you’d like to learn more about the Regent and its history, please check out:
http://theregenttheatre.org/About.htm
http://www.archives.gov.on.ca/english/on-line-exhibits/theatres/theatres/regent-picton.aspx
…or join their Facebook page.
And, although I can’t show you the whole painting I contributed to the Regent fundraiser, it being a ‘mystery’ and all, I think it’d be okay if I gave you a tiny little peek. Here you go… don’t look if you don’t like SPOILERS:
It is a mystery.
Thanks for reading,
Niall
FanExpo 2011 Character Tribute Series (2 of 5): “You Don’t Want To Go Making Friends With The Wrong Sort”
August 24th, 2011 |Posted In: Blog
Aug. 23, 2011 – ‘FanExpo 2011 Character Tribute’ series (2 of 5) – Draco Malfoy. In honour of Tom Felton.
“Come With Me If You Want To Live!” – A Character Tribute Series For FanExpo 2011
August 22nd, 2011 |Posted In: Blog
FanExpo 2011 is practically upon us! Canada’s largest comics convention, which combines comics, sci-fi, horror, anime and gaming under one massive roof, opens this week at the Metro Toronto Convention Centre. This year the expo is FOUR days long, from Aug. 25-28, and, in addition to a stunning array of artists, writers, performers and imperial troops, I’ll be there on each of those days, showcasing and selling Character Of The Day artwork, and taking (hopefully) a whole lot of live-sketching requests as well.
I’ll probably write another note later in the week with more details about what you can expect to find at my table at the show, but for now I’d just like to introduce this week’s character series. In honour of FanExpo week, I thought I’d do something a little different… Basically, tributes to other people’s characters! Characters from movies, comics, television, etc… heroes, villains, and everyone in between, the entire pulsating populace of pop culture that has always been, and continues to be, an enormous inspiration to me, in both my artwork and my life. They’re fictional characters that probably mean a lot to you as well.
So each of the characters that I’ve drawn this week corresponds to a specific guest who will be appearing at this week’s FanExpo. For example, today’s character is that post-apocalyptic soldier of the future, Sgt. Kyle Reese! You know, from ‘The Terminator’ (1984). And of course he’s appearing in honour of the actor who played him in that movie… Michael Biehn, who is among the list of guests scheduled to appear at the show.
Alright, so you’ve got the picture? Good. So now perhaps you’d like to hazard a guess as to who will be appearing in this space tomorrow? If you’d like to see a complete list of this year’s FanExpo guests, please check out the official site:
By the way, since the drawings in this series are my interpretations of other people’s characters, I’m not actually including them among the regular Character Of The Day collection of characters. Instead, they have a separate Facebook album of their own, the link to which can be found below… Right now, only Kyle Reese is in there, but hopefully the ranks of his fellow fictional characters will grow in short order…
http://www.facebook.com/media/set/?set=a.262463307104981.70910.153465984671381
Thanks for reading,
Niall
COTD Update: Winner of The ‘Partners’ Contest, COTD Rough Work, ‘Dark Arts’ and More
August 15th, 2011 |Posted In: Blog
In this note:
1. Winner of The ‘Partners’ Contest
2. COTD Rough Work and Notes
3. COTD on Tumblr
4. New Series – ‘Dark Arts’
1. Winner of The Partners Contest
Congratulations to Kelly Roblin who won the ‘Partners’ series contest for original art last week! Kelly succeeded at being the first to match up the characters from the first ‘Year 2′ series to their correct romantic matches from ‘Year 1′. For anyone wondering how the actual love connections stacked up, here are the correct answers:
The Rivals – Kitan and Marmablade
The Collaborators – Corus Kate and Stardust Artist
The Opposites – Glam Panda and Bland Panda
The Enablers – Oliver Pox and Chelsea Danger
The Puppy Lovers – Kelly and The Coollector
Anyway, way to go, Kelly – thanks for playing! And, yes, Kelly is that Kelly from the ‘Kelly and The Coollector’ match-up. And, yes, that’s the artwork she chose after winning the contest. Kelly tells me that the COTD ‘Kelly’ series will soon be on display in her shop, so next time you’re in Picton be sure to go in, meet the real Kelly, see her new art and check out her kitschy, colourful wares:
2. Character of The Day Rough Work And Notes
I’ve created a new album in the COTD photo albums section on Facebook. It’s called ‘Character of The Day – Roughs and Notes’ and it features rough pencils (and hopefully, once in a while, some notes) used in the creation of finished COTD artwork. I know not everyone will be interested in that kind of thing, but if, like me, you enjoy looking at preliminary drawings and process work, you might fight the sketches interesting. I don’t mid talking about how artwork is created, so if anyone has any questions about techniques, materials, etc. used in the creation of COTD images, please feel free to comment on the roughs (or anywhere, really) and I’ll try to answer best I can.
I’d include the rough work in an album on the actual COTD blog (www.nialleccles.com), but, sadly, I don’t really know how to do that right now. So, for now, I’ll only be posting rough work to the Facebook album. For those interested in checking it out, the COTD ‘Roughs and Notes’ album can be found here.
3. Character Of The Day on Tumblr
I’m not quite sure what made me decide that Character Of the Day should be on Tumblr. Nothing special, really – I guess I just wanted to see what it does. I’ve never used Tumblr before and know very little about it, so it’s nothing more than an experiment. The content I’ve been posting there recently is exactly the same as that of this Facebook page and the actual COTD blog. I have no idea if that’s a useful thing to do or if it’s some kind of horrendous social networking faux pas. I don’t know – maybe some people would rather follow this stuff on Tumblr. If you do, here’s the link:
http://nialleccles.tumblr.com/
4. New COTD Series: ‘Dark Arts’
Some of you may recognize today’s Character Of The Day from the fourth issue of Square2 magazine, which was published in spring of this year. ‘Screamprinters’ was specially designed for that issue, to go along with a feature article on Character of The Day. It was silkscreened by hand by Chrissy Poitras and offered as a unique ‘extra’ in a limited number of the magazines. ‘Screamprinters’ hadn’t yet officially appeared in the Character of The Day collection of characters, and I thought it might make a good starting point for a new series – so check back here tomorrow for another installment of ‘Dark Arts’. Some of the ‘Screamprinters’ editions of the most recent Square2 are still availalble, so please contact Chrissy or Kyle of Spark Box Studio if you’d like to pick one up….
http://square2magazine.com/issue004/
Thanks for reading!
Niall
No, not me! I’m talking about this guy – Stardust Artist! Yesterday’s starlight-painting Character Of the Day. Surely in the whole collection of Characters of The Day who have been created so far (there are 218 characters in total right now) there’s got to be someone who might like to hang out with this stellar fellow. I don’t know – maybe you can help play matchmaker?
You’ve taken a shine to him yourself, haven’t you?
Welcome to Year 2 of Character Of The Day and to the first contest of the new group of characters. You weren’t imagining it – Character Of The Day did take a break for a while. It wasn’t really an intentional break – that’s why I didn’t announce it – but it’s ended up working out well, nevertheless. Time away from this project has allowed me to think about my goals for it, and possible ways to improve it.
It’s also an opportunity to start fresh. Not surprisingly, I really like the idea that no matter how ‘well’ or ‘poorly’ I’ve done with this cartooning experiment, I’ll always be able to start anew each summer. So that’s what I’m doing now – just picking up where I left off and moving forward. One of the main things I’ll be doing differently this time is to make each new character a part of a series, instead of just a selection of random character designs. The element that ties all the images together could either be a theme of some kind (a subject or a medium or a design principle, etc.) or some kind of story (or perhaps even just the suggestion of a kind of narrative). So if you remember the Bird Series or Winter Series or the story of Cobweb and Whisper from last year, you can expect more connected imagery like that this time around.
Another change I’ll be making to Character Of The Day is that each series will consist of five images, with each new character appearing on a weekday. I figure that a weekend break in characters will at least give me a fighting chance when it comes to keeping up the pace and not falling behind.
And, should I happen to fall behind, I’m not going to attempt to ‘catch up.’ Trying to catch up on a backlog of missed days is pretty much the ‘Lucille Ball in a pie factory’ way of doing things. The list of characters-to-be-drawn just gets too overwhelming and difficult to manage. When I’d like the main theme of this project to be about the unfettered joy of creating that is unique to cartooning, stressing out about ‘missed characters’ is pretty much the opposite of what I’d like to achieve here.
As for contests, instead of a ‘monthly draw’, such as there have been, I’ll just try to think of different ways to make things fun and interesting. So you can still expect occasional giveaways for original art and prints, etc. but hopefully each contest will be random and new and surprising.
And, speaking of that, did I say we were actually kicking things off here with a contest? We sure are! I thought I’d bridge the gap between Year 1 and Year 2 of Character of The Day by providing partners for some of the previous characters in the collection. You know, partners – like, girlfriends, boyfriends, husbands, wives, love interests, even crushes – that kind of thing. On Monday, I posted the first of this series, ‘Marmablade’, and yesterday it was ‘Stardust Artist’. And my question to you is, ‘Who Should They Date?’. Well, I actually already know who they’re dating, but if you can find their partners among the collection of characters from COTD’s first year, then you could win a piece of original art from this first series of COTD Year 2 (the ‘Partners’ series).
Hottie.
It’ll work like this: anyone who wants to play along should just type the name of the ‘Year 1′ character (whom they believe is a correct match) under the name of their ‘Year 2′ partner in the Facebook COTD photo album. For example, if you think that Marmablade’s boyfriend is ‘Moss Mouse’ then just type “Mouse Mouse’ under the artwork for Marmablade in the FB photo album. Got it? (I should note that Year 1 art is in two separate albums and Year 2 has just started a new album of its own). The first person to correctly name all five ‘partners’ will win their choice of the original character art from the new series (Marmablade, Stardust Artist, etc.).
Hint: Marmablade is not dating Moss Mouse.
Still single.
Anyway, hopefully you’ll feel like playing. Marmablade and Stardust Artist await your matchmaking skills, and today’s Character Of The Day will be posted sometime before 4pm and would like to be paired up as well (Wednesday, August 10). Contest ends after I post the fifth drawing on Friday and someone has guessed correctly for all five characters. Thanks for reading and for playing!
Again, just find the character from…
Character Of The Day – Year One – Album 1
Character Of The Day – Year One – Album 2
And type their name under their correct partner in…
Niall