My muse and husband, Rob suggested that I have a blog as it would force me to post work, and show a sketch a day. No biggie with the sketch and come to think of it, no biggie with Blogger doing most of the design work for me...So I figured I will give it a whirl.
I am a designer who is in the joyous throes of mid-career education. In addition to having a small design company, I am pursing a MA in Illlustration (a truly random decision) from Syracuse University. Its a great program as you can get as much or as little as you want from it...Time commitment is great--2 weeks in the summer on campus at Syracuse, a week in the fall in NYC, a week in Spring (San Francisco this year), back to Syracuse, back to NYC, and in the spring somewhere TBD...and one more summer in Syracuse...and you are done. The people are unbelievable--the teachers and the teaching students. Talent abounds--and most people are open and very sharing and encouraging. I am making pictures to my heart's content--and actually surprising myself that there is stuff "in there"--that has been looking for a way out. So, the design work is better-- and the illustration work is actually coming along.
Back from a week of illustration, illustration, fun and friends in San Francisco with the Syracuse ISDP (Independent Study Degree Program). Syracuse brought in a wonderful collection of illustrators who inspired us to try new techniques, new ideas and thoughts.
We had an amazing visit with Jane Eisenstat and her daughter, Bunny Carter in her Palo Alto house. Floor to ceiling, left to right, every wall and surface were covered with illustration from NC Wyeth time on to the present. Jane regaled us with stories of each picture as she narrated by pulling large cardboard boxes out from under her beds, or out of drawers of drawers of flat files. Jane's energy and tales from her childhood through her marriage--were knit with illustrations, illustration and art--Bunny, her daughter, also an illustrator and educator also wrote an engaging book about the Red Rose Girls (probably inspired by her parents' collection of the Red Rose Girls' work) and now one on Cecilia Beaux. Bunny's vision and insight on these interesting women, the research she engaged in--and the possibility of the Red Rose Girls' story reaching a wider audience was exciting.
We visited Vivienne Fleisher and Ward Schumaker in their house--with an inspired show and tell of their work, their travels, their pets within their house (their books, their art, their spaces).
We saw Robert Hunt, Jim Pearson, Dugald Sturmer, Steve Johnson and Lous Fancher, Barron Storey, Owen Smith, Kazu Sano,
John Mattos, Yan Nascimbene, Enrico Casavosa, Ronnie Del Carmen. More tomorrow.
(the sketch above is an idea for our SF homework...inspired by China town and all the visual stuff happening there...combined with the factoid that the fortune cookie actually is a SF invention...not that of the Chinese...)...
All images on this blog are the exclusive property and copyrighted by Q. Cassetti unless otherwise noted.