So this begins my post college years. Before this I'd almost always used a spiral bound notebook. Since my previous college sketchbook was a small bound 5 1/4 x 8 1/2 book with a blue paper slip cover and I liked the idea of a permanent record I couldn't alter without leaving some indication I'd removed a page, this time I went for a larger black leather-cloth 8 1/2 x 11 book by Strathmore available at most art supply.
I was very productive during this period, sketching and jotting down thoughts and ideas in pencil, inking them in later, inventing some new comic strips that never went anywhere. There are some erotic images that I will post at Muscle-growth.org when I get to them. Notably I have ideas for a tattoo I designed for my friend Tod Streater, but there are a few Loren and Sylvia riffs too. I also have cameo appearances from friends, as I almost always carried my sketchbook when I was out and about.
Just one more note about the above image. That straw hat I purchased off the street from someone doing a sidewalk garage sale. At the same sale, I also bought a cheaply made blue enamelware pin in the form of a shield that I married to the hat ribbon. It became iconic for me and I wore it around for most of that year.
I like the idea of ripping out pages and then noting why. There was a great bit in Mishima's "Spring Snow" where a woman sends her ex lover eight blank pages and a note saying "this is the eight page love letter I wrote you and then burned."
ReplyDeleteWow! Mishima is a literary god. Somehow I wouldn't know what to do with that if someone did that to me.
ReplyDeleteMy intention was to keep myself honest and attempt to live my life more openly than I had as a teenager. I haven't posted any artwork from my childhood, but the sketch books tend to be thin because I had a habit of ripping out pages and destroying them in a manner I learned from my older brother. Oddly, what I retained in the sketchbooks are mostly personal and sexual material, albeit the dreams and hopes of a budding adolescent gay man. One day I may share them.