stanywck sketch

Barbara stanwyck sketch.

They didn’t end how they started. (sketchbook-cleaning)

Sometimes sketches help make a painting. Sometimes they stop a painting from happening. Sometimes, they should have been a painting.  Sometimes they just…are.  Yes, this is a sketchbook post.

Today I made a sketch of Marilyn and her dog Maf while trying to ditch some anxiety.  Marilyn doesn’t look like Marilyn, and I lost interest in the dog, but I love this sketch for all of these reasons.  When I am anxious again, I may just start doing sketches of iconic leading ladies posed with pets…..and stay unconcerned about drawing the pet or the proper likeness of the lady.

3-21-12

I was bored and detached here. Can you tell?

Beach day is the best day.

 

I am particularly fond of these tragic but semi-interesting 90210 studies that I got…frustrated with in 2010.  I accidentally ended it with the Walsh twins looking like zombies.

and Kelly Taylor looking like ghost.

and to end it…pooooooor Little J

New Works: Teen TV Spoilers and Elusive Marilyns

Hey folks! I’ve been busy! I’ve finished up a few pieces!

The first piece, “Someone This Week Will Die. (R.I.P. Marissa)”, is my favorite piece of my Marissa series so far.  The composition of this piece is based on visual style used in promotions for various teen television series.

"Someone This Week Will DIE. (R.I.P. Marissa)" 16 x 18. Acrylic on Panel. 2012 © Elizabeth Grammaticas

We know Marilyn Monroe as bright, bold, and omnipresent.   As a result, the images of Marilyn I find most interesting are the quiet illusive ones, often on poorly preserved materials.  For me with Marilyn, less is more and my most recent pieces have this in mind.

"Happy Birthday Mr. President". 10x10. Acrylic on Panel. Mixed Media

“Look at the Camera”. Marker and Gouache on Paper. 12 x 16

New Marilyn Study, 11/19

Marilyn Study, 11/19/11

Transient Teens

Exiled….ostracized…put on a bus…shamed……dead. Gone.

These sum up my current fascination with characters in teen television…how we deal with loss, goodbyes, change, closure, and death…through the vehicle of teen television programming.

More to come…


A Jackie-a-Day…kept me away.

I tried to do a Jackie-a-day, I really didt…but I couldn’t.  It wasn’t because of my work ethic, although I questioned it.  It was my interest level.  Jackie sounded great on paper, but not in practice.  (I know, that’s a set up for some JFK jokes, but refrain)

I was a bit surprised that Jackie didn’t draw me in as I had hoped.    I went into working with Marilyn Monroe’s image having no interest, and seeing no personal indentifications between the two of us…yet here we are, years later…and I am still fascinated by Miss Monroe and continuously being drawn in on am emotional level.  While Jackie O. holds much more in common with the people in my own life,  I quickly grew bored and detached, which you could see in the work.    The drawings and paintings never quite looked like Jackie, and slightly looked like my mother when she was young..or other female members of my family.   That’s you get with an icon I guess, but you need something more than just a slight personal touch.     Jackie would give me props for knowing when its time to step away….you know..before the point when you have to move to a private Greek island with a rich old man.   We part ways for now Jackie, but maybe we’ll talk later.

Sorry Jackie...

More to come on the projects I actually have been working on.

A Jackie A Day (…keeps the trauma away..)

Years back when I first started working with Marilyn Monroe’s image, the Marilyn’s I initially produced were drastically different from my current Marilyn work.  The early Marilyns were aggressive and somewhat grotesque.  I knew little about Marilyn outside from her commercial marketing.  Then I started my research…and I am still reading new Marilyn books and evolving a relationship and interest in the subject.  While this transformation happened,   my regret is that I didn’t further document this process and evolution.  I do have some snitbits here:

 

 

Now I have  decided to start a new project with another iconic American lady from a similar historical period.  Appropriately, Jacqueline Bouvier Kennedy Onasis.  For the next month, I will be doing a Jackie drawing a day…and documenting my progress.  I have more up front personal connections with Jackie, and I am curious to see how this work/and relationship will evolve.  Plus you know, I currently live in Boston…might as well.

Here’s some starters:

Day 1

 

Jackie 2, (part 1)

 

Jackie 2 (part 2)

 

3/19/11

stay tuned……..

Abandoned Sketches Getting New Life.

At an attempt to go to back to the crazy concept of…completing an entire sketchbook, I am going back and revising old ‘failed’ or unfinished drawings in my sketchbook.

Here are  a couple of sketch book revisions.

Started 2010..picked up and added to in 2011.

New Marilyn Monroe Study

As usual when I need to take a break, out comes another Marilyn-inspired study.  Here is the latest…a somewhat old one I finally touched up from my sketchbook.

Poor Little J-Revised

Revised version of “Poor Little J”.


"Poor Little J", Elizabeth Grammaticas, 2010

More frequent actual updates & writing to come soon!

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