Beluga

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Detail


Isn't that just the greatest word? Beluga. Say it, and your lips puff out and it pops right out into the air and floats there, just like this magical flying creature. This is another illustration/collage for my buddy Bonny (hmmm, that's kinda fun to say, too. "buddy Bonny"). Her terrific manuscript, Somewhere in These Days of Morning is the perfect home for my collages, and I'm so happy to be able to contribute. If you'd like to visit her blog and read a few more chapters, by all means, go here.

Meanwhile, here's the chapter that accompanies this collage in its entirety:

Beluga is a secret word for ultimatum.

Guess it's not a secret anymore. If you meet up with one, be prepared to act fast and decisively. Because a beluga does not attempt to harness its rage at helplessness. She rides belugas to get her where she wants to go. The view is glorious, and the speed is high. The ride is squeaky and breezy, smooth and violent. She doesn't care that belugas take her where the answers are. She doesn't have any questions.
©2009 Excerpt from Somewhere in these Days of Morning by Bonny Belgum (author) and Andrée Tracey (illustrator)

Now if you will excuse me, I must go and saddle up my beluga and go for a ride.

Mushroom Girl

She's a princess in her court. She's actually a work in progress, a collage that has been shuffled to the back of my studio because I can't figure out how to finish it. So I just played around with a Photoshop background for now, although the actual collage will be quite different when I am finished. But for now, I do like the mysterious feeling evoked with the sky.

Dad: The Sequel

I'm sorry, I forgot to tell you that Dad is perfectly fine now. I got several calls and emails from friends and relatives who were concerned that he was dying. Who knew anyone was actually reading this blog? Anyway, as you can see from this scary close-up, he is back to his old antics, pretending to have a moustache and sideburns made out of cottonwood seeds, floating by as he reclined in his backyard chaise lounge. When I walked out and saw him, I said, "No wonder you have allergies, stuffing seeds and leaves up your nose and ears!"

I know he said he wasn't going to live to be 97 (he's 96). But now I think I may have mis-interpreted that - I think he meant he was going to live to be 107 instead.

Ticket to Paradise

I had an out-of-body experience the other day. I didn't exactly leave my body, but I seemed to leave my house. I was transported out of my neighborhood - out of the U.S! And I wasn't doing anything stronger than my first cup of homemade French Roast coffee.

I was sitting on my sofa, staring out the window, and here is a photo of my window. Not exactly a great view, is it? But I like it, I've been staring at it for the last 15 years. Just a bunch of old trees now blocking the view of my neighbors' homes and not much else to see unless a squirrel makes an appearance.

All of a sudden the view looked different. A mist was rising from behind the neighbor's house, the sun broke through after a morning rain, and I thought I had been transported to somewhere totally foreign. Somehow the view lost it's familiarity, and it looked totally strange and exotic to me. Magical. I knew it was my own neighborhood, but still, I felt like I was in a rain forest or some tropical faraway place. It wasn't that it LOOKED different to me, it WAS different. I sat there for ten minutes, knowing that I was enjoying something very strange and special.

Eventually the curtain fell, and I was staring at my neighbor's lawn again. I keep sitting on my sofa now, drinking endless cups of that French Roast coffee, waiting for this spontaneous vacation to happen again, but so far no luck. But it is nice to know that our minds have the ability to make such a drastic positive difference in how we view our situation/environment.

Trotting the Dog

I was feeling a bit blue this morning, just tired from the previous week, and not getting a good night sleep for weeks on end takes its toll. So I decided to take Suzi-Q for a walk. But that is not correct terminology. She never walks around the house (she trots) so why would she walk in the Great Outdoors? So we don't go for walks, we go for trots. Totally out of control trots. She's had 6 months of obedience training, will do anything you ask her, was awarded best doggie and used as a model for the class, etc. But take her outside, and all that training just evaporates.

Actually, I'm fine with that. When we go for our trots, it's great exercise, and she enjoys her explorations, which is what being outside is all about for us. We both come back tired and restored at the same time.

The AWE-SUM Award!

This lovely honor was awarded to me by my friend Donna of The Good, Bad, and Ugly, a blog that has inspired me and given me comfort as I travel down the rocky road of caretaking.

The award comes with the very tall order to list 7 things about myself that make me AWE-SUM. Hmmmmmm. I had to think about that for a few days, so here goes:

1. I'm the world's best keeper of secrets. I never ever tell, so I have a huge library of amazing personal stories! I think this is because I am a good listener.

2. I've been able to make a living (eeeeek out a living) as an artist for the last 20 years.

3. I'm resourceful. I'll figure it out.

4. I'm persistent. I don't stop until I figure it out.

5. I'm great with animals. I love them, they love me. I also have a slightly uncanny ability to re-connected stray dogs with their owners.

6. I can't sing, but I do it anyway. This probably belongs on an Annoying List, not an Awesome List.

7. Best for last, I once saved someone from choking to death.

I was working as a waitress in a noisy rowdy restaurant during my college days. It was a very dramatic scene - the customer stood up with a blue face, clawing at his neck. He was a very big man. Ok , he was a really, really fat man. I had seen a poster of the Heimlich maneuver posted on the back of the kitchen door, and even though I had not taken the time to study it, it must have seeped into my subconscious, because I immediately stepped behind him and proceeded to try and do it. But the man was so wide my fingers wouldn't link together, and nothing happened! Meanwhile, the entire restaurant became hushed. I could feel all eyes on me. I thought, "Why doesn't someone bigger than me step up to help?" No one did. So I tried pounding him on the back, which I now hear is NOT the thing to do. That didn't work either. So I went back to attempting the H. maneuver. Somewhere in the back of the restaurant, I heard someone say, "I think she's getting it!" and sure enough, out popped a piece of steak! I don't know who was more shook up, me or the customer!

The irony of this story is that I got fired the very next week for being too slow. I was never a good waitress. But I think it's better to save someone from choking on the food than to serve up it up quickly.


The Awe-Sum Award comes with the instructions to pass it along to 7 other bloggers, so here's my list:

Claudine Hellmuth

Anahata Katkin

jillustration

Gennine's Art Blog

Penelope Dullaghan

Julia Rothman

That's it for now. I'm not adding a seventh blog yet, because I just KNOW I've forgotten someone very important, and it will come to me soon.

July Cover

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Here's how it all turned out. I added that distracting label area just to extract some sympathy from you the viewer - it's so annoying to have to plan an illustration around a label, but an illustrator's gotta do what an illustrator's gotta do!

The big challenge with this illustration was combining the copyright-free vintage images and maintaining consistency. Unfortunately, some of the images I found were cropped, which really made it difficult to arrange the composition, unless I chose to finish the images with my own drawing. This proved to be impossible to match since the original images were woodcuts and would require more skill and time than I possessed. So I tried to solve this dilemma with backgrounds on some of the figures. I left some of the figures "out of the box" because it made for a more interesting composition, but I'm afraid I sacrificed consistency in doing so.

Nevertheless, I think using vintage images was a good way to illustrate the difficult subject matter the physicians wrote about in their essays featured within the magazine, as well as evoking the essence of memories and the past.

July Cover - Thumbnails

Another cover for the Minnesota Medicine magazine, July issue - YAHOO! These are the 4 thumbnails that I submitted. The theme of the cover was to announce the winners and other entries of the annual writing contest. Once a year the magazine invites physicians to submit their essays reflecting their experiences in the field of medicine. This year's essays had such bleak (it seemed to me) subject matter: illness, death, abuse, violence, impact of war, difficult patients, aging, etc. But when you think about it, that's exactly what a physician deals with daily! Initially, I submitted thumbnails that were somewhat generic in outlook - just addressing the issue of a writing contest, or keeping the visuals to symbols or medical icons. That's the Pollyanna in me, I guess, the eternal optimist not wanting to face the dark side. But that was not what the editors wanted - they wanted specifics! And the thumbnail they chose was the most difficult for me to realize, the collage. (But I must say, my favorite of them). So I'll show you how I changed it around when I post the final tomorrow.

Another of Dad's Sketches

The people that Dad sketched while sitting in the food court at the mall rarely knew that they were being captured on paper. They continued to eat, chat, and move around continually. They were not a still subjects, but Dad managed to capture their likeness anyway, sometimes completing the drawing after they have gotten up and left their table!

Dad is feeling better today, but his week long illness has left him much weaker, and I'm hoping that he can regain his strength.

And frankly, I hope I can regain mine!

Dad's Sketches

I am always amazed at the way Dad can capture the essence of someone with just a few lines. I also like how he starts boldly with pen, scratches around with lines until he finds the right feel (checkout that crazy receding ear on the black and white sketch). It adds such a vibrant feel to the portrait, makes it more dynamic. Dad was complaining to one of his friends, Marty Harris, that he was so annoyed that he couldn't see well anymore. And Marty, who is one great illustrator, someone whose work I admired before he even discovered my dad at the mall, said to him, "Well, Leo, I think seeing is vastly overrated when it comes to drawing. Draw what you THINK you see. Draw what you feel." Which is exactly what Dad does. Check out Marty's amazing sketches on his Flickr site: Marty Harris

Dad

Dad in his "younger days", age 93


Dad, age 95, sketching portraits in the mall

Well, I'll bet you're wondering where I've been! Me too! Actually, I've been taking care of my dad, who lives with me. He's very old now, 96 to be exact, and has been ill for the last month. Since he has just announced that he has no plans to live to be 97, I thought I would introduce you to him before he departs this earth. Everybody, including me, loves my dad. He's an artist, so apparently I am following in his footsteps. His parents, farm people who immigrated from Lithuania, disapproved of their young son's desire to be an artist. So when he was in his early 30's, he channeled all his creative energies into designing and running a miniature golf course in Sioux City, Iowa. He built it on his parent's farmland, much to the amazement of the city. No one had heard of a mini-golf course, and everyone thought he had lost his mind. But that mini-golf course became so popular that it ended up being one of the major hot spots of the city, and Dad became a celebrity of sorts.

When he retired at 80, he began going to the local mall and sketching people while sitting in the food court. When Mom died 7 years later, I decided he should move to Minneapolis and live with me. That was 7 years ago. He's been amazing adaptable, independent and appreciative of all that surrounds him, and I am lucky to have such a great dad. His mind is sharp as a tack, but unfortunately, he has spinal stenosis which means he has great difficulty walking now, even with his walker. Up until just recently, he has been going to a nearby mall where he is a "regular" with buddies who hang out with him while he sketches in the food court. He says giving away his portraits to the sitters is a way to feel that he is contributing something, which he says is important for him at his age (at any age, I say!).

I think his portraits are amazing, considering he can barely see any more, and I'm going to show you a few of them in the next few days. Also, as you can see from these photos, he looks 20 years younger than his age!

Flamingo Girl

Detail

Sometimes when I'm working on a collage, it just seems to make itself without any help from me. It's like driving a car with a destination vaguely in mind, when all of a sudden some mysterious force takes control of the steering wheel, and I just sit there with my hands folded in my lap and say, Wow, how did that happen? I was planning on putting a crown on the flamingo (I just adore crowns, I desperately want one for myself) when all of a sudden the scrap of paper that I cut out turned into a basket, and the next thing I remembered was a tiny dragonfly that was waiting on the sidelines. And there you go!

Have you hugged your flamingo today?

I'm feeling all Victorian lately. I must be longing for simpler times (which of course were far from simple and in fact were simply dreadful, it's just the concept that's so soothing). I'm also working on several collages at one time, which keeps me preoccupied. A very special thank you to Suzi-Q for her guest appearance the other day. It's still raining here and she's still refusing to go outside until she is bursting at the seams.

Guest Blogger

Hi, my name is Suzi-Q and my mom asked me to step in and say a few words because she is too busy to blog right now. So hi there. I wish she hadn't asked me because I'm really not in the mood, being annoyed with this rain. I hate to get my little feet wet. In fact, if I step outside to go for a walk, which I LOVE LOVE LOVE, and I discover that the ground is wet, I will turn around and want to go home. Fortunately my mom has proven to be very trainable, and I've taught her to put towels down for me so I can enjoy squirrel watching on days when the grass is wet. Is that not cool? Do you think this collar makes me look fat? I have a crush on a dog named Bob, but that's another story for another time.

Hotel Rapid Deterioration

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Time has a way of just drifting away. This is a chapter by Bonny Belgum in Somewhere in These Days of Morning, a forthcoming book of her inspired observations of life paired with my collages, inspired by her observations! Here's the chapter in its entirety:

She used to own a hotel called Rapid Deterioration,

and before that she lived in it. The whole place was done up in tasteful pumpkin. She had to move out to bring the total available rooms to 117, the correct number for any hotel on a large secondary street.

©2008 Excerpt from Somewhere in these Days of Morning by Bonny Belgum (author) and Andrée Tracey (illustrator)

Bonny always has an interesting adventure on her horizons - for more information about her writings and doings, check out her blog.

ILLUSTRATION FRIDAY - Subtract

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In the world of fashion, less is more. And in the case of an alligator bag, this is certainly true. The alligator is less his hide, and the fashionable owner of the bag is less an arm and and a leg, financially speaking.

ILLUSTRATION FRIDAY - Instinct

"The Road To Love"

Have you ever been here before? Of course you have! There sits that castle on the hill with the promise of everlasting bliss, but you hear a warning rumble in the back of your head. Do you go forward or do you tuck your tail between your legs and run like a bunny out of the gate? You just have to trust your instincts at this point.

Listen to the Animals

Do you ever wonder where your mental imagery comes from? Lately I've been featuring animals who seem to be humans in my collages. I never bothered to think much about it (I find it disconcerting to analyze while creating) until I came across a wonderful Etsy website the other day, PaperStreet where I found a great selection of Royalty Free digital files for sale. This image is from a sheet of children's book illustrations. It took me back to my childhood love of reading fairy tales. It dawned on me that kids always know the truth - animals have a language and a world of their own which we would like to think parallels our own. But it doesn't - it's so much more fun and so much scarier than our own. But all those animals in Lewis Carroll's Alice in Wonderland and Alice Through the Looking Glass (the Walrus, the Mad Hatter, the Mock Turtle, etc.) totally fascinated me with their peculiar state of certainty in a topsy turvy world.

woof

Some of the best conversations I've ever had were with my dog. And we don't even speak the same language.

Top of the World

When you're a kid, you're on top of the world. Unless of course you have to make your bed, do your homework and take out the garbage. Then you just want to ride off into the sunset on your well-trained Red-breasted Nuthatch as it calls out in a high nasal chirp that recalls the tooting of a tin horn (according to my dog-eared Field Guild to North American Birds), "YANK - YANK - YANK".

Exactly my sentiments when I was reading the morning newspaper about the sad plight of the economy... I got so mad I just wanted to scream "YANK YANK YANK!"

Which reminds me, this lovely study of Nature in all its glory is available for purchase ($25.00) in my online store GRAPHITEGIRL. Please purchase it so I can stop disturbing the neighbors with my bird calls.

YANK, YANK, YANK!

Dog Waiting for the Bus in Roswell, New Mexico

Let's face it, if you smoke, you're flawed. At least in today's society. But it could be worse. You could believe in flying saucers and then you'd be crazy.

I thought this would be a good entry for Illustration Friday's theme of the week: "Flawed".

It is available for purchase in my online shop: GRAPHITEGIRL, along with my other collages.

Carry Your Heart-small version

DETAIL

Oh my gosh only twenty-five days until Cupid arrives....are you ready? My thoughts are turning to tales of Love, so here's a little reminder. If you are looking for something to charm your sweetheart, this tiny collage will do the trick. It was inspired by an e e cummings poem that is so moving that I included it in the 11/10/08 posting of this blog. If you recite this lovely poem while handing your love this work of art, I'm quite sure the skies will open and hearts will rain down all around you and who knows what else will happen. To purchase this little gem for a mere $25, visit my shop: GRAPHITEGIRL.

Sketch

Here are some things you may not know about me, and probably don't care but I'm going to tell you anyway: I used to smoke, but gave it up many years ago. I've never dated a man who owned a white suit. I own a dog, but she doesn't look like this. And I once saw a flying saucer, but I wasn't in Roswell, I was in Iowa. Same thing.

So I'm putting all this terribly fascinating information into a collage. Check back for an update!

Inauguration Day

A beautiful ending to a beautiful day. Happy Inauguration Day everyone!

Cheerleader with Rhinos

Grisly Detail

I know, I know, you're saying, WHAT is going on here? Can't you see? It's a beefy cheerleader and her motley crew of rhinoseruses. Rhinos. Rhini?

I have NOT lost my mind, I just feel a need to post something, and nothing else is ready to be posted, so here's something from the archives of eBay. Long ago, when I finished my diorama business, I had a lot of left over miniature figures. So I sold them on eBay. And to make them interesting, I would use calendars for backdrops, and then photograph the figures up in front of them. I had so much fun!!

This family of rhinos, complete with lipstick (?) needed a little something else to give the picture some pazazz. I know,...a cheerleader!

This set sold within 2 hours of posting on eBay. It's all in the marketing, eh?

Now back to the drawing board.

Capitol Chihuahua

I've been having the most fascinating dreams lately. Good thing I write them down when I awake, or I would never remember them later. I love my dream journal, just re-reading it now and then is like reading my own personal best seller. It provides me with shocks, laughs, and an occasional inspirational image for a future creation. No wonder I love collage work, it is so similar to the dream state!

If you would like to visit a really good site to interpret your dreams, check out www.mooddreams.com. There you will find a bar to type in the symbol or action of your dream, and up pops a fabulous interpretation that will shed light on your current situation. It's tons of fun and great if you are interested in discovering more about your subconscious life.

On the other hand, sometimes it's better to let sleeping dogs lie. Or fly.

ILLUSTRATION FRIDAY - Clandestine

Excerpted from Somewhere in These Days of Morning
©2008 Bonny Belgum

I hope you all are in the middle of happy holidays. It's been a while since I've posted, that's because I've been busy holiday-ing. But here's another chapter for the collaborative book Somewhere in These Days of Morning, written the fabulous Bonny Belgum and illustrated by me. If you would like to read the entire chapter (it's short and sweet, two whole paragraphs), you can check it out here.

ILLUSTRATION FRIDAY - Similar

Blurry? Fuzzy? It's similar, but not quite the same. Blurry is more......slippery and smooth sounding. And fuzzy has a more textural connotation, don't you think? This collage is another illustration in the upcoming book collaboration, Somewhere in These Days of Morning, written by Bonny Belgum
and illustrated by myself. You may have seen it previously in this blog as That's the kind of person she is, but that was merely a working title. Eventually Bonny felt this title WASN'T working, and this beautiful title came to mind. I love the dual interpretations of morning/mourning and days and morning. Bonny makes words sing.
If you'd like to read the chapter in it's entirety (it's very short, only two paragraphs), go here.

Treadmill

Original sketch


Cover


Detail


Here's the latest cover for Minnesota Medicine. The theme of the featured article was the increasing burnout in physicians, and the renewal of energy and insight that the Bush Foundation medical grants provide them. Since I couldn't find a giant hamster wheel, nor convince any models to dress up as doctors and run around in it, I had to invent the whole darn thing in Photoshop. Phew, that was a job, but really fun!

Moving too fast

Time is just flying by - I can't seem to keep up with myself. I just finished another cover for the wonderful people at Local Design Group, a big thank you to Janna and Carmen! I will post it soon. Meanwhile, my task for today is to figure out how to unclutter my work space. I need more room, I'm starting to go crazy with all the scraps of paper about, files stacked here, books stacked there, dried up paint tubes reminding me to restock. I have this impulse to take my arm and just whoosh it across the drawing table and knock everything onto the floor and then kick it all out the door. Give me room, give me the wide open spaces, I sound like a cowgirl, just give me a horse and I'll ride off into the sunset. Does this sound like someone who needs a little more free time rather than a little more space? Hmmmmm. Maybe I'll just go see a matinee instead. You are reading the thought processes of a procrastinator.

ILLUSTRATION FRIDAY - Pretend

It's been a while since I submitted something to the Illustration Friday website, but I've been working on several assignments. Here's a collage that fits this week's theme just perfectly. Who is a better master at pretending than a little boy? Perhaps a little girl? The secret lives we create as kids are the scrap files of the future artist.

November

If anyone out there is thinking about moving to Minnesota, STOP! Don't do it! Get a grip! This is the state that the sun forgot. I moved here from sunny California, where every day was 72 degrees and the sun shown so fiercely that babies were born wearing sunglasses. Can you imagine the shock of ending up here? There is only one other state that has fewer sunny days than here, but I can't remember which one. I do remember that when I moved here, the chamber of commerce sent me a welcome brochure. Inside I found pretty pictures of people skiing and a fact (this is a true fact, in case you think there are other types) that went like this: "There is only one other place in the world where such wide swings in weather extremes are experienced, and that is Siberia." No wonder they wait until people move here to send out that brochure.

And so welcome to November, National Gloom Month.

Carry Your Heart

It's Monday, and here's a poem to accompany you through the week. It's by ee cummings.

i carry your heart with me

i carry your heart
with me(i carry it in
my heart)i am never
without it(anywhere
i go you go, my dear;
and whatever is done
by only me is your
doing,my darling)
i fear
no fate(for you are my
fate,my sweet)i want
no world,my
true)
and it's you are
whatever a moon has
always meant
and whatever a sun
will always sing is you

here is the deepest
secret nobody knows
(here is the root of the
root and the bud of the
bud
and the sky of the sky
of a tree called
life;which grows
higher than the soul
can hope or mind can
hide)
and this is the wonder
that's keeping the stars
apart

i carry our heart(i
carry it in my heart)

ee cummings

(and yes, I checked and rechecked the spelling and punctuation and this is just as ee wrote it!)

I absolutely love this poem.

Short & Sweet

I don't know what I like most about collecting vintage postcards to use in my work. Is it the imagery, or is it the writing on the back? I am fascinated with the opportunity to peek into the lives and thoughts of people who lived so long ago. Here's a card depicting one of my town's landmarks, Minnehaha Falls. It's dated 1942, and a woman wrote the following on the back:

"Dear Mother,

It is Wednesday and I am very surprised. Everything is fine here.

Love,
Your daughter"


That's it! Oh, wait. There's more under her signature.


"If I have received any mail open and send it to me. Hope you are well mother dear. If you don't answer Welcome home."

Short and sweet. And mysterious....

Bird Girl

My next collage will feature this little lass. What struck me when I saw this photo in a a thrift store bin (without the bird and background) was the necklace. Some proud mama dressed her baby up in her finest clothes and jewelry so that that moment, nearly 100 years ago, would be captured and treasured in memory forever. And so it will be!

Stanford Social Innovation Review

Here's the final illustration, composed of the elements shown previously in progress. The lobbyists were toned down in monochromatic brush strokes to give them a more non-real appearance. And just for fun, check out the pink Caddy below. This is a reference to Mary Kay, who used to give away pink Cadillac convertibles to her hard-working employees as sales incentives. I'll go for that!

Lady Lobbyist

Here's the last transformed figure in the illustration I am working on.


She started out looking like this. I liked this blue suit. I liked this amiable-looking businesswoman, too, don't get me wrong, but I need an original figure.


Then I substituted this woman's hair...


And lastly, new eyes. And I have been staring at my computer monitor for so long, I too, could use some new eyes.

One More

Here's another figure in my ongoing illustration project. He didn't start out looking like this. Here's the progression:


First I found this photo. But he's dressed too casual, and needs new features.


Here's a suit that looks like it would fit him. (after I decapitated the original owner/wearer)



I borrowed this man's lips, eyebrows and moustache to create a totally original figure.....

After a bit of tweaking, I have a new figure for the soon to-be-done collage.

Brown Coat man

Here's a composite figure for the illustration that I am currently working on. I thought it would be fun to show the other faces that I used to create him.


Here's the original photo I started with, a model in a fashion magazine. But I don't want a model, I want a real person. No wait, I don't want a real person, because this is an illustration, and a surreal one at that! So with the magic of Photoshop, I added the following body parts of other men. Each photo had to be in the same position as the first, which was the tricky part.


I used this man's hair....


and this man's lips....


and nice eyes!

New Figure

Here is another element in the photo montage illustration that I am working on at the moment. This is the original photo.


Here is the same man, magically changed by adding features from another man. I was going to add that photo, too, but my work space is so cluttered now, I can't find it!

I'll be adding 3 more figures, so stay tuned!

The Chosen Sketch

This is the sketch chosen for the illustration to be done in collage style. The art director ruled out the vintage figures in front, and my instructions are to replace them with more modern figures. I totally agree, it is the reason I wasn't totally happy with this sketch - it looked like a bread line in the Depression instead of lobbyists! The art director laughed when I said that, and remarked that perhaps, in today's economy, this was the more appropriate choice....The pink Caddys flying around the Capitol refer to the article's mention of the Mary Kay company habit of rewarding the hardworking staff with pink Cadillacs as work incentives in the 1960's.


Here is the first photo that I'm working with, unchanged.


Here he is after some Photoshopping.

Butterfly Man

This is one of several sketches I submitted to an art director yesterday. The assignment is to illustrate a feature story for a magazine, and the subject matter is "CSR", or corporate social responsibility. In a brief summary that doesn't do justice to the author's writing, the article suggests that big businesses that want to do charitable donations or philanthropic deeds need to think of the big picture rather than just dumping money into a cause so they look good. This means lobbying for social issues that are critical to society, being careful of the "footprints" they leave behind, and making improvements that benefit global concerns as well as their own. It's a win-win situation, and how we need that right now in our current situation!

This sketch came from the idea of the butterfly being a symbol of transformation, and relates to the effects of lobbying for beneficial changes. The money circling is representative of how the cash that is sent out by corporations will also return to them as well as make positive changes in the world.

I don't know if the art director will choose this sketch, but we shall see.....

ILLUSTRATION FRIDAY - Packed

--excerpted from Somewhere in These Days of Morning
©2008 Bonny Belgum/Andrée Tracey

Monday through Friday, the days are just packed.

Another illustration for the upcoming book Somewhere in These Days of Morning, written by Bonny Belgum and illustrated by little ole me. Author Bonny's just-published book Cut the Woman Some Slacks! was #25 on Amazon.com's list of new humor essay books today - yaaaay! You can visit her website for more juicy details.

Meanwhile, here's the illustrated chapter in its entirety excerpted from our collaborative venture mentioned above.



Flags are flying, people are marching in a row.

It's a business army, storming a high-rise, expertly trained in death of the spirit. Orders: Shoot to kill. There is a massacre every day, and these living dead sense nothing except fear of reprisal. They fall in step. She knows the tree frog sees this and peps in horror. She loves the tree frog for pepping. His pep can melt a building. So it should.

©2008 Bonny Belgum



OK everybody, put on your shoes now and head for your cubicle.

September Cover

Another fun assignment from the Local Design Group!

It was so timely, too. Ironically, I had just taken my dad to his doctor the previous week, and I brought along all the old prescription bottles and tubes he had collected, all of them with remaining drugs in them. I didn't want to throw them in the trash, and I assumed that a doctor's office would have some way of disposing of them properly. Silly me! When I asked at the doctor's reception desk how they disposed of old drugs, they shrugged their shoulders and said, "We just throw them in the trash!"

So much for environmental responsibility!

So I was delighted to see this topic addressed in Minnesota Medicine, and loved working on the assignment.

Bonny's Reading

My zany friend and partner in collaboration Bonny Belgum will be reading from her just-published book Cut the Woman Some Slacks! next week so get out your calendars and write this down! Bonny's book was ranked #34 by Amazon last week on the Hot New Releases list for essay books. I can see why - this collection of humorous and satirical essays will make you laugh and at the same time, reconsider how you view everything in life, from the mundane to the profound. The BOOK is on Amazon.com and the READING is September 25th at 7:00 pm at Amazon Bookstore , the oldest independent feminist bookstore in North America (right here in Minneapolis!), and I'LL BE THERE SO WHY DON'T YOU JOIN US????

For more information, chuckles, links, directions, pictures, prose, excerpts and everything you wanted to know but couldn't think to ask, check out her website: www.bonnysamerica.com.


Let's hope she wears those ever so proper pearls.

ILLUSTRATION FRIDAY - Island

--excerpted from Somewhere in These Days of Morning ©2008 Bonny Belgum/Andrée Tracey

Yes, September is an island. You probably never thought about that, did you. After you read the upcoming book, Somewhere in These Days of Morning, written by Bonny Belgum and illustrated by yours truly, all sorts of interesting thoughts will dance in your head. Stay tuned for more illustrated chapters, and dust off your mental dancing shoes.

ILLUSTRATION FRIDAY - Clutter

Her house was filled with clutter, but it was no match for her mind!

This is another page in the collaborative venture with the witty writer Bonny Belgum. Her soon- to-be available book Somewhere in These Days of Morninghas been a perfect canvas for my artwork, since it appears our creative thoughts are running in tandem.

Summer's End?

This is Leonard, my garden cat. He normally sits in the garden on his little stand, offering bird seed for any takers. I set him on a fence post today, to offer up another plea. It is September and I'm not ready for Fall, even though it is such a beautiful season. But after Fall comes Winter - booooooooooo! I just can't face the thought of Winter. So can we have an extension please, just a little more summer?

ILLUSTRATION FRIDAY - Memories

Here's another contribution to the upcoming book, Somewhere in These Days of Morning by Bonny Belgum. Collaborating with Bonny on her book is such a treat, because my peculiar illustrations seem to fit her peculiar style of writing, and when a peculiar visual artist meets a peculiar writer - well, it's MAGIC! And you as a reader don't have to go to all the trouble of being peculiar, we will do it for you. All you have to do is come along for the ride - and it will be an adventure! You will look at your world a little differently - it will be a wider, wilder world , infinitely more interesting for the reading.

The chapter that follows spoke to me of memories that we all carry with us in our ancestral history, in our scrapbooks of our cultural heritage, in our DNA. Our pasts are a jungle filled with improvisations and mistakes and fleeting joys. We can't see the future, and if we are lucky or have lots of therapy, we don't care if we crash, because we know the landing is not that bad and we'll be in the company of so many who have crashed before us. It's a chapter filled with optimism. One of the advantages of a winter in our life is that we can see the world more clearly without those beautiful leaves getting in our way.

The chapter in its entirety:

She hears all the bird's songs, from all over the world, at once.

The voices from the jungle sound the most familiar. She may have lived there from before time. The birds where she stands, the birds she can see with our human eyes, are the most muted in the chorus. The jungle birds, the loudest, like to improvise. This is strange for a bird. You must trust your call as you trust your wings. The jungle birds don't care if no one answers, don't care if they crash down out of the sky. The jungle bed is thick and comfortable and never lonely.

The muted birds seem happiest on bare twigs, where you can see through the tree. They dread the coming of spring and new life. It plunges them into confusion until far away when the leaves fall and they regain control.

-excerpted from Somewhere in These Days of Morning by
Bonny Belgum, copyright 2008

Creativity expectations

I found this great article on a great website, so here's a link to them both...

First is Penelope Dullaghan's website. Penelope is a fabulous illustrator, the creator of the Illustration Friday phenomenon, and her website in a creative endeavor in itself. Check it out! penelopeillustration.com.


Within her posting was a reference to the following article which I identified with, especially lately. Being creative is not easy sometimes, even though it may be your calling. There are many roadblocks and hurdles, and most of them set up by yourself. This article was very insightful: HOW Design - Free Your Creativity: Overcome Unhealthy Expectations