Craves book tour 2018

What a week! I just got back yesterday from my first ever book tour as an author/illustrator, and in some ways I’m still processing the incredible experience. It all began over a year ago now, with a message I received through my website on Aug. 25th, 2017:

Subject: Craves Book

Message: Good Afternoon,
I am the Coordinator for Baraga County Communities That Care and was turned onto your book by a local judge that uses it with small children that he sees come through the system. It's an EXCELLENT portrayal of addiction that is easy to comprehend for anyone who reads it. 
Our team is looking at trying to find funding to purchase these books for a large number of students in our community. 
Who would we get a hold of to talk about large scale ordering and what exactly is the program that you offer for coming to speak in person? 

I'd like to have all of our ducks in a row before we bring this to the schools and see what we can do to get this launched in our community.

Please contact me and let me know.

Thanks!

A full year (and million emails) later, we had a schedule in place: Nov. 5th, 6th, and 7th, along with an order for almost 1500 books. The visit had grown to include Marquette, Baraga, and Ontonagon Counties, spending a full day in each, presenting to schools and libraries. My contacts in each of the 3 counties were amazing, coordinating schedules and securing funding for my visit.

My contacts in each of the counties gave generously of their time to show me around their communities, keeping me entertained, on-time, fed, and caffeinated (HUGE thanks to Mary, Mr. Jim, Carrie, and Adriana!!!) The famously harsh Upper Peninsula weather even seemed to cooperate, allowing me to visit some of the beautiful natural wonders on offer.

Canyon Falls, Baraga Co.

Heading into the schools, I was briefed on the issues and challenges that were unique to each community. Among other things, poverty and addiction were two harsh realities facing the kids in these schools every day. We were all a little unsure of what their reaction to CRAVES might be, so in some schools we had support on hand to provide counseling in the event that reactions got too intense.

The students were absolutely incredible. I was so impressed by their creativity, curiosity, and engagement. Standing out in front of any group is a total coin-flip in terms of how well you’ll be able to connect with the audience, but in these schools the rapport was almost effortless.

A young man gifted me his CRAVE drawing after the presentation :)

I am really hopeful that memories from my visit will echo within these students and their communities, inspiring their creativity and empowering them to make healthy choices. I would love to see this program grow and expand to reach more and more students. I’d re-worked my entire CRAVES presentation for this trip and I was kinda nervous about how it was going to go down , but now I can confidently say that it is my favorite book to present to k-5 classes.

With Judge Tim Brennan, who first shared CRAVES with community health workers and got this whole thing started.

I feel so blessed and humbled to have had the opportunity to share CRAVES with communities in the UP this week. Thanks to Marquette, Baraga, and Ontonagon Counties for having me…hope to see you all again soon!

We're making a difference!

(This post is from an update sent to backers of the CRAVES Kickstarter)

Exciting news! I have been working with Baraga County's "Communities that Care" program to get copies of CRAVES to as many of their students as possible. Baraga CTC is an awesome organization that focuses on creating healthy, vibrant communities by empowering, supporting, and connecting their youth, families, and schools. The folks I've been in contact with are incredibly passionate about their mission, and it's an honor to be able to support them in any way I can.

Yesterday I did a marathon signing session and rocked-out 1360 signed copies of CRAVES, all boxed-up and heading to Michigan's beautiful Upper Peninsula this weekend.

The Sharpie gave out before my hand did :)

I'll be doing a 5-day whirlwind trip to the UP and back in early November, visiting schools in Marquette, Baraga, and Ontonagon counties. I'm so excited to share the book with students and spread our message of making healthy choices. 

More updates to follow, but I just wanted to share this awesome little bit of news with you all, because without your support this never would have been possible. So again, because I can never say it enough: THANK YOU THANK YOU THANK YOU  :)   

-Robb

ArtPrize 10

I made a last-minute decision to participate in ArtPrize 2018, and received a last-minute confirmation from Palatte Coffee & Art to host my piece. ArtPrize encourages (demands that?) artists explore large format. I’m still relatively inexperienced in creating large works, but I was excited to show a new piece from my “arbor” cycle. My paintings from this series are done using homemade black walnut dye, along with a handful of other media such as gold leaf, gouache, watercolor, and my beloved mushroom spore prints. Palatte is an awesome gallery space and they are an absolute pleasure to work with.

Druid of the Arbor ii

The biggest challenge of preparing for ArtPrize this year was making my own custom frame. Having works this size framed professionally is incredibly expensive, and I wanted to explore the DIY process to cut costs. Aside from all of the planning and figuring, the work itself went quick, and the materials were cheap (the plexiglass was the most expensive part). All told, I spent less than a quarter of what I spent to have a similar-sized piece framed a few years ago. I’ve built 2 more large frames since the first, and the process is steadily improving.

My Neighbor AskaPo

Just finished the latest interpretation of my lil dumb fatties. I did a watercolor painting of Aska and Po as a bday gift for my gf. I've been a fan of Studio Ghibli and the brilliant Hayao Miyazaki since I was wee, and have been re-watching some of my old faves with Tracy, introducing her to those masterpieces. "My Neighbor Totoro" was particularly well-received, which inspired me to paint my cats in that style.   

Totoro and susuwatari

And there they are. This was a fun one! 

Lucy and Milo

A good friend in Grand Rapids commissioned a couple paintings of her kitties last December.

Lucy and Milo!

I was very excited for this project after hearing her vision for the pieces:

“Hello,

There is no rush, within the next couple months perhaps?

I was thinking one separate picture for each cat in a 10 by 8. Each cat having antlers! With a Mythical feel. Think..a cat that a wood elf may have haha. Or not, lol just where ever your artistic soul takes you!

Let me know if there are any more details you need to know :)

Take it easy,

Melanie”

I had one piece to finish before Christmas, and I didn't do any work until the new year. After doing some rough sketches, I had a pretty good idea of what I wanted to do to give these cats an elvish sort of flair.     

Miloshroom

Mossy Lucy

I'm still taking orders for commissioned pieces for the winter, so please get in touch if you're interested! 

Spores

Autumn in Michigan is an incredible time of year, not least of all for the variety of fungi that start popping up as the temperatures cool and the rains fall. As an avid forager and mycophile, spore printing is an invaluable identification tool. As an artist, the designs they make inspire me to create.

Agaricus arvensis or "horse mushroom"

This year was an especially good one for me. Mushrooms of all sorts were in abundance, and I was even fortunate to discover a new favorite (pictured above). The horse mushroom is an edible species. It has a strong, sweet smell reminiscent of almond extract and dark brown spores that make incredible prints. All you need to do is remove the stalk, and place the cap with gills facing down on light colored paper (for a species with light-colored spores use dark paper). Leave the mushroom undisturbed for a couple hours before gently lifting it off the paper to reveal the spore print beneath. I am very excited to further experiment using the spores in my black walnut paintings.

It's winter now and the mycellium are dreaming softly under a thick blanket of snow. But I am looking forward to next season when I can grab my basket and my knife and start printing again.   

Wally

This good boy is Wally. He belongs to my coworker's dad, and she asked me to do a painting of this old fella as a Christmas present. I'd never painted a dog before, so this presented an exciting challenge.

  These were the two reference photos. I obviously relied very heavily on the first one, but used the second for some details. I did a couple sketches to work on proportions and form, then began the final piece on a 9x12in. hot press watercolor block. Here's what we ended-up with:

watercolor, colored pencil, and black walnut ink

I'm pretty pleased with how he turned-out. I think the proportions could be better, but I think the "loose" style works well. My coworker seemed happy with the work, and there were a few tears when she finally saw the finished piece. Just a quick glance at the photos will tell you that Wally is a gentle, kind soul. If you spend a few hours looking at every detail on his face as you try to capture it on paper, maybe you get a deeper insight into his personality. And if you've known the dog for a lifetime as his family has, you know that there isn't a photo or painting in the world that could even begin to capture his true warmth and character. But that's the task set before me, and I am always grateful for the privilege to try.

I'm in the process of lining-up commissions for the winter, so if you're interested, please get in touch through the contact page HERE.

A place to be, to make

I've never been fond of making art at a desk. Even as a young fellow with a perfectly acceptable little schoolhouse desk in my bedroom, I found it difficult to concentrate and stay focused if I was secluded and tucked away in a corner. Instead, I would carry my paper and crayons to the kitchen table and set about my work there. I prefered the ambient hustle and bustle of being in a open common area of the house, with lots of little distractions around, but nothing particularly distracting. The habit borne of this preference has pursued me into my adult life, as I schlep armloads of watercolor paraphernalia to and from the dining room, my drafting table more often serving as a broad, flat storage space rather than a working surface.

However, the most recent iteration of my "desk" has proven to be an excellent little corner in which to work. The desk and chair were Christmas presents from my girlfriend, and I've been making an effort to make proper use of the gifts. So far, I have some posters and artwork hanging on the white walls in my little corner, and my little trinkets on a shelf next to me. In addition to being creatively inspiring, I find the new space approximates a certain lively atmosphere and background "noise" that I need in order to do my best work.  

Also my iPad, w/ Netflix. 

Cat portraiture (Or, "Capturing the Soul of the Soulless")

A friend got in touch a few months ago with a request for some commissioned art. He and his fiance have two exceptional cats, and they had long joked together about one day getting some classy, over-the-fireplace mantel-type portraits done of the felines. As Superman and Batman. Well, with a wedding on the way, Travis decided to make good on the long-running joke and asked me if I would take on the challenge of depicting Munch and Sam as "The Man of Steel" and "The Caped Crusader," respectively. Sounded like a fun project, and a hilarious gift for a groom to give his bride on their big day.     

A couple things:

First, I have basically no experience drawing/painting cats. 

Second, I don't really do superheroes....

LET'S DO THIS!!!

LOL soo this is off to a weird start.

With the bones of the sketching eventually sorted out, the paintings actually came together pretty quickly. I started with Munch, the light-colored fellow, because it seemed like the easiest place to start:

Supermunch

Sam, the black cat, was a little tougher. I had a couple different options for the costume (black or blue/gray), and I experimented with both. I was initially drawn to the idea of the all black costume because I thought there could be some interesting ways to combine black fur, black costume, and shadow. But, that proved to be too difficult to sort through, and in the end I figured it would actually make for a pretty boring composition. So, I went with the blue/gray costume and wound up with this: 

Batsam

And here they are together:

Evildoers beware

Each painting was done on 16"x20" watercolor block (140lbs., hot press). I used watercolor, colored pencil, Pigma pens (Graphic series), and a gold acrylic paint marker. Plenty of room for improvement, but I'm generally please with how these turned out :)

Kirkus Review for CRAVES

Rolled those pricey dice again and threw myself at the mercy of Kirkus Reviews. For those of you just joining us, they are the industry standard for book reviews, offering fair and (sometimes brutally) honest critiques. Here's what they had to say about CRAVES:   

“Readers who have felt that the things they want in life are like a pet—or monster—trailing them will see that concept depicted in this moral tale.
A young boy introduces a creature that looks like a dog saying, “This is my CRAVE.” The boy narrates, showing how all individuals have a CRAVE. CRAVES follow closely behind their humans in each image, looking like pets to all the schoolchildren. The boy explains that sometimes he feeds his CRAVE, but only a little, because after eating, it grows stronger and bigger. The joyful expressions on the well-fed CRAVES are delightful, but also sinister for adults, who should see where this story is going: the more people feed their desires and bad habits, the greater their presence in their lives. Johnston (Lelani and the Plastic Kingdom, 2014, etc.) illuminates this idea by depicting older kids whose CRAVES are no longer pet-sized but as tall as they are. He shows a range of adults: some have small CRAVES; some have bigger ones; some have CRAVES that follow farther behind; and others have CRAVES right on their heels. When a humongous CRAVE appears, the boy explains: “But some people have been feeding their CRAVES too much, for too long…and they are the biggest and strongest of all.” Those powerful CRAVES don’t follow but lead, with their humans lagging behind. The author’s beautiful, detailed black-and-white pictures with the cute, puppylike CRAVES are sure to have plenty of kid appeal, but adults will likely get the most out of this cautionary tale. Older elementary schoolers may be able to use this story in a critical reading discussion, considering what CRAVES really are and whether or not it’s healthy to feed them. The images offer a fairly diverse cast in terms of skin tone and a large assortment of ages and sizes for the humans (as well as their desires). The layered, hand-drawn, and painted illustrations suit the tone of the book perfectly.
This inventive story about the dangers of feeding desires should spark dynamic discussions with youngsters. —KIRKUS REVIEWS”

So, yeah! Pretty happy that they understood what I was aiming for with this book, and they seem to think I hit my mark. You know what the industry gurus have to say, now grab a copy and find out for yourself HERE.