Libby's 5th Birthday Party

I drove to Nashville this weekend to attend my niece Libby's birthday party which was held at one of the local recreation centers. The theme of the party was Dinosaurs and I have compiled a collections of clips from the event. The best part is at the end when Libby has trouble blowing out the candles. No, they were not trick candles, but libby has a special technique she uses to blow out birthday candles, and it has never been all that efficient. See for yourself.

Analog Dreamscapes

     Imagine you are on your way to work in the city. You have made this journey many times before with minimal complications but this day is different. Something is always in the way, perhaps a fence too high to climb or a river too deep to cross. Time is running short; your anxiety increases.

     When information first enters our thoughts, sensory memory takes a snapshot of our environment but stores it only briefly. Analog Dreamscapes is a series of images that realizes how we unconsciously process information as images while we go about our daily lives. These images can sometimes reoccur in our unconsciousness, no longer vivid and clear but faded and impressionistic and almost totally lacking in color and detail.

     Most of what we dream about is so ordinary that after we awake we remember only pieces of vague images and perhaps the overall theme of the dream or feelings it evoked. In time, these experiences fade away only to make room for new ones.

     The images portrayed in Analog Dreamscapes are ordinary in content and displayed in the form of a contact sheet. This addresses the deliberate but random sequence of events as they occur in a dream disturbed by the unconscious anxiety and the fears we face in our everyday lives but experience more intensely in our dreams. 

     Forgive me father for I have sinned. I have been neglecting my blog for some time now. I hope that all of my faithful, and loyal followers will forgive me. I am truly sorry and I humbly repent. Things are finally beginning to pick up and it has been a difficult journey. I have been working on several projects and I will use my faithful blog to record and document my latest work.

     I recently completed a series of architectural renderings for the 57th Annual Housewalk & Boutique. The Housewalk is a holiday tour of homes located in Kenilworth, Illinois which is located in  Chicagoland's Northshore. The homes in this neighborhood are absolutely amazing. Many of them look more like castles than single family homes and some of the homes on the tour are over 100 years old.

     My part in this whole project was to design a cover image for the invitation, and illustrate only the entrance to each of the homes. I used watercolors to create the illustrations because the medium lends it's self well to architectural renderings.

Navy Pier and Shedd Aquarium

     My sister, brother-in-law, niece and nephew came up from Nashville to visit this past weekend. During their visit I had the opportunity to take them to Navy Pier. We took the water taxi from Navy Pier to the Shedd Aquarium to see the new jellyfish exhibit along with many other exhibits at the aquarium. While my nephew is too young to really benefit from a visit to the aquarium, my niece Libby, had a great time. However I believe Libby could figure out a way to have fun at a Timeshare meeting.

  

Before and After Mattie Picture

Urban Landscapes

Super Moon over Lake Michigan