Cuckoo's Nest Drawings

Nurse Rached

Graphite, 9"x13"

Shock Shop

Graphite,8.5"x11"

The Ward

Graphite, 8.5"x11"

Mac

Graphite, 8.5"x11"

The Escape

Graphite, 8.5"x11"

Arrival of Mac

Graphite, 8.5"x11"

Chief Bromden

Graphite, 8.5"x11"

When I began the MFA program at the University of Hartford back in 2007 the first class I was enrolled in was known as the "Dream Assignment Class". This class was supposed to guide us along in the direction that we were going to head in for the thesis project, or at least get the wheels turning. This class was completely open ended and as the name suggests was to encourage complete creative freedom.

At first I thought I really wanted to do some Illustrations pertaining to Ken Kesey's , One Flew Over The Cuckoo's Nest. We were supposed to show up on the first day of class with six potential compositions. So in this post I am including the six drawings in which I showed up with that day as well as the final drawing(Nurse Rached) I did during that week at Hartford. Similar to most of my classmates, my thesis project took a completely different turn from where things started in this class. I am thinking about going back and finishing all of these pieces in a digital format.. We'll see.

MFA

Below are a few photos I shot during my last contact period with my MFA group in Hartford.

Here is a photo of me with some of the great teachers I have had the opportunity to study with over the years. Ted Lewin, Vladimir Shpitalnik, and Murray Tinkelman.

My wall of paintings hanging in the Silpe Gallery , Hartford Art School.

A shot of Gary Kelley during his demo at the HAS.

A shot of C.F Payne during his demo HAS.

Last week I had my thesis defense, which went fairly well. Included in the defense committee was my thesis advisor Doug Anderson, UHA professor Bill Thompson, Program Director Murray Tinkelman, and Visiting Artist C.F Payne. I was a bit nervous about this, having guys like that in front of my paintings made me feel pretty vulnerable to say the least. Murray being the great guy that he is calmed my nerves by reassuring me that this was not the time to bash me and my work, but to rather celebrate the accomplishment and discuss the overall experience. So I relaxed , the Thesis was approved and I graduated with an MFA in illustration.

The overall experience of being a part if the program at Hartford was incredible. The friends I made along the way, the teachers that I worked with, the speakers that I saw, and the places we traveled to all made up an incredible journey. Personally I watched my own work grow with leaps and bounds, this was largely due to being a part of such a great group of artists.

I have to give the biggest thanks to Carol Tinkelman, the person who holds the entire program together, and Tom Bradley associate dean of the Hartford Art School.. If it was not for them I would not have been accepted into this program due to accreditation issues with my undergraduate school.

So Thanks again Carol and Tom. And thanks again to everyone else that has been a part of the MFA in Illustration program at the Hartford Art School.

Final San Fran. painting

Here is the final painting for my San Francisco assignment given back in March as part of the MFA program at the Hartford Art School.

I posted a few earlier posts in which I showed some of the preliminary drawings, as well as the painting in progress. This painting is now hanging in the 2009 thesis exhibit which is taking place now through the 24th at the Silpe Galley, University of Hartford. The entire show show is pretty amazing, and includes 13 artists from around the country, all working in different styles and mediums. I encourage anyone that is interested in art to stop on by the show, it is one worth seeing. The opening reception will be Friday, July 24th. , 5-7 p.m.

Possible portraits

Piet Mondrian

Acrylic on panel, 8x14

Ken Kesey

Mixed media, 6x9

Chief Bromden

Mixed Media, 4x 12 

In a few weeks I will head back to the University of Hartford for two weeks of classes, followed by graduation. For one of the classes, with Gary Kelley and C.F Payne , we will work on a portrait assignment. I have a few different ideas and directions to go in for this class, and have worked up some studies for them. Two of the possibilities, Ken Kesey and Mondrian , are pretty  straight forward portraits with a little distortion .  The other is an image that I created of Chief Bromden, based on a paragraph from Ken Kesey's , One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest. Not sure which one I will go with for a final piece. Painting  Mondrian could be cool, I think he is a pretty interesting looking character. Ken Kesey is a very unique character  which I think if I tied in something more about him into the piece could be cool.

 I am pretty excited about the Bromden idea, as I think it illustrates some of Bromden's visions/ delusions featured in the book. I am just not sure if this will fly as a portrait. I may  try to somehow enlarge Bromden within the composition, making it more of a portrait.We'll see!

San Fran painting

San Fran contact piece

In between working on my thesis paintings I have also been working on my San Francisco contact painting.I used various mediums on this one. Gouache ,Acrylic, and a bit of photoshop. Not sure how I feel about it yet. It is in progress so hopefully by the end it will be acceptable.

My New Favorite Artist

Jack Levine

Jack Levine Etching

Birmingham 63

Inauguration II ,1958

Portrait of Jack Levine

Massachusetts native , Jack Levine is recognized as an American Social Realist painter and printmaker, who is best known for his satires on modern life, political corruption, and biblical narratives. Levine was born the child of Lithuanian Jewish immigrants , and spent his child hood growing up in the poverty stricken South End of Boston, where he observed much of what became the inspiration for his work. By the age of 17 Jack Levine displayed a level of draughtsmanship that was on the level of masters such as Degas,  his drawings earned him a show a Harvard's Fogg Art Museum in 1932. Levine's raw and explosive style is a unique one, and his technique was  informed by the Old Masters in which he studied. Levine's work displays the same level of technical maturity as the masters, achieving astonishing use of opacity, transparency , and luminosity, all held together with  a sense of mind boggling distortion.  Along with  Hyman Bloom and Karl Zebe , Levine has become associated with the Boston Expressionist movement, and his work has continued to enlighten the world into the present day.

On Jan 3rd. Jack Levine celebrated his 93 rd birthday, and will still be found at his easel where he continues to create, and confront the world around him through his art. Levines work has been included in collections world wide including the Vatican, where his painting Cain and Abel hangs.

This summer during my final contact period at the Hartford Art School I have a class with prolific American Illustrators, Chris Payne, and Gary Kelly. We have a portrait assignment to work on , and I am hoping to work on a portrait of Jack Levine.

Thesis Panels

Mid July is right around the corner, and with it comes the completion of my thesis project, followed by graduation. Completion of the thesis project requires that we submit at least six finished pieces of art accompanied by a written piece. I have come close to completing 5 large acrylic panels and 20 small 5x5 inch panels to make up for the sixth. Some of them were included in my blog post mini thesis paintings. 

Included in this post is 4 of the 5 large panels . All of which need a bit more work especially the one with the monkeys, as this is the most current piece and has a lot more that needs to be done to it. The color in the images I am showing here are not very true to the actual piece of art and I hope to include some better quality images of the finished pieces soon. 

Random sketches

                                                              Siem Reap Concept Sketch

Monkey Sketch

Pulp Thumbnails

Cambodian Couple

While waiting for some gesso to dry I figured I would post a few of my recent random sketches.

Awesome Quotes

Pictured below are some of the faces of,  and the works of , some truly remarkable people. 

Frank Zappa

Grant Wood, American Gothic

Jack Unruh

Lou Brooks

Courtney Granner

Chester Gould

Milton Glaser

Craig Frazier

Peter Deseve

 I wanted to share a few great quotes from a few great people that I have picked up along the way. I hope they are as accurate as possible...

"Find the things in your life and in your art that you are passionate about and try to make an existence for yourself with them ! " - Jack Unruh 

"When digging for gold use a pan, not a tweezer, include everything and edit the material ! "- Courtney Granner -  on how to go about concepting and thumb nailing when designing an illustration.

" I usually start with a repulsive Character and then go from there !" Chester Gould- creator of Dick Tracy

" As illustrators we should not feel as if we must show the world as it is, instead we should show our own ideas, don't be afraid ! " - Lou Brooks

" Art is making something out of nothing and selling it!" -Frank Zappa

" All good ideas came to me while I was milking a cow" - Grant Wood

" Designers that can draw have a tremendous advantage over designers that cannot !" Milton Glaser

" Be relevant in order to have application of your work, popularize your own relevance ! " Craig Frazier

" Usually my best ideas come to me when I am not looking for them!" -Peter De Seve

Mini thesis paintings

 The main body of my thesis project consists of 5, 24x48 acrylic panels that are impressions of the various people, places, and things I have encountered during my travels. In addition to the large paintings , the project will also include a series of 20 to 25  , small 5x5 inch , acrylic panels. Many of the small panels are based directly upon drawings from sketchbooks that I kept while I  was traveling. I also use these smaller paintings as a form of relaxation or as a break from the larger panels. When I reach a crisis point on one of the larger panels or need a break from it, I move on to work on some of the smaller ones . This gives me a nice feeling of freedom for some reason , I guess its because for some reason the smaller paintings feel like less of a commitment.  During my recent solo show at the Day One Skate Shop ,I actually received more compliments on the smaller pieces than the large ones. It seems, like people are really drawn to them and forced to get up close to them because of their smaller scale. Below are just a few of the mini paintings I have been working on, the rest are hanging at the Day One Skate Shop and  I have not had a chance to scan them yet.

Bangkok Tuk Tuk Driver

acrylic on panel

5x5 inches

French Cyclist

acrylic on panel

  5x7 inches

Hassip the Boat Driver

Acrylic  on panel

5x5 inches

Hassip takes flight

acrylic on panel

5x5 inches

Hassip attempts to land

acrylic on panel

5x5 inches

New York City Painting

NEW YORK CITY
ACRYLIC ON MASONITE
24X48

A while back I posted some information about my illustration process, the blog post was titled NYC composition. I figured I should write a follow up to that post and show the finished piece of art.
The finished piece is 24x48 inches , acrylic on masonite, and is now the main image on the home page of my web site, www.DanielYagminJr.com

A Day at the Eisenstats

Recently while in California our MFA group  was lucky enough to have the opportunity of spending the day with one of our wonderful instructors Alice "Bunny" Carter and her mother Jane Eisenstat.  Bunny Carter is an amazing instructor, illustrator, and author , her recent publications include :

The Art of National Geographic: One Hundred Years of Illustration, (National Geographic, 1999), The Red Rose Girls: An Uncommon Story of Art and Love, (Abrams, 2000 and 2002), The Essential Thomas Eakins, (Abrams, 2001), and Cecilia Beaux: A Modern Painter in The Gilded Age, (Rizzoli, 2005) .

  Alice "Bunny" Carter grew up in an environment comprised of illustration, both her mother Jane and her father Ben were working illustrators heavily involved in the field. Their lovely home in San Jose where we visited and Alice Carter grew up is full of  illustration , flat file upon flat file, wall to wall, the collection is amazing. The Eisenstat's collection includes the work of numerous prolific illustrators as well as some others that I had never heard of but wished I had . Below are just a few of the many pieces of illustration that make up the staggering Eisenstat collection. I have labeled them to the best of my knowledge , and a few remain unknown to me. I am as sure as the sun will come up in the morning  that Jane Eisenstat would know exactly who the artist is and any other information one would need to know about the artist. Jane is a wonderful woman and possesses an endless amount of knowledge and insight to the world of illustration. I feel very fortunate to have had the opportunity of meeting such a genuine gem of a person.

Special thanks to Eisenstats for  sharing their collection with us.

                                      Illustrators Chuck Primo ,Greg Newbold, 

                               Chad Grohman ,David Brinley, and Dianne Samet

                                look over the shoulder of Jane Eisenstat as she 

                                shares an enlightening bit of information about a

                                                         piece of illustration.

                                                                        Walt Stan

 Unknown?

Rockwell Kent

Unknown?

Rockwell Kent

Rockwell Kent

Lawson Wood

J.T Benda??

John R. Neill

Wizard of Oz artist

Henry Pitz

Al Hirschfeld

Henry Pitz

Dean Cornwell

Blumenthal

A.B Frost