scenes from my mexican hometown

it's easy for a photography hobbyist to fall in love with san miguel de allende. aside from the colonial architecture & the plethora of color, the city always seems awash in sunlight & fiestas.

i'm no camera expert. far from it. my cameras are basic & i kinda like it that way. it's a nice personal challenge to go against tech tide. i do feel that what i have learned from my day job is a nice plus too. arbus, avedon, adams, lange & the other giants made more with less & simply trusted their eye.

and no, i am not comparing myself to them -- just in case that ridiculous notion was clumsily implied here.

maybe someday i'll find an old film camera & learn to develop film myself. i took a summer class once, but that was long ago & i don't remember much of it except for being perennially late for class. i was not who i am now.

easter sunday 2009. blowing up of hanging judases. life sized paper mache replicas of hated figures (some replicas of real politicians or ex-presidents and even a witch etc. i think i saw g. bush last year).

lots of dogs in this town. i find them quite friendly. i see more than a few dogs perched on the rooftops of houses. always looking down, guarding the fort.

wednesdays in sma

a few weeks back, i decided to join a figure drawing workshop here in san miguel de allende. though i've attended hundreds of these types of workshops before, i haven't actually done one in about 4 years. the rust was clearly showing & i ended the first session a little bit frustrated with myself.

the f.g. workshop i joined is the ana julia aguado gallery right in jardin. the poses were about 30 minutes and i was quite impressed by the variety of trained models. there is also a short gesture workshop on tuesdays, but i've been skipping those.

2-3 sessions later, i saw a bit of improvement. still not yet close the level i wanted but it definitely calm me down some. those close to me know that i can be a bit harsh on myself when it comes to my illustrations (which i actually think is a good thing).

but my main excuse for writing this post is the view from the gallery window:

wine & cheese is also served. AND i also just noticed yesterday that the artwork hanging on the walls are actually original work from mexican art legends diego rivera, david alvaro siqueros & francisco toledo... and it took me 2 months to notice this.

*i have not posted anything new here in weeks. i chalk that up for being the americas slowest book illustrator. i'm currently busy working on a few books (not sure how many but at least four titles). by next month, things should get back to normal.

stanley repackages

more flat stanley tidbits.

i'm also also working on repackaged titles of the flat stanley series, which was first published in 1964 and now on it's 45th year.

my new version 

i'm basically re-imagining the character from previously published stories. shown here is an example of my version of the 2nd book "flat stanley: flat again!" as well as the previous adaptation of the same story. 

previous adaptation (2003)

*aside from the worldwide adventure series (mentioned below) and these repackages, i am also working on yet another flat stanley series geared for the beginning readers. more on that in the future.

a flat new world

presenting two cover illustrations for the new flat stanley chapter book series. i can now show them since the they are now available on amazon.com. 

i've been working on this new updated version of the flat stanley character since last year & hopefully i can show more once i am able to. as always, i'll wait till after the artwork is shown on book sites like amazon or on the publisher's (harper-collins) website.

these 2 books are from the "flat stanley's worldwide adventure" series. as you can gather from the series title, it has an international theme. i have already completed the third book (a fun japan adventure) and currently working on the fourth book of this series.

i am also illustrating repackages for previously published stanley stories as well as an "i can read" series for beginning readers.  inside each book are numerous pencil illustrations that help follow the story. 

this is a fun series to work on. i get to design some interesting characters including the series lead who is well, flat (and even becomes invisible).  i get to bend & play with the character and even transform him into different objects (i.e. a sail, kite, snowboard and even a ninja!). i'm essentially  drawing a kid that technically has superpowers!

the inauguration in san miguel

san miguel de allende was abuzz with regards to barack obama's presidential inauguration. i've noticed that a large number of the town's american expat population seem to be quite socially progressive. suffice to say, i'm ok with that.

so on the morning of january 20, 2009, restaurants & bars opened early and had their large tv screens set to the inauguration. all of them choosing cnn as their channel of choice.

i saw retired expats walking in blue obama/biden shirts and some women in red,white & blue scarves. around 10am, an hour before the swearing in, there were a few of them frantically walking by the jardin looking for a place that was not yet crowded & maybe hoping to score an empty seat or two.

personally, the expat population in san miguel has been a nice surprise addition to my people watching tendencies. i thought my move here would be to enjoy the culture & lifestyle of the mexican people but i also find the expats to be a fascinating unique & separate subculture themselves.


a sports bar advertising the inauguration & the superbowl.


i took a peak at the more prominent "Democrats Abroad" hosted event in this restaurant. soon, people will be turned away as i saw others standing on chairs.


i finally found a cafe that wasn't too crowded. seems like the owner was busy decorating the place for that day. obama buttons were even being sold inside.


the small dinky tv with the spanish telecast (for the latecomers).



applause after the swearing in. the large tv for the american cnn telecast. afterwards, the cafe played the boss' "born in the USA" & jimi hendrix's "star spangled banner", most likely unaware that these were protest songs. but hey, still good stuff.

safe!

it's official. final. done. terminado. after much revisions, a childbirth (not mine), holiday breaks (sadly, not mine either) & a careful lesson in baseball science (looong story). i can now safely say that my 7th picture book is officially completed.

it is an alphabet book with a baseball theme (my second book with the sport). i find it interesting that i've accumulated a number of baseball related projects -- i also did a baseball themed greeting card & a "sing-a-long" baseball picture book a few years back. i'm guessing it was all because of one early baseball image from my portfolio soon after art school.

maybe someday i get to do a basketball book. then again, i may have to write that one.

** a small note: the two images in this post are cropped from that book. i hesitate showing any full images until the book is officially advertised by the publisher, so please don't share the image. just to be careful, i've also decided not to mention the book title.

boy

soon after last month's virgin of guadalupe festivities, a young boy in an aztec costume kept coming up to my wife. we joked that he may be a an aztec fertility god. a sign of what may come. now, she can't get little boys out of her mind.

here's hoping he was just a normal kid in a parade costume.