Bugs

I drew some insects last week for a piece in the Times Sunday Review. Below is the final. I haven't seen the paper, but word was that it was going to be printed 14.2 inches wide, so if you're looking at this on your iphone please just throw it out the window. Further down are a couple of the other sketches I liked.

Conversation Gardening Questions and Answers, part 1

In order to start things off right, the first two people I asked to pose questions for the Conversation Gardening project were my niece and nephew. After some thought over cheese pizza my niece (age 5) decided her question would be:

As you can see from the drawing, I don't. I did a second version later, using reference.

My nephew, age 7 asked "can you draw a centaur?" (the main character in the mini is, of course, a centaur, but not a very well-drawn example). I do sometimes take drawing dictation from these two, and so while I was drawing the centaur I asked what it should be holding in its hands. The answer: a picture of president Obama. Dialogue was also dictated.

I've been on the road for the last month and have collected a good stack of questions at signings and talks in Anacortes, Washington; Besançon, France and Brooklyn. The next three are from France:

(This is from a friend in Besançon. We were planning a side trip to the region of Ardèche my second week there. But it didn't work out)

Some of the questions are very long and complicated:

Sometimes complicated questions have simpler answers.

Sometimes the questions are simple.

More soon. Keep them coming.

Reading and Talk Tonight at Desert Island in Brooklyn

I'm heading to Desert Island tonight to talk about my new book God and the Devil at War in the Garden, and discuss the Conversation Gardening project, including what the question was for which the drawing below is an answer:

I'll be showing a few more of these 'question and answer' drawings and doing a slide reading as well. Come say hi.

I'm doing a reading and book release on Monday at Desert Island in Brooklyn

Think of me as the Devil, small and naked, a little cat in one hand, a toy plane in the other. Think of Brooklyn as the Garden of Eden, full of wild beasts in repose among the lambs and the quails. Think of Gabriel Fowler as God, suffering me to darken the threshold of paradise. Next Monday night. At 7.

(I'll also be talking a bit about the Conversation Gardening project I'm doing... so bring some ideas you want me to draw about...)

••o00o••

On chewing rocks plus some weird plants

Been on the road a bit lately. Stopped for a few days in San Pedro in LA a week and a half back. Went for a walk by the water with Todd Baxter and looked at crazy rocks. The holes are chewed into them by little crustaceans building apartment complexes.

Visiting LA from the middle west is a visual feast. If I could I would just be drawing the weird plants all day long.

Conversation Gardening mini

...is finally printed and in the webstore (orders made for God and the Devil at War in the Garden before July 7 will include a complementary copy). 13 pages, risographed by Zak Sally. The back cover breaks down the experiment and the fine print. Send me a question.