Sunday, November 30, 2008

Schin's Charms



I had too much fun making these charms and photographing them..
I'll have them up in my Etsy shop when I have more time to photograph the rest!

Thursday, November 27, 2008

Persephone Destroys the Light



Finally, the painting is done. I'll probably tweak it around for the next few days, but I think I want to get started on a Christmas card or something.

The picture next to it is a beautiful poster for Wong Kar Wai's 2000 movie In The Mood For Love. At first the movie was just normal to me, but I found myself going back to it over and over again. I love the music (the movie soundtrack has inspired many of my recent paintings), colors, story, actors (so classy DX), fashion etc. It's a rather slow movie to digest, but I love painting while watching it <3
The Criterion Collection version has some pretty awesome deleted scenes and alternative endings that can give a wider perspective of the movie.

Wednesday, November 26, 2008

Persephone & Hades 2

This is turning out to be very fun to paint! I think in a way it is the theme that I am most comfortable with: romantic environments, pretty girls, flowing cloth, flowers, etc. I do so miss painting like this.

In other news, I'll be at Katsucon 15. Come see me at the Artist Alley on February 13-15 2009, at Hyatt Regency Crystal City, Arlington, VA. I'll post the table numbers once I get em.

For fun, I made an Etsy shop. I'll add more products and stuff later. God I love Etsy!! I just want to buy everything in there.

Sunday, November 23, 2008

Persephone & Hades



New painting, Persephone and Hades. I always liked their story.. it's got all the cool things: God of the Underworld, innocent virgin girl who eventually turns into a fearsome 'Iron Queen' and earns the title 'She Who Destroys the Light' (damn!), estranged mother-in-laws, captivity, change of seasons and.. pomegranates. Just so much fun.

Still working on the bodies, I don't think I'll ever be happy with it...

SIDE ORDERS #7

This month, SIDE ORDERS begins with a vintage 1980 TBS late movie opening which stars my favorite theater in the United States, Atlanta's Plaza Theater (open since 1939 and still going strong). This is pure nostalgia for me, and a suitable sort of policy trailer / theater intro for the superlative movie scenes you're about to see!While working at the Plaza, I met Patrick Flynn. An accomplished

Saturday, November 22, 2008

Popcorn










Finally Popcorn #1 is out, with my image Equus in it. The book is great quality, with a zillion awesome artworks and interviews inside. I can't stop flipping through it!
They used my old name 'Luciole' on it, and edited my blurb adding the 'stunning thing' *blush*. It was the silliest blurb too. Everyone listed their accomplishments and things, but I just wanted my platforms and bellbottoms..

Friday, November 14, 2008

Film #92: Reds

Still pretty charming even now, The Many Loves of Dobie Gillis arrived on TV in 1959. This black- and-white sitcom revolved around Dwayne Hickman as the girl-crazy title character, smitten most obsessively with blonde high school heartthrob Thalia Menniger (Tuesday Weld). And, for six episodes in 1960, on came this handsome dude playing Milton Armitage, Dobie's alpha dog rival for Thalia's

Thursday, November 13, 2008

Film #91: The Dover Boys at Pimento University, or: The Rivals at Roquefort Hall

Warner Brothers animator extraordinaire Chuck Jones says that, after he and head animator Robert (Bobe) Cannon produced the groundbreaking 1942 cartoon The Dover Boys, he almost got fired from WB's Termite Terrace (the name for the WB animation house which included Frank Tashlin, Friz Freling, Bob Clampett, Robert McKimson and other WB-contracted animators). The wacked-out style of "smeared"

Wednesday, November 12, 2008

Film #90: Witness for the Prosecution

Billy Wilder's Witness for the Prosecution, still remains one of the most utterly surprising and enthralling courtroom dramas ever made. Adapted from the Agatha Christie stage play by Wilder, Harry Kurnitz and Larry Marcus, the film stars a playful Charles Laughton as Sir Wilfred Roberts, a British barrister who, despite his ill health, is compelled to take on the case of a penniless drifter (

Film #89: Max

In this interview, conducted by the excellent Dark City Dame at Noirish City (where she's kindly invited me to discuss my thirty favorite movies of the 2000s all throughout the month of November 2008), we talk about the incredible film Max. Dean: Hi, Dame!! DarkCityDame: Hello! Dean, I’m glad that you’re able to join me for day 3 of our look at your countdown to number one of your 30 best films

Monday, November 10, 2008

Film #88: The Buddy Holly Story

Some people out there may see Gary Busey as a punchline these days, after his reality show appearances and much-vaunted, helmetless motorcycle accident in the late 90s. I don't because, in 1978, he garnered a well-deserved Oscar nomination as Best Actor for the unlikely achievement of embodying early rock and roll's greatest poet, and ever since, I've always enjoyed seeing him in whatever he

Film #87: Logan's Run

Yeah, it's cornball, I know. But I was nine years old when I saw it so whaddaya expect? We all like EVERYTHING we saw when we were nine. So I still like Logan's Run.



Set in the 23rd Century, director Michael Anderson's 1976 MGM sci-fi epic (MGM submitted many titles to the genre in the wake of their 2001 success) envisions a future where major cities are confined under gigantic domes because

Film #86: Rollerball (1975)

Remakes make me so angry. Let's take the redo of 1975's Rollerball. When one deigns to mention this, yes, over-the-top but still entertaining and meaningful film to people who don't know about IT, but DO know about John McTiernan's missed-the-whole-point, Razzie-nominated 2002 remake, you inevitably hear a groan. And then you have to explain "No, not that one---the GOOD one..." I must have

Sunday, November 9, 2008

Film #85: All The Real Girls

The following is an interview conducted by the excellent DarkCityDame on her website Noirish City as part of our examination of my 30 favorite movies of the 2000s. She's given me permission to reprint a few interviews as part of filmicability, so here's a look at my 29th favorite film of the decade All The Real Girls. DarkCityDame: Okay! First of all, I did watch the film All Real Girls last

Film #84: The Taking of Pelham One-Two-Three

I still remember sitting over at my friend Brian Matson's apartment, snacks in hand, as I ran across this movie's opening credits. I'd always remembered the title: The Taking of Pelham One-Two-Three. But somehow I missed this bloodcurdling juggernaut as a free-so-freeeee filmgoing child of the 1970s. But, here, in the 1990s, sitting in my friend's living room, I was struck by one thing first

Film #83: Barbarella

Jane Fonda, then absorbed in the cheesecake phase of her career she no doubt regrets, teamed with her then-husband, overrated womanizer/director Roger Vadim, to produce 1968's campy adaptation of Jean-Claude Forest's French comic book Barbarella. Psychedelicized art direction by Luchino Visconti's house designer Mario Garbuglia (The Leopard, Rocco and His Brothers) and costume design (by

Saturday, November 8, 2008

The Alphabet Meme, filmicability-style

The idea, first proposed by Fletch at Blog Cabins: the alphabet, a to z, as represented by film titles. The only thing is: I've added numbers 0-9, too (yes, I know Fletch had a rule about this...but I ignored it--sue me). So we have: A - Annie HallB - Breaking the WavesC - City LightsD - David and LisaE - EraserheadF - Fanny and AlexanderG - Godfather H - Hard Day's NightI - It's a Wonderful

Light


Gah! This is already pissing me off.

Film #82: The Wrong Man

Alfred Hitchcock's 1956 drama The Wrong Man remains an anomaly among the director's works. Eschewing his vividly colored, 50s-era studio slickness in favor of a street-level B&W, quasi-documentary form, Hitch held back nothing in telling the true story of Manny Balestrero (Henry Fonda, in possibly his most harrowing performance, next to his role as The President in Sidney Lumet's Fail-Safe).

Wednesday, November 5, 2008

Border design


I made a sorta border sketch today. Feel free to print it out and use it as a memo or something.. but don't sell it!

Sunday, November 2, 2008

Film #81: Mulholland Dr.

NOTE: This is an article primarily for those who’ve already seen this movie, so SPOILERS abound. Still, see the movie if you haven’t--it's a must-watch--and then read this.Just recently, I perused an article on Daniel Johnson’s Film Babble Blog titled 7 Years Later, Does Mulholland Drive Make Any More Sense? In it, Johnson vividly recounts a recent experience of watching David Lynch’s 2001 film