Action Figure Art

I just finished coloring these inkwash drawings I did of two of my favorite childhood action figures...Imperious Leader, and Ovian. Both are from the 1970s Battlestar Galactica franchise.

Drawing these brought me much joy and merriment.

The Plummet After the Conquest

There is perhaps no better time for an artist than, the end being in sight, the artist looks on what he is so close to finishing and with joy in his heart, beholds what God has given him the ability to do and says to himself, "This is good." The tension and momentum builds as the artist finishes what he has poured so much of his heart, soul, time, and sometimes cuss words into.

And then, when it's all over and the work is complete...the plummet. The sagging within. Today is Saturday, and I was a bit of a grumpy, sleepy, overly-sensitive, snappy jerk to my beloved. I usually fail to miss the correlation, but after a major goal is achieved, social event is over, etc., I crash like a box of rocks off the Empire State Building. A bit of an exageration perhaps, but a crash occurs nonetheless.

This time it happened after completion of the "Christ Healing the Man Born Blind" (see previous blog). This was the last of a series of five commissioned prints I did...and they've taken me an entire year to complete.

I'm learning to let the plummet remind me that the deepest longings of the human soul can't be satisfied this side of eternity. We all know that ache...come on, you know you do...after the presents are open and Chistmas is over, the morning after you were married, that raise you've been working so hard for. The exhilaration of the expectation as well as the plummet afterwards can both point us (if we let them)to the One the restless human heart ultimately longs for.

"The loneliest moment in life is when you have just experienced that which you thought would deliver you the ultimate, and it has just let you down."
-Ravi Zacharias

Christ Healing the Man Born Blind...Finished!!!

I'm done with this and it feels great. You're looking at close to (possibly over) 40 hours of blood, sweat, and tears. Almost exactly one week ago, I thought I obliterated the piece and it ended up turning out to be one of my all time favorite pieces. As Johann Sebastian Bach penned, "Soli Deio Gloria."

Here's the Biblical text the piece illustrates (Taken from John 9):
And as Jesus passed by, he saw a man which was blind from his birth. And his disciples asked him, saying, Master, who did sin, this man, or his parents, that he was born blind?

Jesus answered, Neither hath this man sinned, nor his parents: but that the works of God should be made manifest in him. I must work the works of him that sent me, while it is day: the night cometh, when no man can work.

As long as I am in the world, I am the light of the world.

When he had thus spoken, he spat on the ground, and made clay of the spittle, and he anointed the eyes of the blind man with the clay, And said unto him, Go, wash in the pool of Siloam, (which is by interpretation, Sent.) He went his way therefore, and washed, and came seeing.

Go Buy the First Fort Wayne Skateboard Video!!!

There is something transcendant about skateboarding. I'm serious.

My beloved and I just got done watching "Come As You Are," the first official Fort Wayne skate video...and it rules! I'm flying high right now on sentimentality and adrenaline and not sure what else as I sit here writing this.

Through at least two thirds of my life I've had two passions...art and skateboarding. I began skating when I was in fifth grade and continued through my fourth year in college. I remember trying so dang hard up until fifth grade to be good at sports even though I hated them. I tried going out for track...I quit. Tried going out for Wildcats...I quit (after being humiliated off the field during a practice one day when the teams switched out and I was oblivious to it. Everyone was laughing, it was horrible.)

Anyways, skateboarding gave me an identity, and it also gave me something to do that I did fairly well. I loved it. Still do. I don't like to pay my own medical bills now since I'm officially a grown-up, so I don't do much more than ride around in circles on my skateboard in my driveway with flip-flops on.(Well, that or momentarily revisit my skateboarding glory days during long, boring meetings.)

Anyways, the video was put together by my old friend Nick Weaver, owner of "RISE Skateshop" in Fort Wayne. What I enjoyed most, is that the video featured footage of old friends that I've known for half of my life, Dan B., Mikey P., and Dongo. While I'm on that age thing I might as well mention that alot of the footage in the video is on amazing up and coming skaters, particularly a guy named PJ and another guy named Justin, that are, you got it...nearly half my age.

The video also had hilarious footage of the "King of skateboarders himself, Tony Hawk, doing one of the most wussy trick bails I've ever seen at FW's own Lawton Skate Park. Priceless! Speaking of bails, a skate video just isn't a skate video without those hard slams and cringing racking-of-the-nuts scenes. This video has some excellent ones.

Another thing that was very cool and moving, is the tribute to a couple semi-local skaters that died over the past decade. What was neat was that it was obvious that the footage was old grainy and VHS, but priceless and precious. One being a 16 year old guy by the name of Matt Dukes. Matt was a phenomenal skateboarder who was killed in a post-Christmas car crash that also took his girlfriend's mother and injured his girlfriend and her two brothers. Matt's passing (over 10 years ago now) was probably the single most powerful event that caused me to see how brief, precious, and at times uncertain life is. Ultimately, this event led me to bow the knee...raise a white flag, and surrender to Christ.

So, in closing, the video rules and so does RISE skateshop. Swing by RISE Skateshop (1507 Spy Run Avenue, FW) and pick up a copy of "Come As You Are."