My Dream is to be...

My dad unearthed this gem while sorting through some old family stuff.

I've been feeling a little uninspired lately, so this was a nice reminder that I have followed my dreams and am lucky to have done so. It's hanging in my workspace as a daily reminder that I am doing exactly what I dreamed to do.

I even got the purple skirt!

Folder circa 1994

Another busy week; totally forgot about Tuesday Coolsday. I'll be back in the groove next week. In the meantime, here's a gem I found at my mom's house last weekend. This was a folder of mine from grade school, probably around 1994 or 1995 (7th grade). I was getting into music so I doodled lots lyrics that would be stuck in my head during class. Recognize some oldies in there?

I was inspired to post this after seeing Gail Anderson's "My Best Work" article in How Magazine. While my folder is not nearly impressive (I like to think it is because she was a few years older when she made hers), it's still fun to see that great designers doodled about music during class just like me.

Don't worry teachers, we already learned that when you doodle, you remember more.

Cheers,

Cat Scott

P.S. Please be gentle about the stickers. There was a big smiley face thing going on in my generation...remember this poster?

Cat Scott - Louisville Graphic Designer and Illustrator

Old Painting: Jeff

12" x 24" - Jeff's Tattoo

Sometimes I forget about the old canvases I have back in my closet; some of them are kind of interesting. Here's one from a few years ago of my best friend's husband, Jeff. The subject was triggered by the Illustration Friday subject of "tattoo" - he has a lot of them.   The painting isn't half bad. I feel inspired to try more large format pieces instead of the works on paper. Get loose. Get messy.

In the meantime, I'll be practicing drawing horses - another illustration from Louisville Magazine is in the works. Hooray for busy-ness!

Have a great weekend.

old painting

No new drawings today. I started a watercolor but I'm not feeling well and couldn't finish it - hopefully tomorrow. In the meantime, since I don't think I like that sketch of Asian-woman-David, I am going to post an old painting. This was like my "big deal" project in college - I won an award for Realism at an art show for it. It's 3' x 4' and took me for-ev-uh. I remember having an emotional breakdown halfway through it, and my painting teacher, Peter Gooch, totally didn't know how to handle a young, crying female. But, at that moment, he gave me some great advice: He told me my painting was in puberty, like an awkward 12 year old whose body is changing and adapting. It isn't fresh and new like a baby, but it also hasn't fully developed into the adult it will become. I think he mentioned acne and greasy hair. Sounds strange, I know, and it didn't stop the sobbing, but to this day when I feel stuck, I just tell myself it's in puberty and I just keep plugging away.

I like this painting because it's like a moment captured in time. I'm wearing my favorite outfit of senior year (what ever happened to those boots?) I'm in the drawing studio where I spent a LOT of my time. I'm on the couch that we relaxed on during break, and occasionally our models would recline on (eww). The all-too-familiar drapery is tacked up on the wall, and our old metal easels cast shadows in the background. The pages on the ground are little mini Umbrella drawings - they were my big project in my drawing class. Here, why don't I attach one of those too. I was playing with texture and just messing around with pastels and matte medium.

Oh, and I had short red hair, which was fun. Off to try to get some rest...

David

This is like the 113th time I have drawn David in my sketchbook and I still can't draw him accurately. He looks like an Asian woman in this drawing. I used a couple of Derwent design pencils I had laying around. I'll admit, I had had a cocktail or two before the drawing ensued... we have learned that I do not draw well under the influence. It doesn't help that he hates it when I draw him, so he likes to shift around and make faces to make it more difficult.

I sketched him a while back, pre-illustration academy, with a pencil and an eraser, and it looked much better (as in, it actually looks like him). But I'm trying to stick with the George Pratt philosophy of just "get it down" - it won't look right but what matters is that you are looking and drawing. Here's the old drawing:

a REALLY old drawing

Please don't think this is me showing off my awesomeness. This is a drawing from February of '99 (I know, because I wrote the date in huge capital letters on the figure's ASS.) I would have been nearing the end of my senior year of high school. I took these special Saturday morning art classes put on by the Louisville Visual Art Association. (Tangent: I wasn't allowed to take art classes until I got my humanity classes out of the way, so by Junior and Senior year I was trying to get as much art education as possible to try to catch up with the other art students at my high school). This is an example of some of my first figure drawing ever. I was a little heavy handed with the charcoal, but you can see that my interest in shapes, like the curve on her back, had already started to develop. I still think women are WAY more fun to draw then men. So many fun curves (well, on normal women anyway!)

an old drawing

I did this plein air drawing my junior year in college. I think it was one of my first attempts at drawing with pen. My line work isn't top notch, but I really kind of dig it anyway.