allison sommers art.

the goron market

14 x 7 gouache on illustration board.

An homage to the Zelda games, specifically Ocarina of Time. 

 

I am very happy to be able to show this piece finally-- it was a blast to paint, and I am really happy with it. 

This is a commission done for a fellow who is a fan of the various Zelda games, and is particularly taken with the Gorons.  That was lucky, since I too am a fan of the various Zelda games, and am particularly taken with the Gorons.  Anyway, remembering from Ocarina of Time that they were rock eaters, I imagined a big messy noisy food market with all manner of things going on-- toss in a few rats and a couple of my little characters (whose own shop in the bottom left corner is based primarily on the overabundance of said rats) and here we are.  This would be high heaven for a Goron, I think-- just a few rupees can get you bags of delicious rocks, geodes, stones, rocks, and scoops of tasty schist dust (for sprinkling on rocks).  Plus, you can even buy rupees, which look far more delicious than rocks, anyway.  In retrospect, I think I should have included some sort of dental clinic (eating all those rocks...).

Click for details:

Ten points to he who finds the rat king. ;)

teatime with the babysitter.

5 x 7 gouache on illustration board.

He has a careful eye and won't let her out of his sight.   I'm worried, though-- despite all the delicious sweets she's surrounded by, she does look awfully tasty to him...
I bet he chews very, very slowly with that tiny mouth of his... pensively, even.

This fellow below was an afterthought but I'm glad I put him in here.  I had one of these as a kid-- I remember how the nose used to screw off-- I'm assuming that he had a longer nose to swap out with the normal one, being Pinocchio and all, but I don't think I ever had possession of it.

imaginary friend

4.75 x 6.75 gouache on illustration board.

As mentioned, this is the second of those flu-influenced paintings.  I was so surprised by the color direction on this piece, when I first sketched around this character I had a totally different feel in mind...

At any rate, here is a self-satisfied group of ne'er-do-wells lazing around in their (imaginary) chickeny-meaty friend.   (He's wearing a pair of shoes that I just purchased for myself, as a matter of fact.)

treehouse

7.5 x 9.5 gouache on illustration board.

I'm in full swing working on pieces for a group show about childhood called "And One to Grow On" going on at G1988LA in May.  I've been surprised at how challenging the discovery/planning for these pieces has been-- I usually fancy that a lot of my work has to do with themes (or at least settings) from childhood but when I actually try to confront it face-on my mind's been weirdly resistant and somewhat dark.  I'll spare myself any psychoanalysis but it has produced some interesting paintings. 

//(I should mention here that I've been dragged deep under the muck with the flu, which has put me out of commission for longer than I'd like to mention and has rattled my brain-bone a little bit, which I think came out in this and a subsequent painting which I will share in a day or two.  This may be more of the cause of any childhood-weirdness than anything else, I've come to think.)

Anyway, enough of the yammering.   I make no excuses for the sudden darkness of this painting, although it still surprises me.  I had a treehouse when I was a kid, and it was one of my favorite things in the world.  I guess what most attracted me to it, and what still comes through in this piece these years later, is the mine-ness of that sort of space, and its deliberate.  (Although I did have a pulley system to harness and hoist my long-suffering, extremely tolerant best friend of a pug into my treehouse when I got lonely.)

One last note: I'll be giving the aukle birds a rest after this, I swear.  I find them irresistible because I just imagine their mindless, constant noises....
One last, last note: while scanning this piece I realize that I neglected to paint legs for those top aukles.  Needless to say, I will not be sending them off into the beyond legless, that'll get fixed tonight.

quick administrivia

Hello, all!

I'm back from a vacation and ready to go with new art (soon...!) but I have one thing to mention: I discovered that the RSS feed of my blog got entangled with someone else's late last week, so if there were some decidedly strange (religious....) posts coming from my blog, that's why.  Typepad assures me that the problem is fixed, so all should be well-- just wanted to straighten the record in that regard.