Sunday, November 19, 2006

Thanksgiving for Illustration Friday

I offer thanks for every living creature that has escaped a cruel fate at the hands of humanity.

Malaysian Sun Bear on a Poppy blossom

Asian bears (such as the malaysian sun bear and the himalyan black bear) are particularly threatened by the use of bear gall bladder extract in traditional chinese medicine. The bears are captured, kept in small rusty cages and a metal pipe is stabbed into their body to extract their bile. They are in continuous pain because of the pipe and the subsequent bacterial infections they get and often chew their own paws off in agony.

....I'm so sorry bringing up all this sad stuff during your Thaksgiving holiday. Its just... I feel so sad and helpless when I see stuff like this, and there's fabulists like Mr. Make-believe here that only have to open their mouths to make things worse.

Thankfully there are sane people out there (www.wildaid.org and www.wspca.org) that are making a difference. Please, please, please If you know anyone that makes use of this stuff tell them NOTHING extracted from an animal is going to have any medicinal effect because it is protein, which means its made up of the SAME amino acids you get from all the other food you eat. Plus it gets broken down by the acid in your stomach so fat chance its going to retain whatever magical medicinal property its supposed to possess!
Sigh...
Rant over. Thank you for your patience!

Sunday, November 12, 2006

'Clear' for Illustration Friday

Are you happy there?



"Are you happy there?"

"Yes, very."

"What do you do all day?"

"Watch things.. On a clear day I can see right up to the Antennae Galaxies..."



Done in Artgrip Aquarelle. I don't have a scanner so I just took a picture of it and uploaded that onto the computer. Sorry it isn't very clear...

Sunday, November 05, 2006

SMOKE for Illustration Friday

Ganpati reaching through incense smoke to pat a lovely old dog


There's this antique shop called Shang's Antiques near Tanglin that we sometimes drop in on during our weekend walks. There's this lovely, venerable old boxer (he's 15 years old which makes him a 105 in dog time!) there who always lies near this 12th Century Ganesh statue near the door. The dog recognizes us and always wags his tail sort of feebly (he's too old to get up, he used to get up but he just can't now... he recognizes us though!).
The owner usually places flowers and offerings and things in front of that Ganesh (Ganpati/ Ganesh is the remover of obstacles).

I've drawn Ganesh reaching through the smoke (from the incense sticks) to pet the dog (because he's such a faithful and loyal and dependable GOOD dog!).

In the background are other antiquities, statues and textiles from the shop.

Done in aquarelle pencils and then painted with a wet brush.