From Sketch To Novel

Galway artist Roisin Cure presents snapshots of life in the City of the Tribes in bold ink and vibrant watercolor. Her sketches show the beautiful details of Galway's pubs, the musicians and buskers, the exquisite medieval stonework, the marine environment, the vibrant nightlife culture, and the local colorful characters. These striking pictures are accompanied by recollections of conversations the artist had while sketching. This book is a unique souvenir of Galway, of a city that is famous for the arts and yet has so little in the way of visual art. It is a very timely book, released in advance of Galway 2020, when the city celebrates being European Capital of Culture.

The Art of Urban Sketching is both a comprehensive guide and a showcase of location drawings by artists around the world who draw the cities where they live and travel. Authored by the founder of the nonprofit organization Urban Sketchers (www.urbansketchers.org), this beautiful, 320-page volume explains urban sketching within the context of a long historical tradition and how it is being practiced today. With profiles of leading practitioners and discussions of the benefits of working in this art form, this inspiring book shows how one can participate and experience this creative outlet through modern-day social networks and online activity. You'll find more than 600 beautiful, contemporary illustrations, as well as artists' profiles and extended captions where these urban sketchers share their stories, how they work, sketching tips, and the tools behind each drawing. With sketches and observations from more than 50 cities in more than 30 countries, TheArt of UrbanSketching offers a visually arresting, storytelling take on urban life from different cultures and artistic styles, as well as insight into various drawing techniques and mediums.

After searching high and low for his missing pants, Belbum the giant asks his friends if he can borrow their trousers, but when none of the clothes fit him he realizes there is only one thing left for him to do--walk to the tailor in town with no pants on.

Accounts of the rise of American literature often start in the 1850s with a cluster of "great American novels"—Hawthorne’s The Scarlet Letter, Melville’s Moby-Dick and Stowe’s Uncle Tom’s Cabin. But these great works did not spring fully formed from the heads of their creators. All three relied on conventions of short fiction built up during the "culture of beginnings," the three decades following the War of 1812 when public figures glorified the American past and called for a patriotic national literature. Decentering the novel as the favored form of early nineteenth-century national literature, Lydia Fash repositions the sketch and the tale at the center of accounts of American literary history, revealing how cultural forces shaped short fiction that was subsequently mined for these celebrated midcentury novels and for the first novel published by an African American. In the shorter works of writers such as Washington Irving, Catharine Sedgwick, Edgar Allan Poe, and Lydia Maria Child, among others, the aesthetic of brevity enabled the beginning idea of a story to take the outsized importance fitted to the culture of beginnings. Fash argues that these short forms, with their ethnic exclusions and narrative innovations, coached readers on how to think about the United States’ past and the nature of narrative time itself. Combining history, print history, and literary criticism, this book treats short fiction as a vital site for debate over what it meant to be American, thereby offering a new account of the birth of a self-consciously national literary tradition.

A sumptuously illustrated adaptation casts the powerful imagery of F. Scott Fitzgerald’s great American novel in a vivid new format. From the green light across the bay to the billboard with spectacled eyes, F. Scott Fitzgerald’s 1925 American masterpiece roars to life in K. Woodman-Maynard’s exquisite graphic novel—among the first adaptations of the book in this genre. Painted in lush watercolors, the inventive interpretation emphasizes both the extravagance and mystery of the characters, as well as the fluidity of Nick Carraway’s unreliable narration. Excerpts from the original text wend through the illustrations, and imagery and metaphors are taken to literal, and often whimsical, extremes, such as when a beautiful partygoer blooms into an orchid and Daisy Buchanan pushes Gatsby across the sky on a cloud. This faithful yet modern adaptation will appeal to fans with deep knowledge of the classic, while the graphic novel format makes it an ideal teaching tool to engage students. With its timeless critique of class, power, and obsession, The Great Gatsby Graphic Novel captures the energy of an era and the enduring resonance of one of the world’s most beloved books.

Artist Tim Pond's lively and engaging book fuses science with art, providing the reader with the skills, techniques and knowledge they need to create sketches of animals filled with life and movement.There are some very good books written on life drawing, yet when it comes to drawing wildlife, illustrators and artists often revert to working solely from photographs, which can leave the artwork looking lifeless and flat. In this inspirational book, artist Tim Pond shows you how to observe and draw animals in zoos, farms, wildlife parks and aquariums, teaching you some fascinating facts about the animals along the way and ultimately bringing you closer to nature. One of the challenges with sketching wildlife is that animals are constantly moving. However by having some basic understanding of the biology of an animal, such as knowing that a duck has a cheek or that a cheetah can't retract its claws, can influence how you might sketch them, and results in a lively drawing that captures the form, movement and ultimately the spirit of the animal in question. Combining scientific knowledge with expert practical guidance is key to creating successful drawings of animals, and Tim's ability to convey this in a way that is both accessible and engaging makes this a unique and inspiring guide suitable for artists of all levels. Tim's book takes you on a journey of discovery that will enable you to develop the skills, techniques and knowledge you need to sketch a broad range of wildlife, encompassing mammals, reptiles, birds, fish and insects. It includes quick, gestural sketches as well as linear and tonal studies, in a variety of media - pencil, pen and ink, and watercolour. There are numerous studies comprising how to represent the different patterns of animals' coats, how to capture the plumage of an exotic bird in watercolour, and how to sketch a hippo's hooves, as well as guidance on tools, materials and basic techniques. The result is a treasure chest of fascinating facts, studies, sketches and annotated drawings that will not fail to ignite your enthusiasm for drawing animals from life.

I Am Perfectly Designed is an exuberant celebration of loving who you are, exactly as you are, from Karamo Brown, the Culture Expert of Netflix's hit series Queer Eye, and Jason Brown—featuring illustrations by Anoosha Syed. In this empowering ode to modern families, a boy and his father take a joyful walk through the city, discovering all the ways in which they are perfectly designed for each other. "With tenderness and wit, this story captures the magic of building strong childhood memories. The Browns and Syed celebrate the special bond between parent and child with joy and flair...Syed's bright, cartoon illustrations enrich the tale with a meaningful message of kindness and inclusion."—Kirkus

Written by a well-known artist and best-selling art-instruction author with almost rock-star popularity in the contemporary world of representational art, Beginning Drawing Atelier, with its unique workbook/sketchbook approach, and high-quality paper, offers a comprehensive and contemporary twist on traditional Atelier art instruction practices. Atelier education is centered on the belief that working in a studio, not sitting in the lecture hall, is the best place to learn about art. Every artist needs to learn basic drawing skills. In this elegant and inspiring workbook, master contemporary artist and best selling author Juliette Aristides breaks down the drawing process into small, manageable lessons; presents them progressively; introduces time-tested principles and techniques in the Atelier tradition that are easily accessible; and shares the language and context necessary to understand the artistic process and create superior, well-crafted drawings. What makes this approach unique is the fact that it includes blank pages for copying and practicing within each lesson, facilitating traditional Atelier methods. Ateliers have produced the greatest artists of all time--and now that educational model is experiencing a renaissance. These studios, in a return to classical art training, are based on the nineteenth-century model of teaching artists by pairing them with a master artist over a period of years. Students begin by copying masterworks, then gradually progress to painting as their skills develop. Beginning Drawing Atelier is like having an atelier in a book--and the master is Juliette Aristides, a classically trained artist. On every page, Aristides uses the works of Old Masters and today's most respected realist artists to demonstrate and teach the principles of realist drawing and painting, taking students step by step through the learning curve yet allowing them to work at their own pace. Unique and inspiring, the approach in this new book offers serious art courses for serious art students.

Interviews with twelve contemporary American illustrators and analyses of their techniques and approaches are accompanied by examples of their work, with personal comments.

In 1952 and 1953 as he wandered around America, Jack Kerouac jotted down spontaneous prose poems, or "sketches" as he called them, on small notebooks that he kept in his shirt pockets. The poems recount his travels—New York, North Carolina, Lowell (Massachusetts, Kerouac’s birthplace), San Francisco, Denver, Kansas, Mexico—observations, and meditations on art and life. The poems are often strung together so that over the course of several of them, a little story—or travelogue—appears, complete in itself. Published for the first time, Book of Sketches offers a luminous, intimate, and transcendental glimpse of one of the most original voices of the twentieth century at a key time in his literary and spiritual development.