INVISIBLE CITIES: Aglaura

The 25th of Italo Calvino's Invisible Cities and my ninth overall, the colorless city Aglaura. You can see the entire series so far, along with work by my fellow artists Joe Kuth and Leighton Connor, at our group art tumblr Seeing Calvino which is updated every Wednesday with new art.

"So if I wished to describe Aglaura to you, sticking to what I personally saw and experienced, I should have to tell you that it is a colorless city, without character, planted there at random. But this would not be true, either: at certain hours, in certain places along the street, you see opening before you the hint of something unmistakable, rare, perhaps magnificent; you would like to say what it is, but everything previously said of Aglaura imprisons your words and obliges you to repeat rather than say."

10 inches by 8 inches
acrylic paint and ink on watercolor paper
September 16, 2014

INVISIBLE CITIES: Sophronia

The 22nd of Calvino's Invisible Cities and my eighth illustration for the project, the dual city known as Sophronia. You can see the entire series so far, along with amazing work from my fellow travelers Leighton Connor and Joe Kuth, at our group art tumblr Seeing Calvino, which is updated every Wednesday with new art.

"The city of Sophronia is made up of two half-cities. In one there is the great roller coaster with its steep humps, the carousel with its chain spokes, the Ferris wheel of spinning cages, the death-ride with crouching motorcyclists, the big top with the clump of trapezes hanging in the middle. The other half-city is of stone and marble and cement, with the bank, the factories, the palaces, the slaughterhouse, the school, and all the rest. One of the half-cities is permanent, the other is temporary, and when the period of its sojourn is over, they uproot it, dismantle it, and take it off, transplanting it to the vacant lots of another half city."

10 inches by 8 inches
ink on watercolor paper
August 27, 2014

INVISIBLE CITIES: Chloe

The nineteenth of Italo Calvino's Invisible Cities and my seventh illustration for the project, the city named Chloe. This was by far the most difficult piece to complete so far, but I am pleased with the final image. You can see the entire series so far, which includes works from my fellow travelers Leighton Connor and Joe Kuth, at our shared tumblr Seeing Calvino which is updated every Wednesday with a new City.

"A voluptuous vibration constantly stirs Chloe, the most chaste of cities. If men and women began to live their ephemeral dreams, every phantom would become a person with whom to begin a story of pursuits, pretenses, misunderstandings, clashes, oppressions, and the carousel of fantasies would stop."

10 inches by 8 inches
ink on watercolor paper
August 5, 2014

A BESTIARY: Ironclad

11 inches by 14 inches
ink on watercolor paper
July 5, 2014

A BESTIARY: Hydra

14 inches by 11 inches
acrylic paint and ink on watercolor paper
June 26, 2014

THE PEQUOD: Nemesis

14 inches by 11 inches
acrylic paint and ink on watercolor paper
June 30, 2014

INVISIBLE CITIES: Zoe

The thirteenth of Calvino's 55 Invisible Cities and my fifth illustration for the project, Zoe. You can see the entire series so far, which includes work from my partners in the project Joe Kuth and Leighton Connor at our tumblr Seeing Calvino, updated every Wednesday.

"In every point of this city you can, in turn, sleep, make tools, cook, accumulate gold, disrobe, reign, sell, question oracles. Any one of its pyramid roofs could cover the leprosarium or the odalisques' baths. The traveler roams all around and has nothing but doubts: he is unable to distinguish the features of the city, the features he keeps distinct in his mind also mingle."

10 inches by 8 inches
ink on watercolor paper
June 22, 2014

THE PEQUOD: Ishmael

8 inches by 10 inches
ink on watercolor paper
June 19, 2014

THE PEQUOD: Fedallah

10 inches by 8 inches
ink on watercolor paper
June 19, 2014

THE PEQUOD: Ahab Maddened

8 inches by 10 inches
ink on watercolor paper
June 18, 2014

THE PEQUOD: Ahab I

8 inches by 10 inches
ink on watercolor paper
June 16, 2014