illustrated recipe

Dogs, boxes, old stories, cards, nachos and video vibes

A Creative Life, art exhibit, art gallery, artist book, artistic inspirations, author illustrator, dog portrait, Dogs in Art, pet portraits, public art, publications - publishing, published art, recipe illustration, sketchbook, whimsical art, words and pictures

The text for my newest childrens book project “The Professional Dog” is shaping up. I’m still collecting dog photos from friends but I’ve almost gotten them all. The project still feels vague but it’s more in focus than it was last week. I’m content to view it with my peripheral vision so to speak.

Dog photos came this week from a Gallery owner, a Reporter, a Park Ranger, a Sculptor, an Assistant and a Bus driver.

So one of the focal points this week was a masked-up very quick in person visit to the Caplan Art Designs gallery in Portland Oregon. The Gallery invited some of the Gallery artists to participate in a “Holiday Box Exhibit”. We were given wooden box cubes and asked to do something with the cube in our art style. The cubes are 8 inches square. 

This box project is now a vague project on my work schedule. It’s much more nebulous at this point than The Professional Dog book! In a creative life learning to deal well with uncertainty and insecurity is as much an essential creative skill as the ability to draw!

Of course while I was at the Caplan Art Designs Gallery I enjoyed looking at my Odditorium exhibit and seeing the red dots indicating sales and the spaces indicating that my pieces have gone to their new homes! About a year ago my Odditorium project was itself a vague nebulous notion. I dealt with all of the uncertainty and now my Odditorium project is a very solid real thing!

Odditorium by Clancy at Caplan Art Designs https://caplanartdesigns.com/

The other focal point this week was my exhibit “The Old Stories” that opened in Oklahoma at Downtown Art and Frame. Each of these paintings are about stories: a folktale, a myth, or an ancient children’s rhyme or saying. For example the one with the dancing sheep is titled “Ewephoria” and it’s about the history of the rhyme “ring around the rosies, pockets full of posies…” (Black Death)

“The Old Stories” is an artexhibit of my larger artworks – anyway, all of these pieces refer to classic ideas from mythology or fables –
The titles of my collage paintings give you clues…

Panda Dora’s Box – 24″ x 24″
Woolrich Family Yarn – 24″ x 24″
Long Dog Love – 11 3/4″ x 12 3/4″
Just In Time For Cookies. 10 1/4″ x 12″
Ewephoria 24″ x 36″
Cheetahs at Cards. 24″ x 36″

Please contact Downtown Art and Frame in Norman Oklahoma for more information
https://www.facebook.com/profile.php?id=100057154703557

If you’re wondering- no I didn’t visit Oklahoma in person. I just talked with the Gallery owner there via phone. I have worked with Barney at Downtown Art and Frame since the late 1980’s and we can darn near read each other’s minds! Makes long distance projects like this so much easier! They ship art all over this globe the way you and I would switch a book from one hand to the other.

The third focal point this week was the Aurora Gallery https://auroragalleryonline.com – I made sure they had plenty of my greeting cards and my various artist books. I also got, via no-contact delivery, new white boards from them cut to my various sizes so that I have plenty to work with for my Professional Dog book project as well as for my greeting card designs.

I’m particularly glad they have copies of Favorites So Far as I intend to do more recipe postcards and place some at the Aurora Gallery.

Just look at all these lovely blank boards in the photo below! A vast expanse of open potential!! Wahoo!!!

This week the long awaited video thingamajig (see last post) came in the mail!! At first all I had time to do was get it out of the box and read the instructions. Then…

… later I had a very brief chance to practice with the new thingamajig so I did this flip through of a book https://youtu.be/tOf3q9ALNoA It was really nice to have both hands free to turn pages! My brain is a whirl with possibilities!

We’ll see what happens next week with this new gadget… I’m hoping I’ll have time to play with it.

I hadn’t made nachos in a while so I remedied that! Spouse and I had such a delightful off-grid sort of evening! Especially during busy times playing is important!

This recipe is from Favorites So Far – and definitely one of the recipes I plan to eventually put on a postcard!

Clancy’s handwritten illustrated recipe from Favorites So Far https://www.blurb.com/b/10863384-favorites-so-far

No matter how busy your week is I hope you remember to play at least a little! See you next Monday!

MAGIC BEANS – The best since jack found his enchanted beans

A Creative Life, author illustrator, illustrated recipe, story, words and pictures

Bernadette from newclassicrecipe.com asked me to share my magic beans recipe with her readers – so I told my secrets and included sketches! The triple threat she mentions below is me…🤣😇🥳

My story and recipes from my college art school days are in the link below. Enjoy!

Fee-fi-fo-fum!I smell the blood of an English man.Be he alive, or be he dead,I’ll grind his bones to make my bread.[8] Hi there, As a result of posting my claypot recipe, I have become friends with an amazing writer, artist and cook. It seems that claypots are always used by women who are triple threats. […]

MAGIC BEANS – The best since jack found his enchanted beans

Happy holiday sketchbook

A Creative Life, Art Word Combinations, artist book, artistic inspirations, functional art, handmade books, illustrated recipe, kitchen art, recipe illustration, sketchbook, Sustainable creativity, words and pictures

Here’s a page from my kitchen sketchbook with my Irish Coffee recipe. Cheers!! And Happy Holidays!!

Btw: This recipe and many others are in my newest published artist book titled “Favorites So Far- a kitchen sketchbook” https://www.blurb.ca/b/9759759-favorites-so-far

real life story recipes

A Creative Life, artistic inspirations, food in art, illustrated recipe, illustrated shorts, kitchen art, recipe illustration, words and pictures, writing

I’ve been experimenting with the flash essay format. Creating recipe illustrations, for example, and writing a short-short story/essay to go with it. Here’s a recent one as relates to this Holiday season:

Hot Cocoa Espressoism by Sue Clancy

 – My wife and I went for a long hike in the woods on a below 40 degree day in the Pacific Northwest. We were cold when we got home. Before I shed my coat and scarf I began a pot of hot cocoa. Just after pouring the hot cocoa into mugs on the spur of the moment I added 1.5 oz Veil Double Espresso Vodka and whipped cream. I handed a mug to my wife confessing that I had been playing with ingredients again. She took a dubious sip. Oh nice! she exclaimed, adding; You can play with ingredients anytime especially when there’s alcohol involved. Since she liked the drink so much and I enjoyed the bold contrast of the hot liquid with my cold-from-the-hike self I kept the recipe – and drew it here using vigorous lines and contrasting colors in an attempt to capture my feelings.

HotCocoaEspressionism72

“Hot Cocoa Espressionism” by Clancy – https://www.theydrawandcook.com/artists/sue-clancy

Hope your Holiday is similarly filled with fun people, delightful things to do and good food/drink!

recipe illustration finished

A Creative Life, business of art, food in art, illustrated recipe, kitchen art, published art, visual thinking, words and pictures

I’ve finished the recipe illustration I’ve been working on for Chef Sebastian Carosi.  I shared it with the chef and he said “I absofuckinglutely love this!”.  So I take that as a good sign he’s happy with my illustration:

RoastedButternutSoup72

I was curious about whether the printing/production method I typically use would allow me to post a recipe that included cannabis. So to test that I uploaded the digital file. You can see it here:  https://society6.com/product/roasted-butternut-squash-soup-with-lifted-honeyed-yogurt-with-hemp-seed-oil_framed-print?sku=s6-10148641p21a12v52a13v54#

or here:

https://society6.com/product/roasted-butternut-squash-soup-with-lifted-honeyed-yogurt-with-hemp-seed-oil_framed-print?curator=sueclancy

I did use the “mature content” designation on the Society 6 site – but it looks like it will work!

recipe illustration progress plus studio secrets

A Creative Life, art techniques, illustrated recipe, illustration, kitchen art, recipe illustration, words and pictures

As you know from a recent post (here) I’ve been working on a new recipe illustration project for Chef Sebastian Carosi.  I’ve spent the most time designing a character who is doing the recipe “action”.  It was a challenge to create a cannabis leaf character with “hands” holding things. But I did it!  A photo of my progress is below…

When I’d illustrated Chef Kim Mahan’s recipes and we did a cookbook signing event together the question I was most often asked was “How do you keep your hand steady to handwrite all the recipe text?”  The answer is shown in the photograph below that also shows my progress on the current recipe project for Chef Carosi.

Can you see what it is?

SueWorkingChefCarosiSoup

Yes. A mahl stick. That’s my big studio secret. It steadies my hand both for painting and writing.

However I do something with my mahl stick that I’ve not seen anywhere else. I added a piece of foam pipe insulation that floats freely on the stick – so my wrist slides easily back and forth along the stick as the stick is held steadily in a position. When I’m writing text I need to be able to move my wrist a little along but stay on the same line. When painting sometimes I need to make a long stroke. Either way the foam moves smoothly with me down the length of the stick held in one place.

My mahl stick is hand made. You can buy a mahl stick but I find it easy enough to DIY.

To make mine I cut a small 2 inch portion of foam pipe insulation, taped it to the end of a 36 inch dowel rod, then wrapped that end, completely covering the taped 2 inch foam bit, with a scrap of canvas tying it to the rod so that no canvas fabric ends trail/drag.

The remainder of the foam pipe insulation, about 12 inches in length, was slipped onto the dowel rod.  In the photo below you can see the wrapped end of my mahl stick and see how loosely the foam pipe insulation wrist rest is on the rod. The other end (36 inches away!) has a hole drilled in it and a cord looped through it. It hangs on one of my art easel knobs when not in active use.

MahlStickEnd72.jpg

Okay. So the only time my mahl stick is not in active use is when I’m eating, reading or sleeping! Lol!

And now you know.