Dec. 24 That's What Christmas Means to Me, My Love
Well, the last days are rarely ever finished on time, and most of the time its because of family functions, but with all the business this year, my ambitious project for the 10th anniversary was more labor intensive than previous years. I decided to go with the idea of representing my entire series catalog as milagro, the mexican/latin american votive tradition of ornaments that are religious folk charms made as offerings. Milagro trees are something I've seen in my relatives' homes before and thought making a tree of milagro that represented different series would be an ambitious project. I wanted to pay a little tribute to both my own heritage and the things that make me whole, which are the creative process of expressing myself; not that I see myself as a deity but creation itself is a divine entity. A lot of what I make represents things I feel are important, like expressions of love, music, or ideals of human relations and the human condition. Each series I own I broke down to be a symbol that would be easy to hand cut with scissors or an exacto knife, and as such, I chose things that were good icons. For example, Ecstacy Education--a series about teachers who might have been corrupt of seemed inadequate to teach become a faculty team that succeeds beyond all odds--is represented by a suitcase with an apple symbol to represent the idea of illicit materials contained in the cases that typified each teacher (in the series, they're called "polished apples" XD). Pot Sticker has 2 crosses that appear on the main character's cheeks. Distance's series incorporates a clock and open space to embody time and space; the Caller spinoff contains the symbol for the Callers. E.Q. uses the series logo of the treblebass clef. Some milagro will have a hot glue pattern, like Psychic Cafe or Anni & Kawaii, so that they create a raised surface; this will be for the final step of covering each milagro with a silver surface to give dimension. A more detailed description will appear when all the milagro are completed.
This year had a few pitfalls but I'm immensley proud of the work and the ideas done this year. A lot of colleges went into this one because I really do enjoy them, and miss doing them. This calendar has been the most drawing I have done in the past year; I realized I really missed it. Sometimes we can get too busy to do the things we love but once we get going, we realize we can't live without it. I hope you all enjoyed this year's calendar. I can't wait to make it to the 15 year mark.
Merry Christmas, Lunies, and have a great new year!
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