Showing my bud Donna something!!!

This is the latest image.

Arts Leadership - Guess Who!!!!

The Oklahoma Arts Council recently announced members of the first class of Leadership Arts for 2008. Among the 22 communities and 19 counties represented, Murray State College employees Alan Burris, art instructor, Donna Graves, public information officer and Brian Landreth, digital arts instructor, have been selected to attend.
Leadership Arts is designed as a statewide network of community art leaders. Class members will learn how arts and cultural development can be harnessed to create economic opportunity, provide a high quality of community life, and ignite the creative potential of Oklahoma’s youth. This program is of special interest to rural communities.
The scheduled sessions are designed to include panel presentations and group discussions addressing critical issues in the community arts development. courtesy-Donna Graves

Session One covered The Arts and Community Quality of Life was recently held in Muskogee on February 5th in the Oklahoma Music Hall of Fame. This session focused on why and how the arts attract lifestyles for community citizens. I had been to Muskogee a lot growing up. I had three aunts who lived there and we would spend a week visiting them. I stopped going there in the mid-90's because I had too many obligations going on. It was really great to see the improvements and forward-thinking the leaders of Muskogee demonstrated for us during our visit.
I'll be visiting other cities through November as part of the Arts Leadership class. Donna and Alan are fun to travel with (don't tell our bosses we are having a good time) I'm really looking forward to it.

New Freelance Logo

This artwork is for my new logo for freelancing art and design. I decided to come up with a more active design that I previously used. Also, it was just time to change the name since I had used the old one since 1994. The artwork I originally drew using a simple marker on art paper. I could never get what I was looking for when I went back to it. So I went back and scanned it in. Then I used Illustrator's pencil tool and brush effects to give it more of an art feel.

Latest Art

This is a 12 x 12 acrylic I did for a fundraiser in Tulsa, OK. I had a LOT of ideas for the piece but decided to K.I.S.S. (keep it simple, stupid). Since it was in Tulsa, the home of fat-cat, oil men I decided to go with that. The oilee covers the entire canvas and all sides are painted. the sides have small oil wells on them.
It was one of the first to sell.
Thanks to my cousin for taking a photo, since I totally forgot to before shipping it there.

Last of the Holiday Art

I wanted to post this card design as my last submission that is holiday related until next year. This is a pencil drawing partially colored by Photoshop. The before and after are included. Santa's bag has torn open and presents are flying out. The inside quote is "Next Year - Gift Cards!!!"

Happy New Year!!!

I've been away from the keyboard for about a week. So here's my new post. This was my Christmas card for 2007. The theme is an Emo elf surrounded by your typical, bright colored, happy elves. He's so happy this year he's going to smile when you open the card.
Created the line work in pencil and ink, scanned it for 600 dpi, then colored it in Photoshop because time was running out.
I hope you had a happy holiday - whichever one you celebrate.