The Easter Beaver

During the run of the current show at the theater, a joke has continued to surface about the Easter Beaver (as opposed to the Easter Bunny). It’s a long story how the Beaver came about, and a hilarious one. We decided to write and illustrate a creation story, if you will, for the Easter Beaver, which we posted in the green room on Easter. I would like to attribute the writing to the fabulousness of Brett Radke and Katie Mack, and here are my illustrations as well:

Have you ever met a beaver and known him to be different? Let us begin the tale of the Easter Beaver. On this day of joy, you may have heard of a young man named Jesus, or even of a hoppity, egg-carrying bunny. But this story is slightly different. Although it might not move you to jubilant tears, we can promise you one thing: The True Tale of the EASTER BEAVER.

Unlike other beaver pups, this beaver was born with a scowl. While most beavers find pleasure in playing with wood or slapping their tails, this beaver did not.

The young pup would grumble inside, thinking, “Sigh. Woe is me. I know I’m not as happy as a beaver could be.”

Then one day, as the spring flowers were blooming, the young pup was grumbling through the forest, and he happened upon a sorely wounded bunny with pacifiers jammed in both nostrils, close by a scattering of brightly colored eggs. The bunny mumbled, in pain, “Damn those terrible twos!”

The beaver pushed past the bunny, unconcerned with the grumbles of a creature with such a pathetic wad of tail.

As he stood over the eggs a sensation tingled through his right leg, then his left, into his little beaver teeth and eventually into his beaver tail.

Like a magnet to a cork, the beaver had found his joy.

Then, the bunny reached his paw up, and with a death rattle on his breath, began to say, “But you’re not a bu---“…

The beaver stood, trembling, with the colored eggs in hand, and screamed to the heavens:

“I. AM. THE EASTER BEAVER!”

As if in agreement with fate, claiming their newfound successor, the eggs began to dance the G.M.E.D.O.O. The Great Macedonian Egg Dance Of Old.

THE END

Portraits

Brush pens on tinted paper
February-March 2011

Ballpoint pen on tinted paper
March 2011

Brush pens in sketchbook

February 2011

These were done in and around the theater...I strangely enjoy doing stealthy portraits of people in which they do not know they are being drawn, so none of these were posed or with the knowledge of the people who were being drawn. Lovely.

Hair

Brush pens on tinted paper

April 2011

Brush pens on tinted paper

April 2011

Brush pens in sketchbook

April 2011

Brush pens in sketchbook

April 2011

 Brush pens in sketchbook

April 2011

I have been fascinated with hair in all aspects of my artwork for a long time--it's inexplicable creepiness when not attached to the head, its longevity, its symbolism. These are drawings made just for fun, and also to help write my scene for the Apprentice Dark Night project at the theater.

Back to It

Brush pens in sketchbook

April 2011

Brush pens on tinted paper

April 2011

Roller pen on tinted paper

April 2011

Ballpoint pen on scrap paper

April 2011

Graphite on scrap paper

April 2011

Brush pens on tinted paper

April 2011

Brush pens on tinted paper

April 2011

Well, hello again! It’s been quite awhile, but I am back to posting. Here is a mixed bunch of drawings from sketchbooks and random pieces of paper. There are a large amount of clowns in this group of drawings...I have no explanation except the strange inclinations of my brain and fingers. A few of these feature my new-ish brush pens…they make me very happy.

Silliness

 Cartoon Jenny as she makes macaroni

 Cartoon Joey and Laurence

 I drew Miss Melanie, the lovely light board op, in my little denim notebook.

 Understudy Jim Porterfield in the green room

Some unsuspecting patrons, drawn from afar as I watch from the booth.

Graphite on various types of paper

January-February 2011

As I work during Corktown every night, sometimes I stealthily draw the people I work with as they sit, unsuspecting...some cartoon-y versions of the characters onstage...and also whatever random things wander through my head...so here is some of that silliness.

Corktown

 Stacie is wrapped into a painter's tarp and is placed onstage for the first twenty minutes of the show. Wrapping the "cannoli" refers to Stacie when she's wrapped in the tarp.

Graphite in sketchbooks, cue sheets, and scrap paper

So...I've been spending plenty of time with the production of Corktown at the Purple Rose these days...in preview, in performance, you name it. I get to see the show every single time we do it, and that has lead to these drawings that I have made during the show, basically on whatever type of paper I can get my hands on in the booth. Enjoy!

Mark

 Brush pens on paper
January 2011

Helloooooo! So...it has been quite awhile since I've set my pen into this virtual inkwell, so to speak...the culprit is the general busy-ness of my life here in Chelsea, MI. Here I present to you some sketches of the loverly Mark Mirasol, made with my new brush pen (when I get inordinately excited about new drawing materials I know that I shall have a long and storied relationship with the material...brush pens are super exciting!! They're like a portable, super convenient inkwell and brush...). I was in a drawing frame of mind while talking with Mark on skype (he was tired and also wearing a turban to dry his hair). Drawing from skype was like drawing in a secondhand way from life. I love the experience of getting to know a drawing subject through drawing it from life, from within the same environment. I can see the definite merits of using photographs for reference, though...they are certainly sometimes more convenient and time-effective. Anyways, skype is a weird in between space in which your subject is there to move around and show you different angles, but the image is still flat. I like pieces of these drawings; some of them seem a little weird, but I learn as a draw more and more. Anyways, in a nutshell, here's Mark!! With brush pens! Huzzah for the return of the blog!