Sendak Foundation Fellowship

The Maurice Sendak Foundation has awarded me and three other children’s book artists fellowships this Spring. During the residency, which includes a stipend, private studio, and access to Sendak’s archive and home, we have been urged to work on projects of our own choosing.

To that end, I’ve been reviewing assorted story/picturebook drafts that I’ve started and not finished over the past decade, trying to decide which ones to focus on during my time in Connecticut. The lively and benevolent spirit of Maurice Sendak and the very real energy of the other fellows, JunJun Chen, Marianna Coppo and Gracey Zhang will create a unique atmosphere in which to sort, evaluate and move forward.

Below are a few teasers from my very mixed bag of story ideas.

I have a bunch more and those will probably be the ones I will focus on. I’m so grateful to have this time to be inspired and challenged to nurture this side of my career.

Angry Birds

Temporarily, until I have a better idea, I’ve usurped the #angrybirds tag for my drawings of fierce angry birds. As I may have stated elsewhere, these are my direct but artistically open-ended response to the predations of Trump government. Don’t wallow, get and stay mad.

The Birds are Watching

A flock of crows (11-06-24-crows)

A cardinal perching in the sere cattails at the edge of the river. (11-08-24-cardinal)

Avian Anthropologist (11-07-24a)

What's Appropriate?

I’ve been assembling old images loosely categorized as “Stories without Words.” These are paintings with strong characters in them but uncertain story lines. As I trawl through them from 2014, a shift seems to occur around 2019 to fewer images suggesting sweet endings. From 2019 forward, they’re often bleak or just about hoping and coping. I guess I’m an artist of my times and reflect the state of the world.

I must note that these are all uncommissioned works. In this same time period, I’ve illustrated a few well-received picture books (all written by others). There is work to be done I guess to develop some of these into meaningful and attractives commercial narratives. Onward.

It’s still a bit subtle but I don’t think these are your standard American picture book themes: “the long dark night of the soul”, Confused angels, Prometheus, birds pushing a bully over a cliff…?

Tree Bark

I’ve been convalescing from a leg injury. I have lots of stitches and I have to keep my leg elevated. This has curtailed my regular walks. So instead, I’ve been taking my pencils for walks. I call this tagged series “tree bark” because the obsessive rendering of the texture of tree bark. Then I stick some animals in there. That’s about it. Good mindless fun. The animals are watching!

These have their roots in my Crystal Cities drawings. Examples below:

Ibex Mountain

The view from up here is great. The warships sliding this way and that keep the peace. No people are allowed up here but many generations of ibex call this impregnable fortress home.

Problematic Arachnids

The spiders are getting quite active in my basement, in a corner of the bathroom and underneath seldom moved pieces of furniture. And, in my sketchbook too it seems. Moving into new directions often means (for me) accepting limitations and moving through pedestrian drawing strategies: In this case, I’ve accepted the network of intersecting lines on the right side of the paper. I’m right-handed.

Then I play with color and finally add a spider. Sometimes the spider is bad and mad —which probably reflects how I feel about American politics. The spiders all seem to be inside their webs and wish they could get at what’s outside. That’s about it. Trying to keep it loose.

Swans on view

This is one of my favorite drawings from 2023. It was made in October when the young swans had all matured and were anticipating their first New England winter. On a whim, I entered it and a few others into this show and I was pleased that it got in. Below are three additional drawings that didn’t make it.

10-13-23-swans01: this drawing can be seen at the Danforth Museum’s annual juried exhibition, June 22 to September 22.

Landscape, landscapes

There is Landscape and then there are Landscapes. I specialize in both I guess. Almost every morning I go out and draw what I see in nature. Often it’s a kind of nature journaling. This work most closely aligns with the traditional Landscape genre. Here are a few examples:

These are mostly landscape drawings not “paintings” per se. And they include lots of wildlife. Drawing is useful in that it allows me to quickly keep up with the things and “actors” I see as I view and participate in nature, the landscape.

When I’m in my studio however, “nature” is replaced by the art making practice and traditional art making materials: paper, watercolor paints, chalk, etc. And a different form of landscape emerges. The algorithm changes a bit. My emotions and judgements are fairly consistant but the questions I ask of them are quite different.

I have many more examples of both kinds of Landscape and landscapes. I’ve been in love with nature from the very start and focused on landscape-oriented art all through art school and graduate school, which in the 1980’s included photography and site-specific and traditional sculpture. My comfort in both ways of working, which are seamless to me, is their immediacy and directness and the challenges they offer me. And is no shortage of challenges to look forward to as my vocation evolves.

(And I should add, that my portfolio of illustrated children’s books trends decidedly to natural and animal subjects. So despite the differences in the questions asked of me, the answers come from a similar need to celebrate and hold up all that I can encompass of nature. It’s all congruent. What may seem like the work of a dilettante is whole cloth to me and I hope you see that too.

2024 calendar poster for sale

My 2024 calendar poster is available for purchase. Order yours now to get it in time for the New Year. 18 x 24,” shipped flat & folded or rolled in a tube. Please indicate with your order; prices vary. Order at Etsy

2024 calendar poster: 18 x 24” offset printed on satin gloss paper. Price: $8.00 (shipping cost not included)

This is a fully functional calendar with highlighted holidays. Whimsical text in lower right says “It was not the best way to start the day but the twins felt that by afternoon, the little bird would have a mostly positive memory of flying and would soon forget her dusty crumpled feathers.” © Rob Dunlavey 2023

Trees: stumps & driftwood

Landscapes have stories to tell. They tell stories of past lives and new ones adapting to current situations. Tree stumps and driftwood tell tales of violence and calamity, greed and the death of trees. Driftwood symbolizes the circuitous and ignominious journeys trees take and the eventual gift they provide when their wandering comes to an end. Birds are the nurses who care and bards who fashion meaning out of the chaos and calamity of a tree’s life story.

11-18-23b: Two birds, driftwood & stormy weather

Below: paintings from my studio that say something (but what?) about the broken but proud fellow citizens who journey with us. Say hello to a tree today :)

A School Notebook

My daughters have gradually moved away from home and started adult lives of their own. Things that were part of their teenage lives are stored in boxes or have been dispersed. One such item is a lined paper notebook. I started using it recently for my doodles. This is something I do while I wait for paint to dry in my other sketchbooks.

Mazza Museum Summer Conference 2023

The Mazza Museum, located in the heart of the campus of the University of Findlay in Findlay, Ohio is not on that many people’s radar screens. But if you are a children’s book illustrator or author, librarian, children’s librarian or a learning specialist, the Mazza Museum is an incredible treasure and resource. The museum boasts a rapidly growing collection of over 19,000 original works of picture book art: sketches, book dummies and final artwork in all media.

University of Findlay’s Mazza Museum is the world’s largest collection of original artwork by children’s book illustrators. The Museum’s goal is to promote literacy and enrich the lives of all people through the art of picture books.

The museum holds two conferences a year. The Summer Conference is a 3-4 day event with three keynote presentations each day by book illustrators and other creators. An array of diverse breakout sessions and book signings fill out the full days. I was there for the entire conference despite not presenting until the last day. I was able to catch memorable presentations by my colleagues:

Crystal Cities (selections from 2022)

I’m assembling a small book of my Crystal Cities from 2022. There are approximately ninety five that I’ve tagged.

This exercise helps me see what trends might be emerging in this practice. Here is a small sampling of these elaborate doodles. Lately, I’ve done a lot of them —and it’s 2023. What this usually means is that I don’t know what to make pictures of so I default to Crystal Cities. Interesting!