Plentiful as Blackberries: Steve Morrison Illustration

Head

2012-01-31T09:00:00.000-05:00

Owl Ghost

2012-01-30T14:31:00.003-05:00

New Book Cover

2012-01-13T14:49:00.002-05:00

Blue Jay

2011-12-23T19:03:00.002-05:00

Avis Angelus: Tondo

2011-12-15T12:53:00.001-05:00

"Avis Angelus: Tondo"

Acrylic, ink, oil, gold leaf on wood panel, 18” across

I painted this on a round 18" wood panel. First I stained the wood to accentuate it's beautiful grain, and then pressed some large inkblots across the surface. After that, I worked to find images in the random patterns that had been created. The gold sun is a small knot in the wood.

This is a fascinating, meditative process to me, and one that I picked up from Max Ernst via Leonardo Da Vinci.

Rockscape 3

2011-12-13T18:40:00.002-05:00

Rockscape 2

2011-12-12T13:09:00.002-05:00

Rockscape II (16" x 20" Acrylic, Oil, Marble Dust on Wood Panel)

I had a grand time building up these textures with marble powder. It's a departure from a lot of what I do, but I love and miss the massive rocks from the Western deserts where I grew up.

Kudzu Spirits

2011-12-09T08:00:00.000-05:00

One of the first things I noticed after moving to the South was the kudzu draping the trees and changing them into strange, Max Ernst-like monsters. James Dickey wrote a poem about the kudzu--here's a tiny excerpt:

half out of leafage
As though they would shriek,
Like things smothered by their own
Green, mindless, unkillable ghosts.

2012 Calendar Available

2011-12-05T07:30:00.000-05:00

My 2012 Wall Calendar is for sale on etsy!

Hummingbird

2011-11-28T09:00:00.000-05:00

Ruby-Throated Hummingbird. Now for sale on Etsy.
Painting 4" x 4"; frame 8" x 8." Acrylic, oil, and gold leaf on board, with varnish.

Figure Drawings

2011-11-15T09:00:00.000-05:00

Book Cover

2011-11-14T09:00:00.000-05:00

My latest book cover with Pearson--what a great group to work with!

Christy

2011-11-11T09:00:00.000-05:00

Mozart

2011-11-10T09:00:00.000-05:00

Now Available: Monsters & Mormons!

2011-11-09T09:00:00.001-05:00

Do you like monsters? Do you like Mormons? Well, this is probably the book for you. Dozens of stories from Nebula and Hugo award-winning writers. Also has my longest published comic (graphic novella?), "Mormon Golem." Buy yourself a copy--a good time is sure to be had by all.

My illustration for Emily Milner's "The Living Wife" -- a hilarious and poignant story of a woman dealing with the ghosts of her new husband's first two wives.

Title page of my comic.

Prometheus

2011-11-09T08:00:00.000-05:00

Collage 5

2011-11-08T09:00:00.000-05:00

Collage 4

2011-11-07T09:00:00.000-05:00

Collage 3

2011-11-04T09:00:00.000-04:00

Collage 2

2011-11-03T09:00:00.000-04:00

Collage 1

2011-11-02T09:00:00.000-04:00

Rockscape 1

2011-11-01T09:30:00.000-04:00

I need to play with oils more often. This has dirt from the landscape mixed with the paint.

Favorite Halloween Movies

2011-10-31T10:56:00.005-04:00

Here are some of my Halloween movies. Hopefully there are a couple here that you haven't seen--new recommendations are always fun.

The Church (La Chiesa)
1989, Michele Soavi
A crazy, gothic mess of an entertainment. Incredible imagery and one of my favorite giallo movies. Also watch Soavi's hilariously oddball Cemetery Man.

Spider Baby
1968, Jack Hill
Madness from start to finish, a deliriously insane ride. I've seen a lot of weird movies, and this is one of the weirdest--in a very, very good way.

The Bride of Frankenstein
1935, James Whale
Not remotely scary, but thoroughly odd--from the opening scene with foppish poets hobnobbing in a fancy parlor, to the tiny king in a bottle trying to woo a tiny queen in another bottle, you really won't guess what's coming next. The birdlike Bride herself only gets about four minutes of screentime. An absolute delight, and one of the most original movies I've seen.

Bubba Ho-Tep
2002, Don Coscarelli
An aging Elvis battles ancient Egyptian demons in a nursing home. Need I say more?

Carnival of Souls
1962, Herk Harvey
Incredibly creepy tale of a young Salt Lake City organist haunted by ghosts.

Cat People
1942, Jacques Tourneur
Incredible movie. Watch the very different sequel as well.

The Company of Wolves
1984, Neil Jordan
Angela Carter's fairy tale visions on screen. Poetic, creepy, campy, and has great werewolf transformation scenes.

Daughters of Darkness
1971, Harry Kumel
Stylish, elegant, European vampire trash. If the 19th century Romantic writers (Coleridge, Poe, Le Fanu, etc) had been B-movie Euro-trash directors in the 70s, they would have come up with something like this sumptuous dish. Lots of red.

Dead Ringers
1988, David Cronenberg
Jeremy Irons plays two very creepy twins. Rather brilliant.

Hour of the Wolf
1968, Ingmar Bergman
Bergman's foray into horror is an unsettling journey into the Scandinavian heart of darkness.

Kwaidan
1964, Masaki Kobayashi
Somewhat creepy, but mostly gorgeous and poetic. A great series of short Japanese ghost stories.

Let The Right One In
2008, Tomas Alfredson
One of the most wonderful films I've ever seen. The stark Swedish winter surrounds a warm, yet unnerving, relationship between its two young protagonists. Best teen vampire movie ever, by a thousand miles. (Avoid the American remake, which is fine on it's own, but at best a pale counterpart to this rich masterpiece).

Lisa and the Devil
1974, Mario Bava
Bava's movies are filled with incredible imagery, rich colors, and fantastic storytelling--and this is my favorite Bava. Surreal, poetic, and perhaps closer to being arthouse fare than it is to being a B-movie cult classic. Watch lots of Bava, please. He was the Godfather of Giallo.

Mad Monster Party?
1967, Jules Rankin
Rankin & Bass's Christmas classics (Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer, Year Without A Santa Claus, etc.) are wondrous, and their Halloween treat is no less delightful. I watched this the other day with my daughter (age four), and she thought it was a hoot. A little edgier than the usual Rankin/Bass fare.

Night of the Hunter
1955, Charles Laughton
One of the most amazing movies ever made, and one of the most unsettling. Part fairy tale, part Flannery O'Connor, part chase movie, part religious allegory; all brilliant.

Nosferatu
1922, F. W. Murnau
Still one of the scariest movies I've seen, this silent vampire film somehow burrows it's way into your psyche like a horrific albino rat.

Suspiria
1977, Dario Argento
Argento picked up where Bava left off. Insane colors and weird archetypal imagery tell the story of a ballerina and witches. I liked the follow-up, Inferno, almost as much as Suspiria.

The Descent
2005, Neil Marshall
One of the scariest movies I've seen. If you have claustrophobia (I do), this will destroy your life for an hour and a half.

Valerie and Her Week of Wonders
1970, Jaromil Jires
Dreamlike Czech coming-of-age fantasy, with vampires. Lovely music, too.

Vampire's Kiss
1988, Robert Bierman
A crazy vampire Nick Cage jumps on a table. It happens. This movie makes me laugh.

Have a happy Halloween!

Figure Drawings

2011-10-28T09:00:00.000-04:00

Caterpillar With A Cold

2011-10-27T09:00:00.000-04:00

Another oldie.

Tyger

2011-10-26T09:00:00.000-04:00

This is an old one, but I still like it.

Pigs Fly

2011-10-25T20:24:00.003-04:00

Doggies

2011-10-19T16:38:00.000-04:00

Portrait of two dogs (commission)

Alphabeasts: A

2011-10-18T10:30:00.001-04:00

A is for Afanc.
The Afanc was a Welsh lake beastie who terrorized the locals until King Arthur dropped by and chopped it up.

See more Alphabeasts by amazing artists.

Figure Drawings

2011-10-18T08:05:00.003-04:00

Flying Ghosts

2011-10-17T10:03:00.001-04:00

A few versions of the same illustration. This will be published (along with my recent comic) in the "Monsters & Mormons" anthology coming out on Halloween night! Spooky!

Wedding Portraits

2011-10-13T09:29:00.000-04:00

Contact me if you'd like to commission a portrait. Holidays are a great time for new art, and I'll be raising my prices at the beginning of the new year.

Ancient Rome

2011-10-12T09:00:00.000-04:00

Planets

2011-10-11T20:13:00.003-04:00

little comp

2011-10-10T10:55:00.002-04:00

Shopping

2011-10-07T09:00:00.000-04:00

Still More Life

2011-10-06T09:00:00.000-04:00

Still Life

2011-10-05T13:10:00.003-04:00

gouache on illustration board

Chickadee-dee-dee

2011-10-04T13:39:00.001-04:00

9" x 12" acrylic on canvas

5 x 5

2011-10-03T09:30:00.000-04:00

Acrylic and gold leaf on paper, 5" x 5"

The Westmont Art Museum in Santa Barbara invited me to be a part of their "5 x 5" show. I'm excited to be involved--this is the piece I created.

Self Portrait, Morning

2011-09-30T18:04:00.004-04:00

acrylic on wood panel, 6" x 6"

Goldfinch

2011-09-20T14:04:00.000-04:00

Goldfinch, 3" x 4" acrylic and gold on board (6" x 7" framed)

SOLD

Sketch

2011-09-19T21:17:00.003-04:00

Together

2011-09-08T09:21:00.003-04:00

Purchase info here

A friendly group of birds floats together in a castle/head. Are they all in his mind? Painted on a wood panel and mounted with a keyhole hanger to stand out from your wall.
The painting is 6" x 6."

Etsy Shop is up and running!

2011-09-07T11:10:00.001-04:00

My Etsy Shop is up and running! Be sure to visit my website, www.stevemorrisonart.com, and click on the gift shop to enter.

The shop is named UccelloFellow. Uccello = "Bird" in Italian, so it seemed appropriate.

Mr. & Mrs. Owl

2011-09-07T10:00:00.002-04:00

Purchase info here.

Mr. & Mrs. Owl share a tender moment.
9" x 14" x 1/2" acrylic on wood log segment. Mounted with a wooden keyhole hanger.

Mystery

2011-09-02T10:21:00.001-04:00

Acrylic on illustration board, 5" x 7"

Owl

2011-09-01T14:05:00.001-04:00

Cardbored

2011-08-25T09:00:00.001-04:00

The other day, I was stuck waiting around. SO, I found an old cardboard box, cut out a couple squares, and painted these two.

Three Birds

2011-08-24T09:00:00.000-04:00

12" x 28" acrylic on board

Owl Queen

2011-08-23T09:00:00.000-04:00

Cardinal with Gold

2011-08-22T09:00:00.000-04:00

Colonel

2011-08-19T09:00:00.000-04:00

Chasing The Moon

2011-08-18T09:00:00.000-04:00

Trio

2011-08-17T09:00:00.000-04:00

Light As A Feather

2011-08-16T09:00:00.000-04:00

Owl

2011-08-15T15:57:00.000-04:00

Avian Lady

2011-08-10T09:00:00.000-04:00

Avian Gentleman

2011-08-09T13:10:00.004-04:00

3" x 3"

Dreamer

2011-08-08T17:09:00.001-04:00

New Book Cover!

2011-08-05T22:07:00.002-04:00

For a Core Knowledge textbook (grade 3) on the classification of animals. I had a lot of fun with this one.

Karin

2011-07-26T22:16:00.000-04:00

Desert

2011-07-25T09:00:00.000-04:00

Fjords

2011-07-22T20:05:00.002-04:00

Wind in the Willows cover

2011-07-20T09:00:00.002-04:00

Flow'rs

2011-07-19T09:00:00.001-04:00

Work in Progress

2011-07-18T09:00:00.000-04:00

Finished and submitted my comic over the weekend! Will keep you updated about publication info. I loved working on this project!

Life Painting at the Zoo

2011-07-15T14:46:00.002-04:00

Plein Air Painting

2011-07-14T14:47:00.000-04:00

Flowers and Butterfly

2011-07-11T11:03:00.002-04:00

Always Nice To See Your Work In Print

2011-07-01T09:00:00.001-04:00

...and on Amazon

Toad

2011-06-30T09:00:00.000-04:00

Work in Progress

2011-06-29T09:00:00.000-04:00

My latest comic (graphic novella?) is almost done! Deadline is looming fast.

Another Tanager

2011-06-28T09:00:00.001-04:00

Evening Grosbeak

2011-06-27T09:00:00.003-04:00

Warbler

2011-06-24T09:00:00.000-04:00

Tui

2011-06-23T09:00:00.000-04:00

Book Review: "Robert Schumann: Herald of a 'New Poetic Age' "

2011-06-23T07:51:00.001-04:00

A great biography and a fascinating appreciation of Schumann's work. Schumann was one of the great musical geniuses of the Romantic movement, and his contributions to musical form were unique and bizarre. Daverio is especially adept at pointing out the mastery in Schumann's often overlooked large-scale later works like "Scenes from Goethe's Faust" or "Das Paradies und die Peri", finding no loss in quality due to Schumann's supposed mental illness. Ear-opening and thought-provoking, delves into Schumann's literary interests (Jean-Paul, Hoffmann, Goethe, etc.) and illuminates the ways in which he endeavored to create a new musical-literary poetics (a line of thinking that would arguably culminate in Wagner's music dramas). A great read, and it made me think differently about the way I create my own art.

Tanager

2011-06-22T09:00:00.000-04:00

Owl

2011-06-21T09:00:00.000-04:00

Falcon

2011-06-20T09:00:00.001-04:00

Work in Progress

2011-06-17T16:37:00.000-04:00

I'm working on a new portfolio piece, all digital. I'll post it when it's finished--I feel pretty good about how it's turning out thus far.

Skyscape I: Feet

2011-06-16T09:00:00.006-04:00

Head

2011-06-15T09:00:00.000-04:00

Head

2011-06-14T09:00:00.000-04:00

Head

2011-06-13T09:00:00.001-04:00

Triptych VIII: "Little Sanctuary"

2011-06-10T09:00:00.003-04:00

Open

Closed

Head

2011-06-09T09:00:00.001-04:00

Autobibliography

2011-06-08T10:06:00.002-04:00

Inspired by a post from David Auerbach, I've listed out (to the best of my admittedly unreliable recollection), the books that have meant the most to me, year by year, through my life thus far. I'd like to expand this into a series of short essays, so as to explain a little about each choice and why it mattered to me at the time. I doubled up on a few, especially between the ages of 19 and 23, when I read like a demon. Anyhow, here they are:

Pat the Bunny
The Happy Man and His Dump Truck
Animals of Buttercup Farm
Where the Wild Things Are, by Maurice Sendak
Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer
Andrew Lang Fairy Books / The Nutcracker
Pippi Longstocking, by Astrid Lindgren
The Lion the Witch and the Wardrobe, by C S Lewis
The Witches, By Roald Dahl
The Book of Three, by Lloyd Alexander
Jurassic Park, by Michael Crichton
The Phantom of the Opera, by Gaston Leroux
The Hunchback of Notre Dame, by Victor Hugo
The Count of Monte Cristo, by Alexander Dumas
Hamlet, by William Shakespeare
Wuthering Heights, by Emily Bronte
The Brothers Karamazov, by Fyodor Dostoyevsky
Don Quixote, by Miguel de Cervantes
Tanakh / Peer Gynt, by Henrik Ibsen
The Canterbury Tales, by Geoffrey Chaucer / Stories by Franz Kafka
Poems of Shelley / Illuminated Books of William Blake
Remembrance of Things Past, by Marcel Proust / Ulysses, by James Joyce
Essays, by Ralph Waldo Emerson / Finnegans Wake, by James Joyce
Alone with the Alone: Creative Imagination and the Sufism of Ibn al 'Arabi, by Henry Corbin
Orlando Furioso, by Ludovico Ariosto
The Bloody Chamber, by Angela Carter
Don Juan, by Byron
Poems, by Fernando Pessoa, et. al. (so far; still have six months and two days to go)

"Avis Alchemicus" Series

2011-06-08T09:00:00.000-04:00

This series is about alchemical transformation, a fascinating process. I had always thought it was merely about trying to turn things into gold and get rich quick (and occasionally it was). But, not only was alchemy a forerunner of modern chemistry, it was a deeply spiritual practice. A great book on the subject is Max Ernst and Alchemy: A Magician In Search Of Myth, by M. E. Warlick. Jung has also written on the subject, and modern scholars interpret alchemy as a process of psychological growth and transformation.

For the series, I started by finding some scraps of wood, meant to be discarded, and set about to transform (alchemy is all about transformation) them into something of beauty and meaning. These four wood blocks came with a table I purchased--they were inserted for packing purposes and intended to be thrown away.

Each of the four paintings embodies a different color, and each color represents one of the four stages of alchemical transformation. The four stages are listed below, with brief descriptions:

nigredo, blackening (putrefaction): corruption, dissolution. I mixed the paint with ash in this image to represent the burnt-out nature of the beginning of this process. Starting out with nothing, but with the beginnings of a trail (the red string) we can follow all the way to perfection.
albedo, whitening: purification, burnout of impurity; the moon, female. I represented this with a white egret in moonlight. A little bit of ash remains in the paint.
citrinitas, yellowing: spiritualization, enlightenment; the sun, male. The goldfinch lives among thorns and hardship, but it's yellow gold light indicates it's proximity to divine Light. The background here is painted with gold.
rubedo, reddening: unification of man with god, unification of the limited with the unlimited. The red cardinal appears in average daylight. Achieving unity and health allows one to live more fully in the divine light of the everyday world.

It's a beautiful sequence of spiritual growth, and one that resonates with me.

Triptych VIII: Opening Soon!

2011-06-07T09:00:00.003-04:00

Cardinal

2011-06-06T09:00:00.005-04:00

Acrylic on canvas, 9" x 12"

Elegant Trogon

2011-06-03T09:00:00.006-04:00

Wood Duck

2011-06-02T09:00:00.000-04:00

Sunbird

2011-06-01T09:00:00.005-04:00

Chickadee

2011-05-31T09:00:00.001-04:00

Yellow

2011-05-30T09:00:00.000-04:00

RIP Leonora Carrington (If the old woman can't go to Lapland, Lapland must come to the old woman)

2011-05-27T07:21:00.001-04:00

One of my favorite artists has died. Leonora Carrington was a brilliant surrealist.

Everyone go and read her incredible, vivacious, mystical nursing-home conspiracy novel, The Hearing Trumpet.

Now.

Egret

2011-05-26T09:00:00.001-04:00

Finch

2011-05-25T09:00:00.000-04:00

The background is gold!