matouenpeluche

Little Garden Ballerina

Little Garden Ballerina - probably my last drawing for 2017! I hope everyone has a joyful time this evening! Here's to 2018!

2017 drawings - the Matou year in review

I hope everyone had a lovely Christmas! There are a lot of "2017..." type things going on, so I thought I'd get together some of the drawings I've done this year as a way to say goodbye to 2017. I had a lot of fun drawing them!

Peace Kitten, Silver Tabby and Chair, A Good Book and Thou, Maxwell, Botanical Cat, Owen and Gordon.

 

The Cat and the Moon, DJ Stripe, Grandmaster Kitten, Cat Butterfly, Inscrutable One, A Couple of Cool Cats. 

 

Think Outside the Box, Gus Grooming, Study for Two Cats, Brown and Yellow Butterflies, Dachshund Quote by Queen Victoria, Cat + Confetti. 

 

Eckhart Tolle Cat Quote, Charles Dickens Cat Quote, Taylor at MOMA, Auguste Renoir Quote, Purr Purr, Animalia.

A Walk in the Garden, The Art Lover, Underneath the Fish Ferns, Wow Cat,  Cloudscapes, Glenister and the Butterfly. 

Twenty Cats!, Zoe and Jean-Michel.

A Good Book and Thou

This is my new print - A Good Book and Thou. I think it is the height of contentment reading a terrific book with a feline companion asleep on your lap. Also, please note my nod to Christmas with the fir trees outside the window - it's not too many sleeps away now, is it? 

Reading Books

This is my new print "Reading Books". The last book I read, which I highly recommend, was "Experience" by Martin Amis. It is an autobiography/ collection of memoirs that he wrote several years ago which I've been meaning to read forever. It didn't disappoint! It is very, very funny in parts, but also moving and insightful in others. It's a non-linear account of Amis' life as the famous son of a famous writer. I have read most of Amis' books and this autobiography has put me in mind of reading them again; "London Fields", "Night Train" and "The Information" being my favourites. I am quite partial to autobiographies and biographies and have read quite a few over the years and this is without a shadow of a doubt the best I've ever read.

A quote about reading...

I thought this quote by Neil Gaiman was pretty cool. I illustrated it by combining two of my reading girl images: Diana the reader of bird books and The Constant Reader:

 

Ernest Hemingway was a cat fancier...

                                       One Cat Just Leads to Another...

Ernest Hemingway, author of The Old Man and the Sea and A Farewell to Arms, was a keen cat lover. He had a six toed cat given to him by a ship's captain. Apparently, this cat's descendants still live at his home in Florida which has been turned into a museum.

You can read more about Hemingway's museum and six toed cats here.

 

Art Deco Advertising

Speaking of Art Deco (see previous post), here are three fine advertisements from Europe 1921, 1927 and 1930 respectively. They are from the coffee table book Euro Deco.  

All images from Euro Deco.

Raymond Peynet

Whimsical French cartoonist and illustrator Raymond Peynet was famous for his drawings of a young romantic couple. He created the character of the young poet and his fiancée in 1942 which became an instant hit all over the world. Several books of his drawings were published one of which I have called "The Lover's Keepsake". It was published in 1958 and has a forward my one of my favourite cartoonists and illustrators of all time: Ronald Searle! I have three of the illustrations from the "Lover's Keepsake" below for for your viewing pleasure!

Lewis Carroll, Grace Coddington and Vogue

Just a night ago I watched an interesting documentary about the fashion editorial team at Vogue (USA) who work under the helm of Anna Wintour. It was called In Vogue: The Editor's Eye. Gee it was interesting! Everyone knows about Grace Coddington who was made famous by the also excellent documentary The September Issue, but this documentary looks at seven other long time editors who have as equally distinctive styles and ways of putting together a shoot as Grace does. Anyhoo, by chance I saw that it is Lewis Carroll's birthday today and I thought I'd celebrate that with Grace Coddington's beautiful Alice in Wonderland themed fashion spread she did way back in 2003. Not only is it shot by master photographer Annie Leibovitz, but it also features all the leading designers of the time which was a quirky touch that delighted many a fashionista! Can you spot Jean Paul Gaultier, Christian Lacroix, Tom Ford, Marc Jacobs, Steven Jones, Donatella Versace and Rupert Everet (OK not a fashion designer, but there nevertheless)? It also featured Grace Coddington' favourite model at that time Natalia Vodianova. You can read Grace Coddington's account of the shoot here.  

All images from here.

Happy Halloween!

This cartoon is of course by Charles Addams, legendary cartoonist and illustrator and creator of The Addams Family cartoon for The New Yorker and then The Addams Family television series. I think there's probably quite a few folk running around this Halloween day dressed up as Morticia or Gomez or Lurch or Uncle fester etc! 

Above is 1) Charles Addams sketching a model for his elegant Morticia Addams character, 2) the model he used for Morticia Adams, 3) Charles Addams and his wife Barbara, and 4) Charles Addams on location sketching.  

Images form here and here.