I don’t think I have to explain what a black and white drawing is.

But the way I do them is a bit different. I like a very smooth surface when I use pen and inks, so I draw on 3/8th inch archival foam core board with either a croquil or regular lettering pen nib.

I also use the very dense, black Japanese Sumi ink. If you’ve ever used regular black ink, you’ve probably seen how red it really is if it’s thinned out. Not the Sumi ink! Very black. Rich, delicious, full black.

The line I can achieve can vary drastically from almost non-visible thin to fat and juicy. But since I have a pretty heavy hand, the thin lines don’t come in as often.

Most of the black and white images you see on this site came at me at about 3 in the morning.This happens quite often.

Disgusted that these ideas want to wake me up and not allow me to sleep, I lie there trying to not open my eyes, but they have none of it. “UP!,” they say, “UP!” And I say, “Ugh!….”

But by 4 a.m., I’m downstairs drawing. There are eight or ten in the series, so I wouldn’t done till that night.

As you might have noticed, some of these designs appear elsewhere on this site in color: the colorization of these images happened about five years after these originals – I was going through some of my old files and found these images. I liked them so much I decided to put color to them using gouache paint.

PRINTS

You can also get prints, cards, gicléees and posters -framed and unframed, as well as the most amazing pillows, phone cases, tote bags and other goodies at PrintsbyLyon.com, my Redbubble site and my CafePress site.

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