work in progress Bear Hike Illustrations: Exploring Angles Today’s class was all about composition studies, and I ended up picking the toughest angle—looking up! Time to let the bears go big.
work in progress Simplifying Two Asheville Illustration Ideas Today’s class was all about cutting elements, boosting clarity, and giving my hiking and beer-loving bears room to shine.
work in progress Asheville Postcard Sketches: Bears & Storytelling Today’s class was all about picking three Asheville-themed ideas and expanding them. Turns out “minimal” is harder than I thought!
Week 2 at My Imaginary Art School: The Asheville Theme This week’s theme is Asheville! Bears, birdsong, craft chocolate, and a chorus of memories from a town I used to call home.
inspiration Street Art Forage in Asheville A quick getaway to Asheville turned into a sticker-spotting spree. Art everywhere, weird aliens, familiar cats—and a wild reunion!?
work in progress September at My Imaginary Art School: Storytelling & Drawing Each week has a full art cycle—from research to sketch to final illustration. Week one was all about summer turning into fall!
Street Art Forage: September’s Spicy Harvest Tanuki armies, surreal ladies, political genius, and street sticker mystery. September’s forage is already off to a wild start.
work in progress Learning Composition with ChatGPT-sensei I used to be scared of the word “composition.” Now I’m kind of obsessed with it—and I owe it all to my imaginary art school.
work in progress I enrolled in an imaginary art school! So apparently I enrolled in an imaginary art school with ChatGPT. And It’s kind of working.
inspiration Tiny Autumn, Spotted! Cicadas are still screaming, but look—leaves are turning yellow! Fall is sneaking in, one crisp breeze at a time.
inspiration Discovering RISO Magic in the Midwest A Riso catalog from Milwaukee just landed in my mailbox and I’m spiraling into full-on Midwest print nerd mode.
work in progress Leaning Poses and Accidental Sass on Labor Day Started drawing “leaning people” and ended up with fashion magazine-level seduction. Oops? Labor Day energy = zero.
monthly recap Monthly Charlie’s Playground: August 2025 August is over! Here are my favorite posts, quotes, and doodles from a month of recovering, drawing, and getting back into the swing of Chicago life.
inspiration Back to Skokie Northshore Sculpture Park Went back to the Skokie Northshore Sculpture Park—perfect mix of a walk and outdoor art. This time I explored the part I missed before!
inspiration My Treasure: Ben Clark’s Never Forever Picked up Ben Clark’s Never Forever in Amsterdam—cute characters with pitch-black humor that makes me giggle every time.
work in progress Repeating My Weak Spots, Over and Over Still stuck on limp-body sketches—but I believe in practicing the hard stuff again and again until it clicks.
work in progress Drawing Limp People: Crying & Lazy Still wrestling with limp poses—today I added crying and lazy-on-the-couch. The lazy one? Totally my mood lately.
work in progress More Limp Practice: Despair, Death, and Pure Joy Still struggling with limp poses—tried despair again, plus “dead” and “over-the-moon.” Amazing how limp can mean total opposites.
work in progress Practicing Despair (and Feeling It Too) Today’s sketch theme was “despair.” Couldn’t get it right—side profiles are tough! But hey, I kept trying.
work in progress Practicing Limp, Low-Key Still not feeling 100%, but today’s sketch theme was “limp bodies.” Turns out it’s way harder than drawing tense ones!
work in progress Today I’m Just a Cat Felt awful today—this doodle was all I could manage. So I drew myself as a cat, curled up and useless.
work in progress Reviewing My Struggling People This week was all about people straining, stressing, and grimacing—and I’m proud I kept pushing through my weak spot!
work in progress Ouch and Brrr! Drawing Practice Today’s drawing drills: people in pain and people freezing. Needles still terrify me, and Chicago winter is already creeping in!
work in progress Drawing Practice: Full-Body Protest Today’s sketch theme was “angry and resisting”—basically full-body protest poses. Way more fun than I expected, and I couldn’t stop laughing while drawing.
work in progress Just Another Lazy Day Practiced drawing, went for a walk, snacked, lazed around… and somehow the day’s already gone.
