Bird Brains Right Side of Spread

The quote is: "If men had wings and bore black feathers, few of them would be clever enough to be ravens". The actual quote from Henry Ward Beecher was not "ravens", but "crows", but I switched it for this spread.

It was an honor to have worked in this book for Mija, my dear Oregonian Art Friend & Santa Cruz Soul Sister! I must confess that I felt a little intimidated when it showed up as all the previous work is just amazingly beautiful! I took a long time working out what I wanted to do on "test papers" and couldn't find the right fit. Knowing that my personally set deadline to get it in the mail by the end of the year was quickly approaching, I sat down and worked it out. I had the images of the feathers, the large crow, the silly men and the quote but had no idea how I was going to put it together. I opened the book to the blank black spread and stared at it for about 15 minutes. Once I started moving the pieces around, it started to evolve. Then I really got into it and had to force myself to stop and sleep. I picked it up again today and finished it off. As is true with most of my work, it seems to just evolve into something. My compositions never turn out to be what I had in mind in the first place. I know some artists "see the finished canvas" before they start, but somehow that has never worked with me! I usually start with one image or a piece of paper or a quote or word and go from there.

The name "henry ward beecher" was put into the flying bird at the top left at first. Then I wondered, at about 9:00 pm tonight where this quote came from (what text). When I googled I found that it came from a piece called "bird brains" and voila! I knew it had to be put into the bird instead. I really like how it all came to ballance once I moved his name and added the title. With that, I was done!

Tomorrow this book starts its journey to Kelly in Southern California, where she will most certainly create a real masterpiece for it! It feels right somehow that it is going to "little bird" now! I cannot wait to see how it evolves...