The drawing for the Gatehouse Gazette was ink on Bristol. I decided it needed some color, so I broke out the acrylics and got to work on it. This is the finished result… very vintage pulp in its look and feel.
What I was going for was a very retro sort of Neon Genesis Evangelion sort of concept…of course what it translated to was looking very “War of the Worlds”. I’m perfectly okay with that.
Also – I made the below engraving the other night. It is a throwback to my darker and more minimalist style.
A quaint moonlight ceremony on a cozy cobblestone path, surrounded by stone, lit by flickering torches which lend light the reverse side of the tree.
The Path
If you are interested in Prints of “The Path”, they are at ettadiem.etsy.com for now. If however you are interested in prints of The Gatehouse Gazzette piece, watch this space tomorrow (Thursday). I’d get them up tonight… erm.. this morning.. but I am beat.
I was asked earlier today what the status (particularly current remaining count) of the 32×22 (full sized) giclees are, and since I feel it may interest repeat visitors and new visitors alike, I thought it would be good to repeat the information given here:
Of 50 to be made, ever (no “Second Editions”, no “Bonus Editions”, no “Super-duper Extra Golden Millennium Editions Plus!!!”), minus the one I am keeping for myself, 10 remain.
Of those 50 “the Rescue” giclees, 2 have been stolen (1 disappeared in shipping and was replaced with the next print, 1 was stolen from an owner), 2 have been destroyed (1 accidentally, 1 purposefully).
That leaves 46 existing, meaning only one in 139,417,298 people planet-wide will have one of these things when they are gone.
I am saving 3 for upcoming gallery shows, 1 for myself, and I keep 1 print on hand for every print that is in transit (to have a replacement on hand for those who order, just in case something goes wrong).
So, when another 5 of these have sold, they’ll be out of stock online, and I think they’ll have pretty much seen their last Holiday season here.
I say these things not to pressure anyone into buying, but as a heads up. And my refusal to release future separate editions, is to protect and ensure the value of those prints purchased from me.
I do 1 set of full-sized limited editions from each of the three support types (metallic, canvas, and fine art rag paper), and any open editions of any of those support types are at a reduced size – and of course un-numbered and un-certified.
Thank you for visiting – thank you everyone who has purchased prints here (and enabled me to make artworks for a living) – and thank you everyone else who has made this possible – for every blog, every article, every friendly link or friendly mention, for every url scrawled out on a bathroom wall, and every child named “MykeAmend.com” – You people are incredible, even those of you which don’t exist but might.
It was brought to my attention yesterday that there were a number of prints which were not available in the current incarnation of my site – the result of starting anew on the store I suppose.
Looking through the collection, and cross-comparing, I’ve found at least 40 available prints of at least 15 artworks which never made it back to this site when the rebuild was done.
I’ve added a few tonight, and may add a few more soon. Mostly these are my darker works from over previous years.
I’d also like to start moving ahead and making screen printings of a lot of my engraved images, though I am not quite sure if I am going to make special screen prints for wall hanging, t-shirts, or other items in this course – I believe I will be leaning more towards the t-shirts, bandanas and patches – as I’ve already giclees of most of the engravings.
There will also be some books returning. I am remixing my comic book, starting from the ground up in a lot of places, deleting scenes, adding new ones – and leaning more towards the serious and slightly comedic intended work – less towards the wacky shock humor bit it had become. I’ll have related merch for that when done, but if anyone is interested in any of the remaining comics (there were only 100 of which printed), well just go ahead and contact me for those.
My children’s book, 2 years in the not-making, is next on the slate – I do however have two painting commissions to finish (one of which a book cover for a fave author), and some book illustration (interior work) to do for another author friend of mine.
Anyway – I see a lot of great things coming for this site, and will have a lot of news to give in the coming year. I have a good feeling I will find more time to get more of these projects off my plate come January – but for now – watch for the release of two new paintings (and giclees from them) sometime between December 25th and January 10th.
My sister in law Liz Amend makes these incredible fairy figures, and figures by her are always in rather high demand. This one, I just *had* to post here, as it has stripeys and goggles and a very cool nut-shell helmet. It is available here on Ebay.
Harden is an intrepid explorer and photographer and it looks like he is off on another adventure! He wears a little acorn cap (sculpted of polymer clay) and goggles. He has a tiny camera to capture all the amazing things he will see, maybe he might even see a human! Harden measures about 7 inches tall from his head to his toes, but will measure taller with his stand (not shown).
Winter is on its way, and in order to make our Holidays better, yours and mine, I am holding a big November Sale.
Giclees are the main thing on sale this month – some of which there are less than 15 of remaining, ever, out of 50 that will be out there in the world, ever.
Beth and I would like to get into our apartment before winter hits, which will require a new electrical box, having the stove connected, and a lot of work and investment all the way around. Help us towards this goal, and help yourself to prints at the lowest prices we can ever offer.
Now is your best chance this year, perhaps ever, to get these prints for yourself, friends, or family. Not only are the prices incredibly low, but reserves being what they are, some of these may be gone completely by the month’s end.
I’ve organized a section in the store for this sale, click here, or look for “November Sale” in the store categories (lower right side of this page).
I’ve used a lot of my time this weekend link building: one of many necessary evils which come with being an artist on the web these days.
I’ll be working through the day at adding original works and mini prints, and then from there, I am going to be finishing out commissions while brainstorming on ways to make some very unique completely hand-pulled reproductions of some of my works.
Since Giclees are so incredibly accurate, so vivid in color, so perfect in contrast – it is really hard to make hand-pulled prints and make them better than the less expensive giclees – and I really do like to make giclees available to the people who frequent this site.
So, the task at hand is to come up with something that can be done by hand, and yet is more awesome than an actual-sized limited edition 200-years archival reproduction on canvas.
I think I have something in mind, some research and trial runs will tell if my idea is feasible, but I do hope to be announcing something extra special within this week.
Until then, wish me luck on finishing up these projects, and please don’t take it to heart if for some reason I do not get back to you as quickly as normal. I will be back soon.
Also, I wanted to add that I am trying to offer free advertising to fellow steampunks. These buttons top the links page, and float right below the headline article on the main page, really good placement. The button size is 117×60 pixels. You can contact me through my contact page if you are interested, I am giving first consideration to people who are willing to give return links, and of course people I am friends with on the various social networking sites and steampunk boards.
New for summer is an extensive collection of engravings as limited edition giclees on Hahnemuhle fine-art rag paper format.
Each giclee has rough straight-torn edges and a border of 2.5 to 3 inches of this beautiful rag paper, making for an additional 5 to 6 inches in each direction – meaning more wall coverage.
Each these bold limited edition giclees are enlargements of the original highly detailed engravings, showcasing the fine linework and detail within each piece, and making for a wonderful block-print appearance.
Cute Thulhu Against Shiny Gold Stars
To go straight to the prints from engravings, simply choose prints(engravings) in the catalogue listing (right), or click here.
*Also: for those who like to collect mini prints and small prints for scrapbooking purposes, those are next to come… an entire line of every artwork from this site (and some not yet here) will all be available in sizes of 5×7 or smaller.
There are many items now added to the now-better-organized store, and many more items to follow. Please continue to check in this next 7 days.
The site will be undergoing some serious revisions shortly. I have put off a redesign for a while now, but I need to drop my google ads and replace them with something better.
I also need to upgrade, re-install, and rewrite some of my plugins and other things, update links for broken videos in my player, and most importantly – make this thing more roomy and easier to read.
In the next few weeks, this site may revert to the default templates, looking very very plain. It might even present itself incorrectly or broken for a few seconds or minutes here or there, as I will likely make an oops here or there. There are a lot of changes to be made. I am going to miss this design, but hopefully the upcoming one is more striking and easier to navigate and read. This might even force me to fill in some of those much-neglected sections.
The current sale – extended till New Years, then renewed up to Valentines day, will end on March 1st. I need to return a lot of things to their normal prices, putting new and different things on sale soon after.
Bethalynne Bajema and I have been invited to be guests of Honor at TempleCon – a steampunk and gaming convention in Rhode Island, and weeks later, we will have a gallery showing in NYC at Genuine Artikle.
