August 4, 2009
Brad Radina came out this morning and got our AC working again. Nice to have someone handy in the family.

Last night I got some goodies at the post office. I ordered The 200 Drawings of Heinrich Kley from Amazon last week and also The Fourth Annual Collection: Black & White Images from the James Vadeboncoeur Collection. And a third title: Gustav Klimt: 100 Drawings (as a bonus because Kathy needed another book to qualify for some shipping deal). And, by the way, are we spoiled on turnaround, or what? Unlike some entities that warn of six week waits when you buy something, Amazon has revolutionized shipping turnaround and it does one thing very successfully: it makes me want to order more!

Meanwhile, I finished my 12 sketches of the day last night by poaching from a few of the giants from "The Golden Era of Pen & Ink Illustration 1890-1922":

This is a mash of the cover of Black & White Images, which features a William R. Leigh illustration:

But the real star of the trio was the Heinrich Kley book. A German painter and commercial artist with a modest reputation in the 1890s, who suddenly re-appeared out of nowhere in 1908 as a savage cartoonist. Last night I had fun learning from his very liberal linework:

Talk about loose as a goose! This guy could really render with a fluidity that is breathtaking.

These are sketches 9,654 thru 9,666, with 334 to go on my quest to do 10,000 bad drawings.

Meanwhile, got an interesting photo of a gunfighter from Roy Flachs who wonders if it is in fact Wild Bill Hickok. He says, "I figure it to be an 1870s image as it is a CDV photograph which pre-dates tin types. I'm an antique dealer and it came from a local estate at auction. along with a photo of Shoshone chief Washakie."

What do you think? Is it Hickok?

"A successful tool is one that was used to do something undreamed of by its author."
—S. C. Johnson