Animalau Blog

Run run run…

King of Speed III

detail of dee tail! (detail of the tail!)

After drawing the kitty with nib and ink, I took a photo of him and printed it out with a laser printer. I used a blender pen to transfer the image until the photocopy was exhausted. The images here are a little small, as always you can click on them to get a better look!

This is my third cheetah in the Kings series. This one is not on the website yet, but you can have a look-see of my other cheetah pieces and read about why I’m making these if you click HEREEEEEEE

-Christie

P.S. I’ll be updating more regularly now! I made a lot of stuff!

What makes a doe feel sexy?

roar roar roar roar

A stag has to fight for her (and all her friends). He has to roar the most often and the loudest!

If he is victorious he will have a harem of doe and he will still roar all the time because…

It’s an aphrodisiac for females, they come into heat faster when they hear his roars.

And it lets other males know who is dominant.

At dawn and evening, Stag roars and roars. It’s not uncommon for him to get too exhausted to lead a harem.

Soon another stag will take over. 🙁

-Christie

Carved animals

-Christie

Hi hi! I went to Pittsburgh’s National Aviary last week. I was around the penguins when it was feeding time. They were all waiting by the glass for some fish and followed my hands longingly  when I moved them. I could even direct them to look the right angle by moving my pen! Quite fun, was able to observe a lot of detail in real life, even more than while I was in Antarctica.

-Christie

Peacocks participating in a lek reminds me of high school dances. An all boy high school would extend a number of invitations to other schools to join them for a dance party. These schools were of the all female variety, allowing a small group of young men to a wide selection of young women. In leks, a group of peacocks perform in front of a bunch of female spectators, seemingly giving them all an advantageous platform to show off their strengths. Cruelly, however, usually only one or two peacocks clearly seem to be a worthy hottie, and they are the ones that attract a disproportionate number of peahens.

If you were a bad dancer or weren’t born with the best tail feathers, why would you ever participate in a lek? To very altruistically make that handsome peacock look a lot better?

ball point pen

Perhaps the answer lies in the Price equation, where your inclination to help another is based on how closely related you are to your kin. The males who participate in a lek are all related, so really, by helping them find a good wife(/wives) at least some of your genes will be passed on.

If you were a boy from a single sex school, you’d want to pride yourself in belonging to a school known for the best parties and most successful guys. Or the hottest high school girl in the world is dating a guy from your chemistry class!

-Christie

doodles in their original ink colours

-Christie

This one has been on my work desk for a year and I’ve only drawn it just now.

-Christie

During our vacation on the Galapagos Islands we  visited a farm where tortoises roam freely. Visitors are also allowed to roam freely so I squatted near one, about 30 ft away, and watched him eat grass.

Tortoises really do move in slow-mo and the sound of their breathing is steady and hollow, like Darth Vader! To my amazement, this tortoise  started feeding in my direction and would occasionally make eye contact. At the time I felt like I should appear and breathe similarly so that I would not alarm him and hopefully attract him even nearer.

"Hares are awful, aren't they?"

Or perhaps he was rather more interested by my dissimilarity, like I was with his. Was he merely curious? Did he wonder what was so stinky? Do tortoises investigate with their mouths? As he got even closer, my excitement mutated into nervousness. I fixated on his eyes and worried over not understanding his intentions. He continued to advance (Zzzzzzz), and at last I made a sharp movement. I panicked because…he was too alien.

Immediately, he hissed and sucked his head into his shell.

I flinched because I believed our minds were too disconnected. And yet, once he recoiled I knew we were at least on the same chicken wavelength. I still wonder what would have happened.

-Christie

Another cheetah from the King of Speed series.

Kings 2

detail of original ink drawing

original and his first descendant

The image reproduction technique I used for this piece was a transparency transfer. It requires documentation of the original, an inkjet print on a transparency, matte medium and a spoon to burnish the image onto the paper. Visually, I really like how this method reveals the pigment the printer uses to reproduce a black ink drawing, and also how the matte medium rips the transferred image. It truly distorts the original make up of the cheetah and deteriorates the copies of him.

-Christie

Capillary action is only one of the phenomenons of water. Water can be intricate and fleeting itself and yet mercilessly ravage our own delicate works. Whether water goes with gravity or against it, does evil or good, it will have no emotion.

Japanese Macaque

Unlike these Japanese snow monkeys. Linear description of them is threatened after a superficial meeting with water.

against gravity

The design of water dictates that things get lost and exquisite works revert to mush. The clip that stuck with me the most has been the houses ripped and submerged by the tsunami. My condolences to the victims in Japan who have lost their dear homes and are experiencing such violent heartbreak.

Sadly, also to the dolphins that were trapped in their sea pens and crushed against the rocks as fierce tides rose and fell repeatedly in Taiji.

http://savejapandolphins.org/blog/post/cove-volunteers-safe-after-apocalyptic-experience-taiji-dolphins-perish

-Christie