This is a card I created from a scratch board I drew of Coney Island, in Brooklyn, NY. All of my friends will tell you that Coney Island one of my favorite spots. It is a short-ish subway ride from my apartment and it contains the perfect mix of glamour and grit. The hot dogs are fantastic, the cheese flavored topping is suspiciously bright yellow, and there are still huge portraits painted on the sides of the buildings for a freak show. The area is "in transition" right now which in New York means that condos and banks are coming to take the neighborhood away from the Freaks. Coney will always live in the collective conscience through movies like On the Town, Annie Hall, Requiem for a Dream, and The Warriors.

This picture prominently depicts the Parachute Jump, a which is sadly no longer running. This structure serves as the main landmark on the boardwalk. Behind the Parachute Jump you can see several tall apartment buildings, the Wonder Wheel, and the Cyclone. The large sandy beach stretches to the right of the picture and eventually to Brighton Beach, New York's Russian Community. (Another one of my favorite spots!) Since Coney is on the Atlantic Ocean large weather fronts are not unusual to see as they slowly float out to sea and make their way to England. Here I have depicted some of the most magnificent clouds I have ever seen.

If you like this card please check out my Etsy page where it is available for purchase. http://www.etsy.com/shop/danieljosephdurkin . I would like to thank everyone for checking out this posting. Hope you're having an exciting summer! -Dan :)

Koi Pond

I love koi fish! It was just a matter of time before they ended up appearing on a card. My boxes of photographs have been filled with snap shots of koi fish from garden ponds for the last several years. Drawing koi also gave me the fun excuse to work with a very exciting shade of orange. If you like this card it is available on my Etsy page at http://www.etsy.com/shop/danieljosephdurkin .

Although this is an illustration of koi, I have to admit that lobsters and seaside port towns have been on my mind following my recent trip to Maine! Please stay tuned for new sketches and artwork!

(Titles for this posting that you will be GLAD that I did not use; "Koi to the World", "Let's Hear it for the Koi", "Babes in Koi-land", "Koi-es Don't Cry", "Koi Vey!")

2011- Year of the Rabbit

The Lunar New Year is almost upon us! For the last several years it has become a favorite holiday of mine. My birthday is on Valentine's Day and my boyfriend and I have thrown parties at our apartment in the past. We figured out that if we called it a Valentine's Day Party single people would feel excluded. I also felt that throwing yourself a birthday party is self-indulgent... we finally decided it would be easier and more fun to celebrate the Lunar New Year.

Last year was the year of Tiger. Any thoughts? I thought it was an okay year... But now we are heading into the Year of the Rabbit. According to the dependable people at a web site called theholidayspot.com we can look forward to a relaxed year in which, "Good taste and refinement will shine on everything and people will acknowledge that persuasion is better than force." Sounds good to me!

This illustration is something I've been itching to do since the year of the Horse! I have a fasination with paper lanterns and I've wanted to try to create the warm, beautiful glow that you get from them when they are lit. Thanks to my buddy Jen who approved the rabbit illustration in advance to make sure he was cute enough... You can't quite tell but this little rabbit is thinking, "This is going to be my year!"

As always this card is available on my Etsy page. Best wishes to my friends!

Holiday Card for 2010!

Hello Friends!

I am pleased to post my holiday cards for 2010! After I posted the Thanksgiving card on Etsy.com I received the greatest response possible; People bought them! I'd like to shout out to my friends Opera-John and Shawn and thank them for buying. Also, Jordan on Manhattan's Upper West Side, Rose in Florida, Jen in Maine, Melissa in Texas, and the Parsons Family in South Carolina! The boost to my confidence was incredible!

Here you see images of the card and two images of the envelope. My initial idea was to create a three image joke. The front of the envelope serves as our "establishing shot" and shows Grand Central Terminal, here in midtown New York. The person receiving the Holiday Card will (hopefully) flip it over and will see an image of an invitation, inviting someone to a Holiday Party that evening hosted by Orion. Upon opening the card the viewer will find that the Holiday Party is being thrown on the underside of the ceiling of Grand Central Station, with all of the Zodiac signs invited. (Taurus the Bull has a present, Pegasus has three gifts, and Cancer the Crab is bringing gifts and wine!)

The illustrations were created from scratch board and they are printed on a natural toned piece of recycled paper. I used a gold marker to try to recreate the gold leaf and stars in the Grand Central Ceiling. It is disappointing but the gold is impossible to scan into the computer. (Please pretend that each figure shimmers a bit!)

If I don't get a chance to post a message before the Holidays, I would like to wish everyone my very best for the last few weeks of 2010 and joy and peace for all of 2011!

Things I am thankful for

I have attached an image of a Thanksgiving card I am preparing to send out to friends and family. Everyone who reads my blog (all five of you) will be receiving a card from me. If anyone else is reading this and would like to receive a card please just send me a comment with your name and home address!

This is an image I have wanted to create into a card for several years. Over the years I have filled several sketch books with doodles in which I planned out this card. The sketches have never worked to my satisfaction and I always question myself and ask, "Does anyone actually send out Thanksgiving cards?" Each year Thanksgiving has passed me by making all of this moot. Happily, this year I managed to find one day to get all of the drawing done. Now I just need a few evenings to paint the white details.

The Thanksgiving Parade in New York was one of those things that I LONGED to attend when I lived in Chicago. Now as a New Yorker I just try to keep it in mind and avoid Times Square and Broadway on Thanksgiving. Often it is very cold and the street is always packed like a sardine can. One has to admire the Radio City Rockettes. Rain or shine they show up every year wrapped in short little fur coats and hats, but only wearing nylons and tap shoes. I'd have thought they'd have learned from the previous years and said, "Hey ladies, how about we wear pants this year?"

The card above is a scratch board illustration of the Dakota on Central Park West and 72nd in New York. This is the famous building where John Lennon and Yoko lived and where Mia Farrow as Rosemary cried out, "His eyes! What have you done to his eyes!?"

The large balloons in front of the building are stand-ins for the cartoon characters who float down the parade each year. I expected to run into legal trouble from The Networks if I put in Sponge Bob or Kermit so here is Nicky the Simple Squirrel, Georgie the Over-Indulgent Turkey, and Wilhelm the Aggressive Penguin. (All the names come from a non-fiction book I'm reading on the lead up to World War I.)

Later this week I will be posting some of these cards onto my Etsy site. Please check them out there along with some of my other work. I am thankful and proud to say that I have sold two items off of Etsy. The two images of the vegetables below were sold and will soon be hanging in someone else's kitchen.