Michelle Dickens- 69 Love Songs

When I first heard "Zebra," the sweetness of the melody and use of accordion reminded me of carousel music. Invoking Victorian-themed imagery, I set out to capture the fleeting, dream-like quality of this song with this fantasy illustration.

Kyle Smart - 69 Love Songs

'I think I need a new heart'

Somehow 2006 passed me by without this album, what a lovely set of songs. Again, using this as an opportunity to try some new digital techniques.

Elisabeth Alba - 69 Love Songs

 I uh... don't listen to Magnetic Fields and had no idea what their 69 love songs were! So I looked through all the song titles and "Abigail, Belle of Kilronan" caught my eye, since it sounded like it could be historically based. The lyrics tell the tale of a young man off at war, imagining how his love, Abigail, will someday be the beauty of County Galway. I decided to paint Abigail, praying for her love to come home.

Tried something new... painted it all first with my favorite matte ink (Dr. Ph Martin's Black Star) then layered the color on top. So here is the black and white version... (scanned it in case the color didn't go well)

Daniel Nyari - Favorite Love Story

Yo Month Of Love, I’m really happy for you, Imma let you finish but Yeezy has one of the best love stories of all time!

Lee Moyer - 69 Love Songs

Kristina Carroll - Fetish

Pasiphae
graphite on paper

Taurophilia - The love of bulls.

Oh those Greeks. So much bestiality.

 I've been enamored of the Labyrinth and Minotaur story ever since I can remember. So naturally I had to give a nod to poor Pasiphae who was cursed by the gods to become obsessed with a bull and give birth to the Minotaur as a result. This was a very quick drawing experimenting with different ways of using graphite. I've had bulls on the brain a lot lately because I am working on a full Minotaur illustration right now. Here's a teaser:

Daniel Nyari - Fetish

Apotemnophilia: The Sexual Arousal based on the image or fantasy of one's self as an amputee.

Taryn Cozzy - Fetish

Gerontophilia - sexual attraction to the elderly

Winona Nelson - Fetish

A little-studied fetish: Narcissism, or autoeroticism.  It's a sexual and romantic attraction to oneself and preference for single-player sexy times over sex with a partner.

Scott Murry - Fetish

People do some weird shit out there. We all love our pets, but somewhere you gotta draw the line—Keep that peanut butter to yourself!

Lee Moyer - Fetish

Jorge Mascarenhas - Fetish

Just another Formicophilia illustration.

Chris O'Neill - Fetish

I'll let this one speak for itself....

Angela Rizza - Fetish

Did my piece on formicophilia, which is when you're sexually aroused by insects crawling on you.

Richie Pope - Fetish

Pygophilia, the love of butts. Enough said. 

Carly Janine Mazur - Fetish

5" x 7" oil and acrylic on board

Formicophilia - having sexual interest in being bitten by and crawled upon by insects. Among other things... but that can be deduced with your imagination.

Lee Moyer - Fetish

Craig Maher - Fetish

My fetish? Absolutely nothing at all (on).

Amanda Atkins - Fetish

MFK Fisher's passion for food and her ability to describe the pleasure it can bring in writing is what led me to paint this little portrait of her for Fetish week. 

Consider the oyster.

Stacey Lee - Fetish

FURRIES.  

I mean, whatever floats your boat...

Tim Durning- Fetish

This may or may not be a thing people do, but is sure grabbed my attention:
Oculolinctus, also known as "worming" or eyeball-licking fetishism, refers to the alleged paraphilic practice of licking eyeballs for erotic gratification. In mid-2013, it was reported that this alleged fetish was popular in Japan, where it was referred to as "Gankyū name purei." A new "second base" when kissing got boring.

Turns out this can also lead to a lot of eye infections! I wondered, is pink eye just the new hickey to some people?

Jason Cheeseman-Meyer - Fetish

Female pubic hair is coy by its very existence.  It simultaneously conceals and calls attention to.

Lee Moyer - Fetish

Alice Stanne - Fetish

For my fetish piece I decided to do formicophilia, the arousal to insects, or as I like to call them my kinky bugs. Each bug was painted in watercolor and cut out, then pinned into a handmade box lined with cork board.

Kevin Jay Stanton - Fetish (2 of 2)

Like I said, this was a tough one for me to figure out. In the end I decided the closest thing I have to a fetish is falling in love with a series of fictional characters. I have a thing for grumpy, sarcastic guys in particular, and chief among them is Garrus Vakarian, of the Mass Effect trilogy. It's actually spun into what could be a small series akin to Kali Ciesemier's awesome zine, All My Anime Boyfriends, at this point. So maybe I'll give that a shot when I have a little more time!

Kevin Jay Stanton - Fetish (1 of 2)

Initially I didn't plan on doing a piece this week because I couldn't think of anything other than the lyrics of a Rihanna song. When I mentioned this to my little brother, he thought of Hedonismbot, so I did a quick cut-out of one of my favorite Futurama characters. It's kind of a dirty gold color, which I think is pretty apt.

And I couldn't help but hear "Djambi!" in my head while doing this.

Next piece coming in a few hours!

Jeanine Henderson - Fetish

Found myself kind of fascinated when I came across "Forniphilia" while doing a little research for this challenge. It 's a form of bondage and sexual objectification in which a person's body is incorporated into a piece of furniture...

I've been inspired a lot lately by the work of Erte, simplifying & stylizing and trying to find that sweet spot of illustration perfectly married with design.

Lee Moyer - Fetish

Elisabeth Alba - Fetish

I recently learned about Melissophilia, an arousal toward bees/wasps/hornets/etc. Melissa comes from the Greek name for 'honey bee.' There's all kinds of interesting things that can be read about bees in mythology here: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Melissa. Anyway somehow I decided I wanted to draw a girl with bees and it turned into this!

Lee Moyer - Fetish

Scott Murry - Favorite Love Story

Linda Ramone originally dated Joey, but ultimately went for Johnny. It's one of the most famous love triangles of modern love. She was even the subject of classic Ramones songs like "The KKK Took My Baby Away." However it went down, these two are rad. Happy (belated) V-Day!

Kristina Carroll - Favorite Love Story

Dragonslayer
Charcoal 18 x 24

It's a little ironic that I am not a huge love story person. When it comes to romance, I like my stories with a little less "Happily Ever After" and a little more grit. And while so many of the stories illustrated so far definitely fall into that category for me (some of which I was considering doing myself!)- I still needed something more. Especially when it came to inspiring me visually.

There is a painting By Jeffrey Catherine Jones called Dragonslayer. It's  a twist on the classic St. George and the Dragon tale, where the hero goes to rescue the Maiden, only to find her in bed with the Dragon. I have been in love with this painting ever since seeing it and just couldn't get it out of my head. So I decided to pay homage to that illicit romance and one of my favorite artists.

Taryn Cozzy - Favorite Love Story

This is based off of Norah Jones' song "Man of the Hour" - It's one of those funny love stories about how a woman's unsuccessful search for a man has helped her realize she doesn't need one. She sees that she has a more reliable catch - her dog - and together they share the kind of love a man can't fill. This love story goes out to those of us who share an unconditional love with our dogs.

Favorite Love Story- Ricardo Lopez Ortiz

The Terminator

Guy travels trough time in order to save girl from killer robot, who is also from the future. While protecting her, he falls in love and fathers the future savior of mankind.

Perfect.

Erika Steiskal - Favorite Love Story

Beauty and the Beast has long had a place of honor in my romantic heart.

Jorge Mascarenhas - Favorite Love Story

After deliberating between 6-10 stories, I finally chose this one: "Let the Right One In."

Lee Moyer - Favorite Love Story

Mary Shelley starred in her own poetic love affair of course. But that may not even be her greatest or most sublime reason to be here in the Month of Love.

Steen - Favorite Love Story

I had a list of couples about twenty long and I couldn't choose any one over the other.  I love each of them for different reasons, but one trope I always come back to is the knight/noble lady.

Lauren Saint-Onge - Favorite Love Story

The Dark Tower Series by Stephen King is my favorite book series of all time.  The fact that Roland Deschain is so emotionally detached at the start of the tale and by the end, transforms into a feeling human being, is fascinating to me.  Someone who has learned to be alone for so long, accepts friendship, as well as the ability to love and depend on other people again. And I think that's a great kind of love story.

Love Story - Marc Scheff

This week, again I'm doing double, or quadruple duty.

I read this story, "Magnets" by Thais Miller from Nautilus mag, about a love through time, like a mini Cloud Atlas. It seemed like a fun one to take apart. I also decided to do it on a 5.75" square postcard, so I can use it for the Mail Me Art project. Then my friend, DJ 80 Bugg emailed me about her new album, Escape to Mount Cyanide. The imagery I had in mind fit, so I did this up and it will be included with her new CD. I also kept the original drawing intact to put up for sale on my private collectors list.

"Escape to Mount Cyanide"

acrylic, ink, pen, pencil, on a very small postcard