André Franquin (1924 - 1997)

Belgian André Franquin is most known for his comic creation "Gaston Lagaffe", a weekly episode of a guy with lots of interesting ideas but poor execution. Although Franquin had a very humorous style and lots of great ideas, he could be very depressed and couldn't draw for years. Perhaps that's the price some people have to pay for their talent.
Despite that his style is very vivid and extremely fluent. When you're reading his comics it almost looks as if you're watching an animated movie. I can't name any other illustrator who comes close to that style. Take a look at this website and you'll see what I mean. It's French, but the drawings will do the talking.

Panflute

The panflute is known in different parts of the world, in different shapes and names, originally mostly made of wood or bamboo.

One of the most charming uses of the panflute takes place in the Peru - Bolivia area. The women of the Aymares use the panflute to communicate with each other. They have two small panflutes, in different tonal setting, to match with another woman. Who also has two different panflutes. Once they partnered they are musically bonded with each other for the rest of their lives.

The women of the Aymares also assemble in large groups and blend into one complete melody. Just the way music is supposed to be.

Pen and ink, coloured with watercolor.

Big drawing

One of the new year's resolutions I made was to make at least four big drawings this year. Usually my drawings are more or less the size of a postcard, so making drawings at a A4 or even A3 scale will be quite a challenge. In terms of: "can I find enough time to make them?".
The first one is allready inked, as you can see. It's a drawing of a garage in a fictitious little village somewhere in the South of France and I must say so far it's been fun to draw. Most of the drawing is based on two previous posts, as you can see here and here.

Happy New Year