I was meeting some friends and members of the IO in the “Aquazoo in Düsseldorf”; a big aquarium with lots of nice fish. I don’t fancy to draw fish, I don’t know how to define their body forms and shapes. I guess, I don’t like that they all seem so arbitrarily in their forms, that there is not a real rule attached to them.
But the structures and colors of them are so amazing. Too bad, that I just sketch in black & white :)

I am also attending a drawing class. My study at the university of Düsseldorf left lots of space for wonderful typography lessons, but not really for drawing classes: illustration was nothing more than dalmatians are for Cruella de Vil.

My new drawing class is taught by a Russian artist from the St. Petersburg art academy, which is awesome only that all of the attendees are on an extremely low skill level. Some of them are really weired:

I think that one of them spies on me :) do you remember this Eager Beavers who sat next to you spying on what you were writing, pulling back, holding their arms all over what they were writing, in case you wanted to spy on them (which they did already in first place). Well, anyway, I have an older lady, probably 50, who talks in a very precocious way, and when she sits next to me, she spies like that at my drawings: giving exaggeratedly looks, pulling back, holding her arms over her own drawings. Haha, that makes me feel quite weird.
Another woman was insisting that there was a pencil stealer in the room and that she saw that I have the same pencils than her. Funny, I don’t have these pencils. But she was telling everybody outside while smoking.
Well, as you see, I am not so well with the people there, but the teacher is fantastic. He knows what I need: perspective and anatomy. Even though I read a lot about perspective, I am so much more happy that he tells me the tricks and just force me to do perspective, which I usually avoid.
It is also a nice way to get out of my own habits of drawing in black and white and experiment again.

And here is a music-video in which I fell in love with. I want to buy a little praxinoscope and experiment with it and do animation again (its just 16 frames, perfect!)

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Contribution for the magazine “Batterie” It comes with a little riddle inside.

// Beitrag für das Magazin “Batterie“. Es hat ein kleines Bilderrätsel versteckt. Wer kanns raten? //

I did this little assignment for a bigger agency. Unfortunately they didn’t accept it into their pitch.
Anyway, I think it is a cozy setting.

Diese Zeichnung entstand im Auftrag einer größeren Agentur. Leider wurde es nicht für den Pitch ausgewählt. Ich glaube trotzdem, dass es ein gemütliches Bild abgiebt. Mehr darf ich nicht sagen… :)

Hello there, well,… I think I was lucky enough to choose the wrong door again:

Mother holle led her also to the great door, but while she was standing beneath it, instead of the gold a big kettleful of pitch was emptied over her.

My webhost went bankrupt and shut all its services down immediately. I lost my website/blog again… *I am sorry for the inconvenience of the “Hello World”-message again.* I had a backup of my website, but these databases are my curse :(

What I actually wanted to post:

I did an illustration/poster for a little street-festival here in Cologne. As usual I like the simple use of black&white more than colors. The client wished for some colors though.

I was also in the Cologne zoo again. The visit always gives me a nice, smooth holiday feeling.
I like to draw bisons the most, although I don’t count it as one of my favorite, or best smelling animals.
It was a fun day with my friends Lidi, Oleg, Hannah and Stas.

Speaking of holidays: I was in holiday a few weeks ago. With my overseas-family (Conors dad, mum and sister Shannon ♥) and their friends. We visited, as it is obligatory for Americans, Vienna (Austria), Budapest (Hungary), the Champagne (France) and Brussels (Belgium). I liked bits and pieces of every destination: especially the Schönbrunn palace with the famous Sissi-Story. I have not watched the movies…

…but the story of her (Sissi on Wikipedia) is very dramatic and makes the whole visit in this castle even more exciting.

Worse a visit are the “Heurigen”-gardens. They serve wine of Vienna’s vintners, with excellent food, in wonderful fairytale gardens.

Budapest is a very, very cool city: beautiful, exciting and cheap. The fantastic restaurants, bars and views make up for a less culturally packed city as Vienna. The bars can be found in old ruins in the Jewish Quarter (ruin pub “Szimpla”) I have not been in any cooler bar than in Budapest. And again, everything is cheap.

Here is a little view of the Budapest princess, similar to the mermaid in Copenhagen. It has no strong meaning to it, but it is beautiful.

We bought some nice Champagne in the Champagne, of course. And we had some good Belgium bear in Brussels (and Comics en masse)

I have some new and fresh ideas, and after all this digital mess, I am happy to move on.
See ya.
Antje

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Dear reader, you may have wondered about the “Hello World” in your reader or on this site. Well, while I had been struggling with programming and database switching, I accidently deleted my blog content. I am sorry for the loss of my digital diary. Especially the part hurts, where I was reporting about my trip around the world.

Nevertheless, it doesn’t mean that I have to stop this blog; I just have to restart. (ENTER THE HERO!)

And isn’t it a fresh, nice start when you also happen to have a brand new website set up? *wink*wink*

You have access to my new website in two languages (english/german) and I hope that the Internet Explorer is not a disaster, as it usually is!

www.antjeherzog.de

I was pretty busy with the redesign. I hope you enjoy a smoother navigation and a better look into my portfolio. I am happy about comments, critique and feedback. My blog was redesigned, too; of course (including a cute lucky cat watch). So, dear fellows, get out of your RSS-reader and into the browser-universum. :)

What else am I busy with?

Currently I am helping my friend Inga with the set up for her jewelry collection. We ordered some pattern for nice little jewelry bags.

I am also accepted into the 3×3 Professional Show with my book “Neighbourhood Conversations at Flower Beds and Fire Hydrants”.

I am shown in the recent 3×3 magazine, featuring James Jean, Eddie Guy and Christopher Silas Neal. The magazine is really beautiful, not only the presented art and illustration, but also the paper quality. The articles are a little bit difficult to read for me, which is totally owed by my lack of proper English :/

The NY based magazine is run by the accredited publisher and design director Charles Hively. It appears three times a year and “takes an in-depth look at art and environment of three illustrators”.

I am proud of these achievements :)

Currently I love:

Her Morning Elegance, by Oren Lavie. I wouldn’t say that I am a big fan of his music; but I haven’t seen such a beautiful video in a long time. It is so creative: I think I watched it over 15 times now. It makes me want start a stop motion movie immediately.

Whats next?

I am going on vacation, yay! I truly need a little holiday. My second family from over the ocean is going to visit us here in Cologne and we are traveling with them to Vienna, Budapest, Champagne and Brussels.

I will post some vacation photos and I will not forget my sketchbook!

See ya…

Antje

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