Bitter Ashes cover

This is a cover illustration for a book about the Canadian effort and experience in World War II. I took this illustration to approximately 95% completion in late April. At that point the publisher deemed it good enough to use, but I wasn't totally happy with it, and planned to give it a little more polish.

Unfortunately, it took me four and a half months to finish it. I'm not sure if it was just a lack of time in my schedule, or a lack of talent and confidence. It was probably a combination of all those factors, since I'm sure I've picked up some knowledge along the way that helped me put this piece to rest.

If you are interested, the book is called "Bitter Ashes," and is published by Napoleon/Rendezvous Press.

This painting is © Christopher Chuckry.

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Spirit Mask

Even though it was warm enough to go to the beach today, Autumn is just around the corner. With Autumn comes Thanksgiving and Hallowe'en. This is definitely one of my favourite seasons.

Here, as a foreshadowing of Hallowe'en is a spirit mask I drew a few months ago. Masks of all kinds are interesting to me, so they pop up in my work now and again.

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© Christopher Chuckry

Gargoyle Genie

Seems I'm on a bit of a Gargoyle kick here. This is a quick sketch, inspired by a photo of a gargoyle, that happened to be on my drawing table. I took the photo somewhere in Europe, maybe Paris, I can't recall. I have recently assembled a set of flat file drawers for storing and organizing my artwork, and was able to clean up my studio a little. The kids were anxious to see how things now looked in "Daddy's office," so we spent some time out there this evening, exploring and having a bit of fun.

I drew this with chocolate colored Derwent drawing pencil on 50 lb. Strathmore. It is © Chris Chuckry.

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