Very random. I know. I wish someone could pay me to draw various birds all day.

An old illustration I dug up from god knows how many years ago, way to heavily inspired by the original “Can you pass the acid test?“.
I think it is fitting for this week.

(These were made as a wall sticker set a couple of years ago, I thought they would look nice in a big white room with minimal furniture.)

1. Wikipedia’s article about sushi. This is a really nice article about sushi and sashimi. A lot of people think that sushi is the same as raw fish, but in fact sushi is the rice, and not the fish. This article about sushi is good reading if you want to know more about different kinds of sushi.
2. The Beauty Of Typography: Writing Systems And Calligraphy Of The World. This is a Smashing Magazine article about different exotic writing systems, mainly focusing on Eastern Asian Languages and Arabic writing systems. I learned a lot about how Arabic is written from this article, and the illustrations are beautiful. It almost made me want to learn Arabic, just to draw those beautiful letters.
3. Kari Bremnes lyrics. Kari Bremnes is my all time favorite artist. A lot of people just quote “Åpen Post” (Norwegian TV show that made a joke about her name) or mistake her for other people (why do people think she is Lynni Treekrem, there is nothing similar about them apart from having a northern dialect). If you have actually listened to any of her songs, you will find a beautiful melancholic and poetic voice. She is absolutely wonderful, and I found out that there is a part of her web page which has lyrics for most of her albums, and it made me so happy. I have been humming to myself all day, even if I can not sing, because her words are so beautiful.
4. Sinhala script. God, it looks beautiful. I first saw it in a bible in a hotel room in Yokohama last summer, and I wanted to find out more about it, so I found some beautiful examples doing a google image search.
5. Lang-8.com. Regarding language studies, lang-8 is absolutely awesome. You write a diary entry in whatever language you are studying, mark what language it is (by choosing from a drop down list), and then native people will correct your diary entry for you. In return, you can correct journal entries written in your naive language. I have found a lot of cool people learning Norwegian and English, and there have been so many kind people correcting my Japanese on this site. No matter what language you are studying, this web page is a great resource.

A couple of years ago I decided to use a different kind of portfolio for a while, so I got a first aid box, and I mounted all the prints on foam board, and had them as little charts inside the box. I was pretty happy with the result, but I think that if I am going to make a new portfolio again, I want to try a different idea. I thought about making my next portfolio like a family photo album or a cabinet of curiosities, but it is a hard line between making something just because it is fun and it is a hobby, and making something you can show clients and employers. If you have seen any creative portfolios around, I would love to see them. I am not planning on making a new one any time soon, but I really want to stock up on ideas for later.

Things have been quiet here on the blog for the past two days, what can I say, real life caught up with me, and I got sick. I am still feeling a bit under the weather, and I am sort of picturing all of these little monsters floating around in my bloodstream and in my head.

I made a couple of sketches during one month last summer because I just wanted to get into drawing a little bit again. I feel like the theme song of my life is “not enough time, too many things I want to do”, so I decided to make some time. It actually worked out fine for about a month, before life caught up with me and I had other and better things to do. But here are some of the sketches from last summer. It would be neat to do some similar projects, to take the time out of the day to do something you want to get better at, if only for a week or so.