Artwork for the Children's Theater: T-Shirts & Posters!

Modeling my fashion line at a Children's Theater near me.  With my boys after a performance of "Disney's The Jungle Book Kids" wearing the cast T-Shirt with my drawing on it.

  When we first moved to North Carolina my son Presley was befriended by a classmate who had an interest in children's theater. Our family was invited to one of her plays; an original adaptation of "Alice in Wonderland". This was followed by seeing her in a production of "Disney's The Little Mermaid, Junior". At first Presley seemed very content as a spectator only, but at some point he was convinced to audition for an adaptation of "Oliver Twist". He was cast, and well he discovered that he really loved acting. Our corner of North Carolina has a very active community theater scene and he alternates between two companies-"Activate Community Through Theater" or "ACT" and the "Mooresville Community Children's Theater" or "MCCT".  I was eventually converted from a Parent Volunteer to a member of the Board of Directors of  MCCT.  It has been a fun experience being involved in the "behind the scenes" activity of the MCCT.  I have already shared some of the large paintings I've done and I also contribute graphic art for the needs of the productions; posters, logos, T-Shirts.

  If I search my memory far enough I'd have to say I wanted to be a cartoonist, this morphed into an ambition to be a production designer(stage/film/TV), which led to "a career in ARCHITECTURE". Being a person who "was Born 40" I haven't changed much over the years, I'm pretty much the same person I was when I was 6 calendar years old. Or to put it another way I draw in an architectural style heavily influenced by film/tv with a dash of cartoonist thrown in. I emphasize bold line work, heavy geometry and bold use of color.

See that little doodle hanging from that banner, I drew that! 

  For  MCCT's Princess and the Magical Pea I came up with a logo that looks like the famous stacked mattress canopy bed.  I wanted bright, punchy colors since it is a fairy tale and it is a children's theater production. I was just learning to use "Paper by 53" a very intuitive sketching app for iPADs. I can't recommend this enough, it's like having an unlimited supply of fresh Prismacolor markers at your disposal. I do all the artworks using this app. The logo went on posters, street banners and a T-Shirt. Presley played an orphan in the ensemble, we developed his backstory and he named himself  the very Victorian sounding "Ezra Preble".

Picnic with the Peanuts for "Your'e a Good Man, Charlie Brown", this my sketch and it is an original composition.  Not for profit, fair use, etc.

For MCCT's production of "You're a good man, Charlie Brown" a logo was needed for the related fundraising/promotional party that traditionally accompanies our plays. This was to be "A Picnic with the Peanuts gang". So I drew an original sketch of some of the gang having a Picnic with a joyful Snoopy dancing on the table. This ended up being on the cast t-Shirt.

Another one of my banner attachments, this one was hanging on Main Street (Mooresville), U.S.A.!

For MCCT 's "Disney's Jungle Book Kids" I designed an original artwork  that was adapted for posters, street banners, and the cast T-Shirt. I also did a large format lobby painting (I did a separate post on my paintings). I used jungle temple ruins as a frame and as a place for the show title. The characters were then arranged around this frame. Mowgli on Baloo floating on a river, Shere Khan hiding in the grass, Bagheera watching Baloo from above. Colonel Hathi in the distance and the Vultures on a tree branch over it all. Presley had 2 wonderful scene chewing parts, that of Col. Hathi: leader of the elephants and as "Bill, a Vulture" who hoped to eat the carcass of the man cub.  He also was in the Jungle ensemble as a tree, three parts in this one!

"Pencil & Marker" Sketch using Paper by 53 APP

I love drawing so being able to do these has been a real joy. These are my original compositions, done as a volunteer with a non-profit organization which held the appropriate licenses for the various theatrical productions. So no copyright infringement was meant.