Illustration Friday - Tales and Legends 2 - Man In Black

On the building of Old Town Hall complex, right next to a Gothic bay window, you can see a picture of the man in black who is mentioned in one of the oldest stories - about a widow and a false oath.

Every Wednesday , people used to come to the town hall court with their complaints to seek justice. Once a widow stated that her husband´s field had been robbed by one of the municipal lords who was sitting in the room. He replied that the woman is mad and pulled out a document with a seal which confirmed that the field was his. "The document can´t be right! " screamed the desperate widow. "Let the Municipal Lord swear that he is telling the truth ! " He did so, and added, " If it is a false oath, let me be punished justly." Then the whole house shook and became smoky, from the smoke appeared a devil, he threw the liar over his shoulder, and before he disappeared with his booty touched the Town Hall wall with his black hand, and left for ever pressed into it picture of the lying Municipal Lord. Or his own , who knows it exactly today?
And here it is Devil/man in black , done in watercolor and Lamy ink pen on WN CotmanNOT/cold pressed 300 gsm watercolor paper

Illustration Friday - Tales and Legends 1 - Joker Posmievačik

There is only a few cities in the world which has so many tales and legends still living among people, like Bratislava. Many of these found their artistic realisation in fountains, pictures or statues.
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In the niche of Neoclassical house (on Panská street 29) is a small mid-nineteenth century statue of a crouching boy laughing malevolently to which has stuck the nickname Posmievačik (Joker)
The Joker is linked with a story about a beautiful girl living in Pressburg (former name of Bratislava) who could not decide between two admirers. As a result of her quandary, she said that she would marry the suitor who could build a house more rapidly. (Clever girl , isn´t true ?) Both masters started to build houses on sites standing opposite each other. The winner got the bride. In a niche on the front of his house the Joker sat to mock his neighbour for his loss. However,some city inhabitants say that the statue is only boy who wanted to see a coronation procession, so much, that he peered over from his potty where he was sitting. Others say that the boy is looking at flood waters to see if they have started to fall. Finallu, according to some, he is showing sailors the way to the previous location of the red-light district - the Vydrica.
Who knows it today ? It´s a tales and legends all about.

The Joker is done with watercolors (Yarka White Nights) and Lamy pen at WN Water Colour 300 gsm Cotman NOT/cold pressed paper

17th World Wide Sketch Crawl / Bratislava, Slovakia

Today was a day for 17th WWSC. Here in Bratislava was terrible weather, it was foggy, rainy and windy. Despite of this I spent two and half hour in Old Town sketching down some maybe interesting objects.In my art goals for 2008 standing : depicting of 12 views of Bratislava here in my blog. There are a plenty of interesting buildings, statues, fountains here . On sketches you can see Ganymede´s fountain right at front of the Slovak National Theatre building, funny statue of Papparazzo and brave soldier (all are friends of Čumil and Schoene Naci ) , with short break for hot tea with view to a Old Town Hall with Roland and his fountain,now covered for winter time).Drawings are done in normal HB pencil and watercolor pencils , sorry for weak scans .

Illustration Friday - Stitch

Done in watercolor pencils Koh-I-Noor Mondeluz on Tillia watercolor paper 250 g

...gone

This is how I feel last 3 months...completely burnt out.

Happy New Year

To each of you, each member of EDM group and each visitor of my blog , thank you for your supportive comments and permanent inspiration.

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Let your year 2008 be CREATIVE & HAPPY !