Artist Emily Steinberg just raised the stakes on the morning coffee and newspaper ritual. It doesn't just jolt her into consciousness while she checks out world events - she credits it with the evolution of her latest visual narrative, "A Mid Summer Soirée."
"Back when I still got the paper in the morning ... I had a little ritual," Steinberg, who teaches art at Penn State Abington, said. 'I would do the crossword puzzle every morning and then draw a little creature on top of the puzzle or somewhere on the funnies page."
"I liked the randomness of what happens in a drawing when you draw on top of things. Bits of words, bits of comics, find their way into my new little drawing, creating a densely packed image," the Philadelphia resident continued. "I did this every day for months. Then, I scanned them and added the storyline."
The intricate drawings, some in color, merge with and emerge from scraps of crossword puzzles, newspaper articles, and cartoons. Each showcases a creature or or two, some in pre-party mode and others arriving and socializing.