Uploads from Tobin Springs

Ultimate good luck charm :)

nobody@flickr.com (Tobin Springs) — Sun, 22 Nov 2009 19:54:15 -0800

My daughter helping me get my work done! :)

Matthew 13

nobody@flickr.com (Tobin Springs) — Sun, 22 Nov 2009 19:53:29 -0800

Title: Matthew 13
Colored Pencil, 40"X30" (Each panel: 28"X9")

Description and Inspiration
From left to right (1st - 4th panel). The top half of each panel is Jesus' "The Parable of the Sower" (Matthew 13:1-9). Additionally, the bottom half of each panel is Jesus' interpretation of The Parable of the Sower to His disciples (Matthew 13:18-23).

1st Panel
Top Half
Matthew 13:1-4
1That same day Jesus went out of the house and sat by the lake. 2Such large crowds gathered around him that he got into a boat and sat in it, while all the people stood on the shore. 3Then he told them many things in parables, saying: "A farmer went out to sow his seed. 4As he was scattering the seed, some fell along the path, and the birds came and ate it up.
Bottom Half
Matthew 13:18-19
18"Listen then to what the parable of the sower means: 19When anyone hears the message about the kingdom and does not understand it, the evil one comes and snatches away what was sown in his heart. This is the seed sown along the path.

2nd Panel
Top Half
Matthew 13:5-6
5Some fell on rocky places, where it did not have much soil. It sprang up quickly, because the soil was shallow. 6But when the sun came up, the plants were scorched, and they withered because they had no root.
Bottom Half
Matthew 13:20-21
20The one who received the seed that fell on rocky places is the man who hears the word and at once receives it with joy. 21But since he has no root, he lasts only a short time. When trouble or persecution comes because of the word, he quickly falls away.

3rd Panel
Top Half
Matthew 13:7
Other seed fell among thorns, which grew up and choked the plants.
Bottom Half
Matthew 13:22
22The one who received the seed that fell among the thorns is the man who hears the word, but the worries of this life and the deceitfulness of wealth choke it, making it unfruitful.

4th Panel
Top Half
Matthew 13:8-9
8Still other seed fell on good soil, where it produced a crop—a hundred, sixty or thirty times what was sown. 9He who has ears, let him hear."
Bottom Half
Matthew 13:23
23But the one who received the seed that fell on good soil is the man who hears the word and understands it. He produces a crop, yielding a hundred, sixty or thirty times what was sown."

Matthew 13 (1st Panel)

nobody@flickr.com (Tobin Springs) — Sun, 22 Nov 2009 19:52:59 -0800

Tobin Springs posted a photo:

Matthew 13 (2nd Panel)

nobody@flickr.com (Tobin Springs) — Sun, 22 Nov 2009 19:52:48 -0800

Tobin Springs posted a photo:

2nd Panel
Top Half
Matthew 13:5-6
5Some fell on rocky places, where it did not have much soil. It sprang up quickly, because the soil was shallow. 6But when the sun came up, the plants were scorched, and they withered because they had no root.
Bottom Half
Matthew 13:20-21
20The one who received the seed that fell on rocky places is the man who hears the word and at once receives it with joy. 21But since he has no root, he lasts only a short time. When trouble or persecution comes because of the word, he quickly falls away.

Matthew 13 (3rd Panel)

nobody@flickr.com (Tobin Springs) — Sun, 22 Nov 2009 19:52:39 -0800

Tobin Springs posted a photo:

3rd Panel
Top Half
Matthew 13:7
Other seed fell among thorns, which grew up and choked the plants.
Bottom Half
Matthew 13:22
22The one who received the seed that fell among the thorns is the man who hears the word, but the worries of this life and the deceitfulness of wealth choke it, making it unfruitful.

Matthew 13 (4th Panel)

nobody@flickr.com (Tobin Springs) — Sun, 22 Nov 2009 19:52:07 -0800

Tobin Springs posted a photo:

4th Panel
Top Half
Matthew 13:8-9
8Still other seed fell on good soil, where it produced a crop—a hundred, sixty or thirty times what was sown. 9He who has ears, let him hear."
Bottom Half
Matthew 13:23
23But the one who received the seed that fell on good soil is the man who hears the word and understands it. He produces a crop, yielding a hundred, sixty or thirty times what was sown."

Nursery Rhyms for Evangeline

nobody@flickr.com (Tobin Springs) — Sat, 21 Nov 2009 15:42:11 -0800

Tobin Springs posted a photo:

Pen & Ink , Watercolor, 30"X20"

Illustrating a few famous nursery rhyms for my daughter.

Wind

nobody@flickr.com (Tobin Springs) — Tue, 17 Nov 2009 22:16:26 -0800

Tobin Springs posted a photo:

Acrylic, impressionistic style painting, 30"x20"
As a Christian, a comparison might be made to a sail ship, where one wants God to guild them, powering them, move one through life by the Holy Spirit. Very quickly you become dead in the water if you let your sails down and stop catching the wind, stagnating in life, directionlessly bobbing around in life. I want the Wind in my sails! :)

final

nobody@flickr.com (Tobin Springs) — Sun, 01 Nov 2009 23:52:17 -0800

Tobin Springs posted a photo:

Gift

composite copy

nobody@flickr.com (Tobin Springs) — Sun, 01 Nov 2009 23:52:10 -0800

Tobin Springs posted a photo:

The Way

nobody@flickr.com (Tobin Springs) — Tue, 20 Oct 2009 00:20:38 -0700

Tobin Springs posted a photo:

The Way , is a 20"X30" Pen & Ink, watercolor, on Illustration board/smooth surface.

This turned out being a lot more detailed than I expected it to be, but I had a lot of fun seeing it develop as I worked on it. The general idea in this one, was more topical and symbolic in nature. Simply put this picture is meant to show change in a persons life when they come to faith(specifically Christianity). The left side of the picture, was based off of a WWI, trench warfare, no-mans-land idea. All symbolizing the chaos that people can be in when they don't have structure or God in their life. I've been challenged recently in my life personally with becoming a father, and seeing how so many people have kids in a non-ideal way (e.g., single parents, cohabitation without committing to marriage and raising kids) and how it many times leads to craziness for the family, especially the kids as they grow up. I was challenged by the thought of marriage, and how in many ways without what we read about in Genesis and God's establishment of marriage for humanity, and IF we never had that concept...SO many things would be different in world. That's just one concept/area that this might apply, basically you could take this line of thinking into nearly every area of life and apply some sort of moral/ethical teaching in how God has provided a type of structure for humanity to live by. Lastly regarding my inspiration, some of the reason why I was thinking about all of this, is over the years, I have taught a number of students who are 1st generation immigrant students from many war torn regions of the world e.g. Somalia, Ethiopia, Eritrea, Iraq, Bosnia, Cambodia, Laos, Vietnam, and Burma...and a lot more...but basically, how there is a prevailing theme of insane levels of chaos/war and how destructive it is for people. People, family's, are not able to live and thrive in a chaotic, lawless environment, let alone a war. Using Somalia as an example, its crazy, because their country has been without an official government for 15yrs. and they really are only able to progress to a certain level before more fighting breaks out because certain groups don't want other groups to have all the power. I guess I'm making a point for how destructive long term civil wars and wars in general can be for human development, and that was part of my inspiration for the left side of my work.
The right side of the work is meant to symbolize the state that a person comes into when they choose the path of faith, i.e.when someone becomes a Christian. I guess it might go beyond just faith, and into action and change of lifestyle as well. I used orchards and vineyards as contrasting imagery to the trenches, that simply symbolized life and growth. Green vegetation was a way that I showed this through out this whole side, grassy fields, pools instead of blasted craters in contrast to the wasted side. It wasn't my intention for the right side to be heaven, rather an example of how things change for people who come to faith, and how many will profess how they see their life as becoming a type of new life from their past. Maybe more peaceful, calmer, things more in order and alive. My main focus for this side was to convey a sense of peace, and life. The horizontal boardwalk that runs through both sides of the work, is meant to symbolize the path of faith that a person gets onto in order to cross the wall. The lit lamp represents Jesus (inspired by C.S. Lewis' lamppost in his Narnia books), maybe the wall represents the separation of sin between humanity and God. How the world of human chaos and destruction and ultimately death, and God's world of peace, hope and ultimately life. There is obviously Christian/theological symbolism in this work, and yet it wasn't my intention to create a whole theological work...rather I simply wanted to show the contrast between the two worlds in a symbolically clear way, relevant in symbolically showing how a person maybe comes to faith...from one state, into another. I tried to mirror a lot of imagery on each side. I was a fun picture to paint, and I was intentional with making the distance appear more washed out and lighter due to an atmospheric effect as you got farther and farther into the picture.

Dimensional Fishbowl, 20"X30", watercolor pencils

nobody@flickr.com (Tobin Springs) — Tue, 20 Oct 2009 00:20:35 -0700

Tobin Springs posted a photo:

The idea/inspiration behind this work:
I'm fascinated how in science as we make more and more discoveries about our universe, there seem to be more questions that arise. Specifically, I'm very interested in the study of other dimensions, e.g. the 3D world we live in, but also, time, and ALL the other unseen things going on around us...that we are unaware of, yet are happening. I've read and heard about how many scientists believe there could be a lot more dimensions than what we perceive now. The mysteries of the human body, black holes, the study of Anti/dark-matter and the huge questions of where 90% of the universe's mass is, seem to point to this concept that there are other dimensions that we just test for...yet.

I played off of Leonardo's: Study of Man to symbolize a lot of the mysteries of the human body - especially, the concept of how rare intelligent life is or any life for that matter. The unique issue of how the human mind, brain and body all work together for each person and the question if there is something more to that whole process? Is human life/biology JUST a bunch of chemical and electrical impulses? Do emotions (such as Love) point to a type of evidence that we simply can't test for?

I saw a documentary about deep sea vents off the coast of Chili, and how its a 100% zero light environment at the bottom of the ocean, and yet life is flourishing in total darkness because of one type of bacteria/extremafile that is able to pull surfer out of the water (that is super hot). A whole mini ecosystem of life - 6ft big tube worms, crabs, shrimp and other things all living in this harsh zero light environment. It was fascinating to me because this has been going on for a while now at the bottom of the ocean and nearly everyone was unaware of it and yet now we know that life can exist in a 0 light environment. Some scientists even think that life has the potential of living in liquid oceans on other planets because of this evidence.

Showing the Earth and sun symbolizing the huge dynamics that are essential for life to exist on Earth. Apparently if Earth would have been closer or father away from the Sun, we would be cooked or frozen. Additionally, because of the orbit and motion of our planet in our solar system, Earth's iron core spins causing a magnetic field/shield to be project in space around our planet effectively shielding us from a lot of our Sun's harmful solar radiation. The Ozone layer helps prevent a lot of harmful Ultraviolet light from reaching the Earth. All of these factors combined help life be able to exist on Earth.

Dimensional Fishbowl

nobody@flickr.com (Tobin Springs) — Tue, 20 Oct 2009 00:20:31 -0700

Tobin Springs posted a photo:

The idea/inspiration behind this work:
I'm fascinated how in science as we make more and more discoveries about our universe, there seem to be more questions that arise. Specifically, I'm very interested in the study of other dimensions, e.g. the 3D world we live in, but also, time, and ALL the other unseen things going on around us...that we are unaware of, yet are happening. I've read and heard about how many scientists believe there could be a lot more dimensions than what we perceive now. The mysteries of the human body, black holes, the study of Anti/dark-matter and the huge questions of where 90% of the universe's mass is, seem to point to this concept that there are other dimensions that we just can't test for...yet.

I played off of Leonardo's: Study of Man to symbolize a lot of the mysteries of the human body - especially, the concept of how rare intelligent life is or any life for that matter. The unique issue of how the human mind, brain and body all work together for each person and the question if there is something more to that whole process? Is human life/biology JUST a bunch of chemical and electrical impulses? Do emotions (such as Love) point to a type of evidence that we simply can't test for of something more?

I saw a documentary about deep sea vents off the coast of Chili, and how its a 100% zero light environment at the bottom of the ocean, and yet life is flourishing in total darkness because of one type of bacteria/extremafile that is able to pull surfer out of the water (that is super hot). A whole mini ecosystem of life - 6ft big tube worms, crabs, shrimp and other things all living in this harsh zero light environment. It was fascinating to me because this has been going on for a while now at the bottom of the ocean and nearly everyone was unaware of it and yet now we know that life can exist in a 0 light environment. Some scientists even think that life has the potential of living in liquid oceans on other planets because of this evidence.

Showing the Earth and sun symbolizing the huge dynamics that are essential for life to exist on Earth. Apparently if Earth would have been closer or father away from the Sun, we would be cooked or frozen. Additionally, because of the orbit and motion of our planet in our solar system, Earth's iron core spins causing a magnetic field/shield to be project in space around our planet effectively shielding us from a lot of our Sun's harmful solar radiation. The Ozone layer helps prevent a lot of harmful Ultraviolet light from reaching the Earth. All of these factors combined help life be able to exist on Earth.

Story Time

nobody@flickr.com (Tobin Springs) — Wed, 16 Sep 2009 19:45:27 -0700

Tobin Springs posted a photo:

Story Time
Pen & Ink, Watercolor, 30"x20"
Inspiration was pretty simple, I've always enjoyed books, kid books, graphic novels, books, books, books! :) Remembering my Mom read to me as a child is still with me to this day. Maybe the fairy tail character Little Red Riding Hood was the inspiration for the woman in this work, maybe the toll was a type of self portrait (I'm a big guy, who still enjoys stories being read to me). I was going for a fun, fantasy, feel in this work. Hope you enjoy it all. I wish I hadn't made the ladies face so scary. :)

Avid Grapes

nobody@flickr.com (Tobin Springs) — Mon, 24 Aug 2009 20:21:57 -0700

Tobin Springs posted a photo:

Drew this in San Diego CA

IMG_7277

nobody@flickr.com (Tobin Springs) — Wed, 03 Jun 2009 00:23:40 -0700

Tobin Springs posted a photo:

IMG_7154

nobody@flickr.com (Tobin Springs) — Wed, 03 Jun 2009 00:23:38 -0700

Tobin Springs posted a photo:

IMG_0874

nobody@flickr.com (Tobin Springs) — Wed, 03 Jun 2009 00:23:37 -0700

Tobin Springs posted a photo:

IMG_0865

nobody@flickr.com (Tobin Springs) — Wed, 03 Jun 2009 00:23:35 -0700

Tobin Springs posted a photo:

Trying to catch some zzz's with my new born daughter. :)

IMG_0862

nobody@flickr.com (Tobin Springs) — Wed, 03 Jun 2009 00:23:34 -0700

Tobin Springs posted a photo: