Congrats to President-elect Biden

And so the Orange one appears to have lost... maybe another casualty of the Covidian monster!

I sincerely hope that President-elect Biden can handle the Presidency and this doesn't turn out to be a case of elder abuse, as sometimes Joe seems to be a bit out of it.  

I pray for him and wish him the best of luck - I didn't vote for you, but now that you're about to become President, I will support and respect you and hope that you're not being used as a stooge by the DNC to set up your VP.

I gotta bad feeling about this - keep your eyes peeled Dr. Biden! Protect your husband!

God Bless you Mr. Prez, and God Bless the USA!

Saint Ninian Preaching to the Picts

St. Ninian Preaching to the Picts
1995 Charcoal by F. Lennox Campello 

When Marines go wild

All I said... by F. Lennox Campello, circa 1983

The Sonoma Ballet Conservatory Drawings

These are some of the drawings that I did as a fundraiser for the Sonoma Ballet Conservatory in early 1993 - there were almost a couple of hundred of them! I exhibited about 30 of them at the Chevrier's Presidio Gallery in Sonoma, and they all sold out on opening night!

I used some of these in 1994 or 1995 to apply for a studio at the Torpedo Factory.

I was rejected, and one of the reasons given for the rejection was that the drawings were "clearly copies of Degas' works." 

I was furious that someone's lack of art history knowledge had disqualified my application, but later I realized that whoever that erroneous and anonymous juror had also taught me an unintended lesson: there are some subjects in art (in this case ballerinas) that are so imprinted into the collective mind as coming from a particular artist (in this case Degas), that the subject has been signed off into eternity as not to be re-done by anyone else!

That was a harsh lesson to learn, but a very valuable one! 

Portrait of John Lennon

This portrait of John Lennon is from an assignment at the UW School of Art - circa 1980. The assignment was to incorporate a complex pattern (his shirt) into an otherwise plain line drawing. It has been for years in the collection of my lawyer.

Portrait of John Lennon by F. Lennox Campello - circa 1980 

The Gunny

A 1975 sketch from observing a USMC Gunny conducting counseling on some drunk Navy sailors from USS Saratoga.

The Gunny conducting squid training outside the Texas bar in Naples
1975 sketch by F. Lennox Campello

My grandfather

My paternal grandfather - a Galician immigrant to Cuba. Together with his brother he started out as a ditch digger in Guantanamo at the beginning of the last century, sleeping in the woods and saving money to eventually buy a cow, and then they began to sell milk while they alternated working as ditch diggers in the growing city, which was one of the first in all the Americas with underground sewers. 

By 1959 he owned a large estate and provided milk for most of the region around Guantanamo. By 1961 the Socialists of the Castro Revolution had shown their true cards and declared themselves Communists and confiscated all of his assets. Within two years there were milk shortages all over the island and they remain to this day.

This is what we Americans of Cuban ancestry mean when we say that "we've seen that movie and know how it ends..."