En-Gross-ing Study

I think I will stop trying to be funny with the titles. It's hard!

Here is a Milt Gross moose, as filtered through my paintbrush.




This moose comes from the cover of Gross's "Hiawatta Witt No Odder Poems", which was published in 1926, and of which I am the owner of a not so bad copy from said year. Here is the cover that I copied above:





I had some trouble with the moose's body, so I didn't draw the moose's body ... I drew the negative shapes around the moose's body instead, and when I was finished, presto ... there was the moose's body! I would kill to crack the secrets of composition and negative space, two things which Milt Gross was obviously well acquainted with when he drew this moose mural. It is deceptively simple, but my oh my how it pleases the eye.