Cody Goodin - The artistic and spiritual journey of Cody Goodin

Hi there out in blog land.  I thought I'd post a few new pieces I have been working on for an upcoming show.  I will be debuting these and some other things at the October Essex Studios art walk on October 5 and 6.  Anyway, these are from my more introspective and spiritual side.  I call them Ghost Dancers and are kind of tributes to experiences and thoughts about life.  It has been a rough summer yet again.  I am not sure why I feel so melancholy lately.  Is it the end of an era, the world, culture or simply just a transition phase into something else.  I think it is a complicated process of growing and evolving as a person and inhabitant of this universe. So, I hope you enjoy a look into a different side of my creative expression.  Most of these are around 18" high give or take an inch.  They are mixed media with the foundation being some of the elm and dogwood tree branches saved from a tree pruning a few years back. ...

Hi my fellow art friends out there in blog land.  I wanted to at least post a quick update on one of my projects.  Here is the whole gang of six alter ego dolls I am making for friends.  Can you feel the rainbow?  I really love the pattern I ended up designing in the end.  It was originally based on a Meo Feroy pattern but, it just wasn't what I really was looking for in the shape.  So, I pulled out an old torso pattern and then began tweaking it and redoing the other parts to fit my torso pattern.  So, here are the naked hairless results.  The next stage is hair and facial detailing and then cloths.  I have a shirt from each of my friends that I will be transforming into the clothing for each doll.  Can you guess which color is mine?  This has been such fun so far and has inspired some other ideas. Thanks for stopping by.  Hope to post more stuff in the next week.  Until thing peace and love.

Hello out there in blog land.  I apologize for the long delays in posting.  It has been a busy few weeks for many reasons.  One of which I am experimenting on some Photoshop techniques for processing the images for my Graphic Novel Project or GNP as I lovingly call it now.  The series of images were made from a series of photographs my friend David Walker took of my studio when I had made lots of heads waiting for their next stages of development  I used a cool filter called Lithograph to get the basic effect.  Then it was tweaked in the image menu with the adjustments functions. This image is a cropped version from the above using a adjustment palette of saturation and contrast  to achieve this look. This is another image using color saturation and contrast in addition to a noise filter called dust and scratches. Finally this is a two layer picture that uses the lithograph filter with a layer...

Howdy my fine art doll and fantasy friends.  I thought I'd show you some of what I am up to.  I am working on a big holiday gift project for me and five of my closest buddies.  Next year will mark our 30th anniversary of being friends.  So I am going to create alter doll egos for the six of us.  It is a nice diversion from my graphic novel project.  I am going back to my doll making roots by making these dolls in cloth.  Fleece actually is what I am using.  Each doll will be a different color.  I originally thought to use this lovely doll pattern by designer Meo Feroy.  It is called Funky Fred.  you can see her design pictured below thanks to Dollmakers Journey.  However the body is a modified triangle shape which seemed to squat and unshapely. So I decided to alter the body by using one I had designed years ago.  I tweaked the head and the limbs a bit to make it work.  So thank you Ms. Feroy for a lovely b...

Hello out there.  Sorry for the long delay in posting.  But, in all honesty I don't have much to show in physical form yet.  I am busy working on my big project that is consuming a great deal of research, writing and location scouting.  So, I thought I'd give you some idea of what is in store for me in the coming months. Above is a picture of things that are on  my work table.  Believe it or not, these lovely pieces are awaiting there transformations into characters for my project.  I am using lots of pre-made doll bodies to transform into fantasy characters for my upcoming story debut.  I have put a call out to lots of my art and doll making friends to help me locate used Ken, GI Joe and Barbies to transform.  This isn't a new process but it is for me.  My intention is to use these dolls as a canvas to create the characters for a huge project.  I have been creating over the years small stories based on fantasy ...

Well, it's been a very long time since I have posted.  At least long in terms of my posts.  Lots of stuff been going on and not going on.  Our power went out on the 29th of June and was out for 36 hours.  It was 99 plus degrees the whole weekend.  miserable isn't adequate for the yucky experience.  Man, are we in for a terrible time on this planet if global warming isn't put in check. Anyway , I am not here to preach to anyone.  But, to say I have been doing a lot of soul searching in regards to this big mythic journey project I have been struggling with for over two years now.  So, I have decided to throw in the towel in a way.  I realize I am not ready for the type of story I had originally intended.  So, instead I am going to focus on something that I have been dabbling in for quite a few years.  It has always been a dream to create a series of stories based on local fantasy creatures that live and inte...

I just spent a two day intensive class with NIADA artist Kathryn Walmsley taking her full body sculpt class.  The goal was to have a little character sculpted and painted ready for dressing.  Most everyone made it to the hair stage.  I on the other hand had to put the hair on today.  Anyway, here is my little guy.  He is a brownie named Xe.  He has shorts and a little mohawk style hair cut.  His body is sculpted out of Super Sculpey polymer clay over a wire body armature.  He is then detailed with soft pastels and acrylic paint.  He is only about 8 inches tall and so was a big challenge for my visual limitations.  Not impossible thanks to such a great teacher.  If you ever get a chance to take a class with her please do.  You can see her work here . That's it for today.  Hope you all have a great week ahead.