REPLAY Fragrance ad, Stina Persson

This annimation is for Replay, a fragrance.
It is just wonderful and how I wish when I did an annimation, it looked like this!
Check it out if you can xx

Thoughts for layouts and exhibition space.

Tina Berning

Stina Persson

Julie Verhoeven

In a few weeks, we are having a little exhibition and I was thinking of some ideas of how I can exhibit my work.

So I turned to my 3 favourite illustrators for some inspiration...

Julie Verhoeven has her work in a kind of haphazard way. I'm sure it's not, but it gives that impression. I really like how one is 'inside' the work, where you have to climb in and out. My work at the moment is drawing after drawing and this would be an exciting and interesting way of showing it.

My first thought of how to exhibit my work was to take a leaf from Tina Berning and Stina Persson's book- to have my work framed. But I would have my frames different sizes as my drawings come in different sizes and shapes.

I don't know how much space I will have to exhibit so I supose I shall play it by ear.

Competition Brief.

The project that I am working on at the moment is for a competition.

The competition is to illustrate a new cover, spine and 3 illustrations for Albert Camus' book, the Outsider.

I am near to finishing the story and I am rather enjoying it. (Which is a good start!) I have never read any of Camus' books before, but I certainly will be doing from now on.

To start myself off, I thought it best to research a little on the author.

Albert Camus was born on the 7th of November, 1913 and died on the 4th of January, 1960. He is half French and half Algerian and as well as being an author, he is a philosopher and journalist. Camus is most famous for the story The Stranger, (which is infact often translated as the Outsider.)

The story is about a young Algerian man, (who is a French citizen) named Meursault. He is a rather strange character, who is rather hard to figure out by the other characters in the story.

The story is set out in 2 parts and the first part is really about losing his mother. People are quite taken aback about how he is affected by this. When he hears that his mother has died, he can't cry and when he sees her body in the coffin, he does not appear to be sad. All he does is sit in the room, smokes a cigarette and drinks white coffee- this later is held against him.

Part 2 is about how he comes to kill a man, and when asked to explain why he has done such a thing, he says he was bothered by the heat and sun light. He then is arrested and is sentenced to death- I have not yet finished the last few pages so I am looking forward to how things turn out.

At first, I was worried that this story would be hard to illustrate in my style, but as I read the story, it is rather easy as I have images in my head that I could and will illustrate.

Henry Moore

Henry Moore. Tube Shelter Perspective. The Liverpool Street Extension. 1940-1941.

I really wasn't that interested in Henry Moore's sculptures, which I had to study in college, so was strangely put off by them. But one evening, I was watching the Culture Show on BBC 2 and it was all about art in the Second World War.

One artist that came up a lot was Henry Moore's drawings of air raid shelters, or in this case, one of many tube stations that was used as air raids, Liverpool Street.

Ever since seeing these images, Moore has become alot more interesting to me than before.

He has captured the cramped conditions that people had to cope with, with hardly any room to move and also has captured how dark and depressing these places would have been.

I really like how Moore has sketched the people. He hasn't used much detail but used shape more than anything. They appear almost ghostly and a shadow of their former selves.

The people look sad... which of course they had many reasons to be, but the artist has decided to capture this as they seem, but many artists draw and produce works that show the people in the war happy and ready to fight.

There is a sense of innocence and sadness which Moore has captured with the use of colour. The main colours used are black and shocks of white and yellow. The more one looks at this piece, you feel like you are being pulled into it, it is rather haunting.

Stockport's Air Raid Shelters

On the 5th of October, myself and a friend of mine went to the Air Raid Shelters in Stockport. I have always wanted to visit there as I am so interested in the Second World War. I visited when I was at school, (quite sometime ago!) and wanted to visit again.

My friend and I decided to go in whilst we had the afternoon off.

When we entered, the women told us that there was a class in at the beginning, where you go into a small room where the introduction is... I know a lot about the war, so we were asked to start in the main shelters and have the introduction at the end, which was no problem.

The second photograph shows you what you see as you enter the shelters. Long dark tunnels, only lit up with a gas lamp.

The atmosphere is strange. It is dark and eerie and full of history.

We were the only ones in the tunnels at that time and one couldn't help but feel a little apprehensive as one finds it hard to believe that hundreds of people at that time were sheltering in it whilst the Luftwaffe planes droned on above. It is so cold and damp, but one has to remember that that didn't matter as one had no choice if you wanted to be kept alive!

The tunnels carried on for miles, and some were boarded off for one reason or another but we walked for a very long time around them.

We entered where the warden slept, a little room, damp, dark, hardly any room whatsoever to move in and also went in the nurses station which still to this day had all the equipment in it that they used.

We also entered the toilets, some for the women and down another tunnel was for the men...

What shocked me was how many bunks were lined up on eachside of the tunnels. (Some were just benches if one was in there for a few hours.) There were about 3 beds ontop of the other, which were damp and extremly narrow... but all in all, it catered for what it was for.

Being there, just gave one an inkling of what life was like during the Blitz and how lucky we are not to have lived through it.

Thoughts and ideas for my entrepreneurial object.

As I am in the first half of my third year, we have been asked to produce our own entrepreneurial object.

I admit, when we were first given this brief, I was rather nervous as I have never been asked to do anything like this before... but after some thought, I am feeling rather good and have started thinking of some ideas.

At first, I was thinking of something simple, for instance maybe a calender. But when I read over the brief again, the object needs to be personal and something that shows who we are etc... so I have decided to make a bag, after seeing and researching the above.

The 3rd bag is done by the fashion illustrator David Downton. I recall that he produced them for M&S. Years ago, when I first saw them, I thought then what a good idea it was- everyone would see it, it would promote oneself and is a great object for the enviroment.

The other two are done by Julie Verhoeven, another favourite illustrator of mine. The second bag was done for Mulberry... this isn't a favourite of mine, but the idea is there.

The first one is done again by Julie Verhoeven. It is an illustrtion, done by hand, on a plain paper white bag for Selfridges. It is so simple but yet it is quirky and catches the eye.

Even before I saw this image by Verhoeven, I had thought about doing something like this and now the idea seems more concrete.

Stina Persson...Again

It is no surprise that Stina Persson has appeared again on my blog... and with a beautiful illustration.

I find that everytime I go on the computer, the first website I go on is Stina Persson's.

This image stood out to me because of the block colour, (black) and with the shocks of faint colour on the woman's face, which I think is tissue paper.

Even though there is hardly any detail on the body, except a block shape with some drips, one can tell exactly the pose she is standing in.

One other thing that I adore is the detailed faces that appear, through the bold colour... it looks effortless, but I know that she has probably spent a long time on it!

Vivienne Westwood illustration

When I was studying at college, I spent most of my time studying fashion, and the designer that popped up most of the time, was Vivienne Westwood.
But now that I am studying illustration, I have taken an interest in the illustrations that are made for Vivienne Westwood and her products.
This image above is a poster that was designed for an exhibition of hers. I am having trouble finding out who designed it but none the less, I do like it.
It is not often that one finds an illustration nowadays that is done by hand in a traditional way. It really remind me of how I used to sketch, very in detail... my images now are a lot more 'free'.
The limited colour adds depth to the image- having a very detailed image, the one colour simplifies it and brings it alive.

2 more pieces.

These 2 images are more or less finished. I drew the girls and then played around on photoshop, adjusting the colours etc. I have put the bare drawings on paper that I have manipulated, for example, fried the paper or burnt it etc. Producing work this way puts me in mind of the great Tina Berning, with old paper behind it.

This one at the bottom, is just eyes, nose, rosey cheeks and mouth. Very simple and yet I think is effective. This image, may be a good one to put on a business card or something of the like... I ll have to think about it.

More of my work...

I adore working on paper, just pure and simple paper, whether it already has other sketches on etc. This image was one of about 10 that I produced one afternoon.
I love the fact that I hardly spent any time on it at all and yet the finished image is probably one of my favourites.
In the past, I spent far too much time on one image, afraid that the 'girls' were not pretty or beautiful enough. But with this 'speed' drawing and creating, I am not as precious with them than I have been.
The reason I like this one is the limited colour and the random materials that surround her.
Also, I like the way I have drawn it, with pen and ink. You get this lovely scratchy effect, like when people 200 years ago wrote.
This woman is not beautiful, she is missing her limbs... and the look on her face, she doesn't care!

My Work x

This year has been an exciting one really, as I have seen how my work has changed, for the better in my opinion. I am alot more comfortable with my style of working and feel confident with how it is moving on.
As is said in previous posts, I am a huge admirer of Tina Berning and Stina Persson, an with their help, I have become a lot more confident.
These 2 images were done by hand, no computer influence with them, but may in the future adapt them to make them look more professional. The bottom image was drawn from a picture in a catalogue. I just looked at the image and then interpreted what I saw with ink.
I love working with fluid lines, mainly with ink as one gets a beautiful and simplistic finish.

The image at the top is one of my favourites.
I spend time drawing everyday, whether if it's in front of the television, where I will keep on drawing until I produce something good, or if I sit at the table/desk and think about it, sometimes this works and sometimes it doesn't. I much prefer to sit in the middle of the floor, with all random papers, inks and even tea or coffee to use on the paper to get different effects.
I can often produce 10 drawings and sketches a day and yet only maybe 2 or 1 will be worth keeping.

This is all a part of learning and I am enjoying creating my own style and experimenting with other materials.

Stella Im Hultberg

I was just browsing on line, looking at some art by Egon Schiele, and this illustrator/artist court my eye.
I have never heard of her before, and just by looking at one of her images, like this one, reminded me a lot of my own work!
The drawing looks so free and I love the use of materials that are in it... the tea staining, the ink drips, very like my own work... Stella is someone I will be looking out for in the future.