Illustrated Book Covers.

For my subject on illustration, I had to illustrate the covers for 3 Penguin Classics books of my choosing, combining some stylistic elements of my two previously emulated illustrators, Shel Silverstein and Miguel Calatayud.

For my illustration, I chose to depict a woman in aristocratic attire. The woman has been depicted without facial features, and her body hangs lifeless. She is being controlled by strings from above. In this respect, she appears marionette like, to represent the manipulation displayed by the scheming lead characters, the Marquise de Merteuil and Vicomte de Valmont. The marionette girl could very well represent either/or Madame de Tourvel and the young Cecile de Volanges.  In some respects, the marionette could also represent Merteuil herself, whose calculating nature stems from the strict ideologies placed on her as a powerful woman in an otherwise patriarchal society, which eventually leads to her public disgrace.

Miguel Calatayud, Part Two.

Continuing on my illustration unit, I had to do a further seven illustrations emulating pop artist Miguel Calatayud. This time, as with the Shel Silverstein unit, I had to take two separate elements from Calatayud’s work and combine them in to something new.

Miguel Calatayud, Part One

For my next illustration assessment I was tasked with repeating the previous assessment utilising a different illustrator. I’m still not that confident in my drawing abilities so I didn’t want to tackle anything too complex. What I did want to explore was colour and shading, as my Shel Silverstein illustrations were very simple and sparse.

I chose an artist called Miguel Calatayud. He doesn’t seem to be that well known outside of Spain but his pop art style appealed to me greatly. His work reminds me a lot of Peter Max, another artist I greatly admire, and also Heinz Edelmann who was art director on the Beatles film Yellow Submarine

I used Adel watercolour pencils, which I used to love as a kid so it was a joy to use them again. It’s also making me consider using proper watercolour paints in future work.

As before, I have started with seven direct copies of Calatayud’s work

Shel Silverstein, Part Two.

The second part of this assignment was to take two of Silverstein’s illustrations and combine them in to a new, separate piece. This was to get us accustomed to the style of the artists we are emulating.

Things I Want Science To Do For Me For Selfish Reasons

Looking back on how far we’ve progressed as a society, it’s astonishing to think of the technological advances we’ve made. Electricity, penicillin, the automobile, space travel… these are all things science have made possible for us, and by extension, has helped better our lives. Where would we be today without space travel? I sleep easier knowing that the moon’s surface is mostly submarine grey and rocky in texture, and not lush with purple grass. Considering these achievements, we’ve also grown impatient with science. Where is our cure for cancer? How is famine still a thing? It’s natural, having over time cracked the safe of science, to want to rob that vault blind of all its answers to our troubles.

I for one have a few demands of my own. Allow me to preface by saying that these demands are purely out of my own interest, and maybe a few other peoples’, and will not better humankind as a race in any way except I would be super happy if they happened.

1. The body hair has to go.  Since we as a species figured out how to clothe ourselves against the elements and subsequently realised how fabulous we looked wearing said clothes, the need for body hair below one’s shoulders now seems quaint and out-dated. Until evolution catches up with us and all that unnecessary hair is bred out of our bodies, there must be something science can do about it. Science has given us the consolation prizes of electrolysis and laser but these methods require many many visits, results are never 100%  and its expensive. Great for the odd armpit or bikini area, not quite so practical for the legs. I’m often engaged in a race with the shower’s hot water supply to finish shaving my gams before the water turns icy. There must be an easier way. Some kind of radioactive bath we can dip ourselves in, forever banishing all that nasty hair for good and leaving us with pure unadulterated skin, free from the damaging effects of shaving and waxing. A pill. An injection. Anything. I’m a very busy, important gal and can’t afford to watch the world pass me by while I’m in the bathroom.

2. Make All Delicious Food Nutritionally Rich and Non Fattening, Alternatively Make All Nutrition Rich Food Taste Like Cheeseburgers: With time, food has become much more than a source of fuel for the delicate engines that are our bodies. It’s a social instigator, it’s a psychological appeasement. It can also be really, really delicious. Or gross. That’s the amazing thing about food, it covers such a wide spectrum of flavours and fragrances and textures that to even entertain the possibility of being someone who’ll eat ANYTHING is outrageous, and the fact that we choose what we do or don’t eat is probably our biggest downfall. Or it’s my personal biggest downfall, whatever. Celery sticks are good. A loaf of garlic bread is better. What I’m getting at is I want to make the choice to eat either, but get all the flavour sensation of the garlic bread while also reaping all the nutritional benefits of the celery. I’m pretty sure we’d all be okay with engineering our food if it meant we really could have our cake and eat too much of it and STILL have the body of a Russian gymnast.

3. Weather is Too Unpredictable, This is Unacceptable: Climate change is on a lot of people’s minds at the moment, and with good reason. We can’t afford even the slightest upset in all the elemental things that keep the earth spinning around the sun lest we all drown like ants (fancy science lingo please keep up). I also hate having to go to work on beautiful days. I hate when it’s cold, or it’s foggy and I could potentially drive straight off the side of a mountain. Short of being one of the X-Men, there must be something science can do to allow me to decide on my own weather conditions while maintaining the climatological status quo. I’m willing to accept that it will rain every day I have to go to work if every day to myself was sunny and beautiful. That would work, right? Just shift a few things around babe.

I think my demands are fair, and technologically plausible. If we can somehow manage to make these three things become a reality, people will complain less and eat more vegetables. Sounds like a flawless model for world peace to me.

Mouths

Experimenting with Instagram’s new-ish video function. Unfortunately I don’t think there’s any easy way to share a video from Instagram on WordPress, I only managed to get this here by uploading it to Storify, saving the mp4 and uploading it to Youtube so i still have the ugly Youtube framing around it. Better than nothing, for the time being.

Shel Silverstein, Part One

 

We are studying illustration at college this semester. 

I love illustration, but I’m not the strongest drawer, so this was a great opportunity to hone up my skills. I think it’s a great medium for communication that really resonates with me. When I was a kid, I was a huge fan of Charles M Schulz and Quentin Blake. Their work was simple, but so smart and full of wit and pathos.

We had to choose an illustrator to do a case study on and emulate their style to help build our illustration skills. I chose Shel Silverstein. Every day I have to do a new drawing, for 21 days in total. For the first seven days, I had to do seven direct copies of Silverstein’s work. 

Having not done any real drawing in years, I’m just thankful they didn’t turn out a complete mess.

Mermaid in a schooner of beer.

My first of seven original illustrations emulating the style of Shel Silverstein

The real reason I know that.

A woman phoned me at work today, her last name was Krause. I correctly guessed the spelling and she sounded super impressed. Having an unusual name, I know what a relief it is when someone guesses the spelling right first go.

From an outside perspective, I probably sound like someone who has travelled enough to encounter people with names other than Wilson or Taylor or Jones.

The real reason I know that is because Peter Krause on Parenthood is a hot dad.