Watercolour landscapes

My favourite subject i like to create in watercolour is landscapes. What inpsiresmeto paint landscape tends to be colours and the composition ofobects within the landscape. Here are a few of my favourite landscapes i have painted:

Malham Cove, watercolour

What inspired me to paint this area of Malham Cove is the bright greens in contrast to  the grey stones of the cove as well as the various elements of nature; the trees, the grass, the stones and water.

Bolsover Castle, watercolour

 

The arch creating a perspective leading to the landscape through the gateway interested me as well the bold colours of red and blue against the browns.

Forest, watercolour

What drawn me to this landscape was the sunlight peeking between the trees and the vibrancy of the greenery.

Nightsky, watcercolour

This is a painting that i painted freely, there was no landscape that i used as a reference this painting was a challenge i create dfor myself to experiment with perspective so i made black trees to emphasise the perspective and added a colourful galaxy style backdropto make the trees stand out.

 

I’m back

After graduating in November i have since been busy setting up a Etsy shop where i will be selling different kinds of artwork. After a hectic Christmas break i feel like i now have some time to carry on with this blog even though its not uni work i still think its relevent to me and my art work. I had to do research with working with polymer clay such as attaching eye pins to the clay to make jewelry, what is the best paint to use etc, all which was learning as i went to make my items the best they can be.

Link below to have a look at my shop:

https://www.etsy.com/uk/shop/FransArtDesign?ref=hdr_shop_menu

Also i am now on Instagram which will be a mixture of Etsy work and everyday things: https://www.instagram.com/fransartdesign/

Displaying for assessment

The above photos are different layout that i tried out as to presenting my final pieces

However after talking to all of my tutors they agreed that it might be best to have one or two best illustrations and only display them, then it was to which size A3 or A2.

Finally it was decided that i would display one of my illustrations printed at A1 on matte paper and the present all of my sketchbook work in a portfolio, this was so advised to try and get as much marks as possible after being ill and also to show how my work has progressed.

Pop-up book making

End of November i signed up to attend a session of how to make a pop-up book with artist Elina Rantasuo. i found the session really fun however it was more for people who know the basics of how to create a pop-up book it wasn’t a demostration of how to make po-ups it was used to show different types of pop-ups.

From the two day session everyone from the group had made there own pop-up book, we were advised to make the book related to our project work. At that time i didn’t know what exactly what to do for the project so i chose to do the book with the theme of a woodland and as a happy coincidence that if i think about it the book could link with my work in the way that theres a woodland setting in one of my final illustrations when the reader is introduced to the Snow Queen, therefore i think this book can relate to my project.

Snow Queen

To make the book i used strong card for the book cover and fabric to make the book spine stronger and so it wouldn’t come apart. I used ink to free hand draw the illustrations and  i created small paper stamps to transfer black leaf designs for the background.

Front cover

Back cover

 

Research

The research that i have done for this project was mainly from my essay, the essay was about representation and how other artists create their book illustrations specifically fairytale illustrations so it had linked in with my own work because i had chosen a fairytale story and it allowed me to learn how to use representation in my work as well as understanding semiotics which helped a lot.

Exploring and identifying representation in illustration (long essay)

Link to essay above.

Other research i have done is looking at examples of book illustrations from websites such as http://www.foliosociety.com/ and https://www.penguin.co.uk/ this was to see other peoples work book cover illustrations as well as inside illustrations.

I found some illustrations that was similar tomy linear style and others were totally opposite and were all digital based like digital painting which i liked but knew i will probably not be able to do illustrations like that my style is traditional based with minor digital elements if needed.

Below is exmaples of the type of work i was looking at mainly because they have a similar style of my own work so i used these images as pointers of  how to do fairytale like illustrations. Like i said before my essay was my main outcome of research all the research i did for my essay links in with my project and my work. Research that i have done can be found in the references in the essay.

List of research references

Andronic, M. (N.D.). Madalina Andronic. Retrieved from http://www.madiandronic.com/4949/about.

Branston, G. & Stafford, R. (1996). The Media Student’s Book. London: Routledge.

Branston, G. & Stafford, R. (2003). the media student’s book (3rd ed.). London: Routledge.

Encyclopedia Britannica . (2014). Sir John Tenniel. Retrieved from http://www.britannica.com/biography/John-Tenniel.

Flower meaning. (N.D.). The Pansy Flower: Its Meaning & Symbolism. Retrieved from http://www.flowermeaning.com/pansy-flower-meaning/.

Gaiman, N. (2007). Happily Ever After. Retrieved from http://www.theguardian.com/books/2007/oct/13/film.fiction

Garcia, B. (2013). Medusa. Retrieved from http://www.ancient.eu/Medusa/.

Hackett, C. (2015). Fine Art and Illustration. Retrieved from https://caitlinhackett.carbonmade.com/about.

Hall, S. (1997). Representation: cultural representations and signifying practices, London: SAGE Publications Ltd.

Harris, R. (1987). Reading Saussure. London: Duckworth.

Heckel, J. (2014). Been There Done That: Why We Keep Retelling Fairy Tales. Retrieved from http://www.tor.com/2014/08/11/been-there-done-that-why-we-keep-retelling-fairytales/

Holdcroft, D. (1991). Saussure: Signs, System, and Arbitrariness. Cambridge University Press.

Honderich, T. (2005). The Oxford Companion to Philosophy. Retrieved from http://www.oxfordreference.com.libaccess.hud.ac.uk/view/10.1093/acref/9780199264797.001.0001/acref-9780199264797-e-147

Joseph, J. E. (2012). Saussure. Oxford University Press.

Londonist, . (2005). See Beautiful Fairy Tale Illustrations In A Free Pop-Up Exhibition. Retrieved from http://londonist.com/2015/04/see-beautiful-fairy-tale-illustrations-in-a-free-exhibition#gallery=606252,606257.

Nadel, D. (2005). Pictures & Words: New Comic Art and Narrative Illustration. Retrieved from http://search.proquest.com.libaccess.hud.ac.uk/docview/231080788/flltextPDF?accountid=11526

Narvaez, J.D. (N.D.). Julian De Narvaez. Retrieved from http://www.juliandenarvaez.com/read-me/.

Oxford Dictionaries . (N.D.). Fairy Tale. Retrieved from http://www.oxforddictionaries.com/definition/english/fairy-tale.

Sun Yatsen University, (N.D.). Visual Grammar: Social Semiotic Perspectives on the Modality of Fairy Tale Illustrations. Journal of Sun Yatsen University (Social Science Edition). Retrieved from http://en.cnki.com.cn/Article_en/CJFDTOTAL-ZSDS200705010.htm.

The Folio Society. (N.D.). The Green Fairy Book. Retrieved from http://www.foliosociety.com/book/GFB/green-fairy-book.

University of Chicago. (N.D.). Representation. Retrieved from http://csmt.uchicago.edu/glossary2004/representation.htm.

Willats, J. (1997). Art and Representation. Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press.

Woodard, K. (1997). Identify And Difference. London: SAGE Publications Ltd.

 

 

 

Examples from website research

Caitlin Hackett

 

Danuta Mayer

 

Niroot Puttapipat

Tim Stevens

 

Final illustrations

Below are the final illustrations i have done some have colour others are just black and white. This is to show that my work is a work in progress because of the amount of time ihave been absent from uni and being ill so the way the illustrations seem both detailed but unfinished suggests this.

Crows bowing to prince and princess

Cityscape

Original hand drawn image of observational drawing in Whitby. This was then traced and edited to be the next image.

cityscape before altered in Illustrator

Cityscape

Mirror

House & garden

The Snow Queen

 I am pleased with how these have turned out. I prefer the black and white images just because you can see the details better then if theres colour to distract from the detailing.

All of the finals have been done digitally. The process was hand drawn images scanned and then traced in Illustrator and finally edited in Photshop such as neaten lines and inserting backgrounds.

Sadly, my claim for an Extenuating Circumstance was not approved which i was disappointed with because i have not been able to catch up with my studies and i feel i have not done the right amount of to get a high mark. Also my original plan was if i was given the EC i was going to do much more illustrations and hand make a book with the original story so the illustrations are in a book situe. But i have to think positively about the situation, tutors who have seen my A1 final piece have liked it and have suggested ideas of how to expand on my piece to be a exhibition piece such as projecting an image on the wall and use the projection to paint directly on the wall which i like the idea of but i have never tried that technique so if i do that idea i will worry about messing it up.

Progress of work

Start of a cityscape

Final outcome using Adobe Illustrator

Illustration which is my exhibition piece hand drawn and finished inIllustrator

These are illustrations i have donefor the story, some i ampleased with others i am not such as the boy on the sleigh i am not good at drawing people from imagination i can only draw people in a still life situation so perhaps i should have used a model but i was on a time schedule.

This is another piece that i was not pleased with the outcome it looked better wheni imagined it in my head but it did not turn out good i wanted it to look like the mirror has fallen from the sky and smashed on the floor. i tried to capture  the falling mirror by using erasure which i think looks alright but as a whole the illustration does not.

These are extra illustrations i have done to add has backgrounds i also redid the garden image.

 

Work process

After starting out with the book cover illustration idea i had i started designing a cover for lord of the rings however after a tutorial it was suggested to chose one book and create illustrations based on the book. So i chose Hans Christian Andersen’s ‘The Snow Queen’. I began by rereading the story chapter by chapter and draw what i saw in my head what the setting and characters would look like, they only problem with this was i was creating the illustrations as if they were going to be the final version and i was on limited time so i changed my process so that for each chapter i would make at least three quick sketches of illustrations of what i thought could be used in the story and chose one sketch from each chapter to finalise.

This process method allowed me to save time and spend more time with the digital aspects of the illustrations because i wanted to have digital elements in the illustrations to make them look more professional and high quality.

These are the ideas that i had for book cover illustration and live brief before i changed it to book illustration.

Research for project

As part of research for the final major project i went to Cartright Hall where the were exhibiting art by local artists.

This got my eye not only because of the sketch like style but because of the theme of was and conflict it dipicts. I think the style is interesting because even though it consists of quick black lines you can still make out the setting and the people the artist is trying to portray.

This painting got my attention mainly because of the detailing it has, from a distance there seems to be blocks of colour however when you look up close you can see each bruch stroke the artist have done.

James Holdsworth, Quiet Walk, Acrylic & Ink

The style of this artwork is similar to my way of working when i use watercolour and pen. it looks simple from a far yet up close you can see all of the linear aspects which make upthe detail of the painting.

With these two pieces i was fascinated in the way the artists have captured the detailing with the etching technique because i know from experience that it is relatively hard to do.

John Ridyard, An Artist’s View, Mixed Media

John Ridyard, An Artist’s View, Mixed Media

I like the simplicity of these pieces, with the combination of drawingand string the artist has managed to depict what an artist sees and the technique they sometimes uses to create work.

The two images above are pieces that i found interesting was the way they used negative space with the white space creating a highlighting effect inthe images. I also like the crosshatching Henry Prosper have used, the technique has created mid tones as well as highlights and shadows.

Michelle Mansour, Figure Study III, Ink

This image consists of scratching off the ink to create a form of a figure. This is more likely to be from a life drawing study. Even though the lines are quick and sketchy it is still possible for a viewer to see a figure in the image.

The visit to the art exhibition was really interesting it certainly made me think about my own project as to what materials i could use and techniques as well as how to possibly present my final major project in an exhibition.

Major project presentation

My powerpoint was very sparce mainly because i am still behind on my studies so i had little amount of work to present however i was able to show work in progress and work i have nearly finished.

The feedback i got from the presentation was about what to do for a exhibition piece because i wanted to create a book of Hans Christian Andersen’s The Snow Queen however with less then three weeks to go until the exhibition i was warned that it might not be possible to do that solely on the amount of work i would have to do in limited amout of time so there was a discussion about what i could submit for an exhibition piece such as illustrations that focused on places that are represented in the story, my line drawings of a cityscape was said to be one of the best illustrations because of the style which i agree so i possibly could do the illustrations in that style perhaps add a small amount of colour that links back to my previous idea for the project of focusing on line and colour where i added colour to the drawings that caught my eye and made me draw that image.

One of the main concerns was what support i was getting for my studies, an extension was discussed in the previous weeks but after talking to the acting course leader a EC (extenuating circumstance) was advised so i am currently getting a doctors note requested by the university to say that i had on going issues and recoverying etc. The issue that was brought up in the feedback was if i am wanting to carry on with my studies to try and graduate in July or that i graduate in November; i am unsure at this point because i am not sure how the EC process works so i can not tell for certain what i will be doing at this point, if i am not able to submit all of my illustrations for the exhibition then i will not be able to complete all work by then because it is the deadline for both exhibition and project.

SO my next course of action is to talk to Advice Centre about the process of an EC, alter illusyrations so they are linear with selceted colour and figure out what to do for a exhibition piece/how to present my work