Steve Bell - Political Illustrator

Our fifth and final illustration topic came in the form of political illustration; more specifically we were looking at Steve Bell. When I found out that I would be studying this subject I have to say, I felt a little apprehensive. I have only just become aware of the political world, having only gained the ability to vote in the last couple of years, so I feel as though I don’t know very much about politics. In the end, I feel as though I’ve done quite a good job with my own interpretations, maybe even enjoyed making them.

Study Number One

Whilst I should have been doing work for another module, the idea for this illustration kind of came to me. I thought that the David Cameron Bullingdon Club scandal was too good an opportunity to miss, visually anyway. The story came about out of a rumour about the Prime Minister’s involvement in a society that he was a part of during his time at Oxford University. Claims of an ‘obscene’ initiation [1] relating to a pig and a vaguely sexual act, hit the headlines a few months ago and although the topic is quite taboo, so is a large amount of political illustration. I made this image using Photoshop entirely using my very basic digital painting skills, this reference image [2] and this reference image [3]. I have referenced the children’s programme Peppa Pig, using the character of mummy pig as my tie to the Bullingdon Club story. I had Cameron ask her to ‘call him daddy pig’ as a reference to a common sexual kink and also mummy pig’s male companion in the show, Daddy Pig.

Study Number Two 

For my second political illustration I jumped across the pond to a rather controversial politician, currently running for presidency in the United States. Donald Trump is the famous conglomerate business man undertakings in real estate, sports and entertainment [4], and now politics. His involvement in the run for presidency has been met with criticism and debate for many reasons, perhaps most namely is the candidate’s financial status. I remembered watching an interview with the entrepreneur stating ‘my father gave me a small loan of a million dollars’ [5], referring to when he first started out in business. When I first saw this, my mind instantly flashed back to the Austin Powers films, most importantly the character of Doctor Evil who famously delivers a similar line. So I decided to combine the two and drew Trump in the same pose and costume as the character using this reference image of Trump [6] and this imageof Evil [7].  

Study Number Three

For my third study I chose to use a technique quite commonly used by political cartoonists and illustrators; making a direct parody or reference to a previous work of art, and using this to make a social comment. For my interpretation of this chose to emulate one of my favourite pieces of portraiture, Jan Vermeer’s Girl with the Pearl Earring [8], instead replacing the girl with Russia’s President, Vladimir Putin [9]. My comment on this image is quite a subtle one. Putin is infamous for his opinion and laws to do with the gay and transgender community, and this is chiefly why I chose him to be wearing a pearl earring. There is a stigmata attached to men with pierced ears that is tied to gay stereotypes and assumptions, which gives the image a subtle irony. Overall, I’m quite pleased with the image itself, although it did look better before I inked it.

Study Number Four

My fourth and final image was an attempt at anthopomorphism, yet another technique commonly used by political illustrators. My subject this time was the leader of the UK Independence Party, Nigel Farage. In many photos that I have seen of him the politician usually has his mouth wide open in a sort of toothless grin, such as my reference image [10]. His tight, squinting eyes and flared nostrils were somewhat reptilian and I thought that these were just crying out to be accompanied by a flicking, forking tongue. Using this image as reference [11], I added in these rather monstrous features and gave him a decidedly green skin tone and some grey shading.

References

[1] Mutch, 2015.
[2] Wintour, 2013.
[3] Davies, 2015.
[4] Trump.com, 2015.
[5] Snyder, 2015.
[6] Eggert and Colvin, 2015.
[7] robertkaplinsky.com, 2013.
[8] Ebay.com, 2014.
[9] De Nugent, 2015.
[10] Baker, 2015.
[11] thinglink.com, 2013.

Bibliography

Baker, N. 2015. TheDrinksBusiness.com. Farage forgoes alcohol for January. [Online] [Accessed from 2015] Available from: http://www.thedrinksbusiness.com/wordpress/wp-content/uploads/2014/11/tumblr_inline_n6m8y86oc81r05kcc.jpg

Davies, E. 2015. The Daily Mail. How Peppa Pig has conquered Christmas... and made multi-millionaires of three friends from Middlesex Poly. [Online] [Accessed from 2015] Available from: http://www.thisismoney.co.uk/money/article-3342010/How-Peppa-Pig-conquered-Christmas-multi-millionaires-three-friends-Middlesex-Poly.html

De Nugent, J. 2015. Enemies can bring out the best in us. [Online] [Accessed from 2015] Available from: http://johndenugent.us/images/putin-angry-banks.jpg.pagespeed.ce.fjVlkcA87U.jpg

Ebay.com. 2015. Your Guide to Girl with the Pearl Earring. [Online] [Accessed from 2015] Available from: http://i.ebayimg.com/00/s/NjAwWDUwOQ==/z/ZP8AAOSwh6xTtQAK/$_32.JPG

Eggert, D and Colvin, J. 2015. Yahoo News. Trump says he’ll release policy specifics soon. [Online] [Accessed from 2015] Available from: http://media.zenfs.com/en-US/video/video.pd2upload.com/video.ynewskatiecouric.com@df3727ac-3227-3cc1-9d7b-f1fae7858acf_FULL.jpg

Mutch, N. 2015. Theweek.co.uk. Bullingdon club: inside the elite Oxford society. [Online] [Accessed from 2015] Available from: http://www.theweek.co.uk/65410/bullingdon-club-inside-the-elite-oxford-society

RobertKaplinsky.com. 2013. How Much Money Should Dr Evil Demand? [Online] [Accessed from 2015] Available from: http://robertkaplinsky.com/wp-content/uploads/2013/04/drevil_cover.jpg

Snyder, B. 2015. Fortune.com. Reference to Donald Trump interview. [Online] [Accessed from 2015] Available from: http://fortune.com/2015/10/26/donald-trump-loan-dad/

Thinglink.com. 2013. The King Cobra. [Online] [Accessed from 2015] Available from: https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgcXEEIk8Ynj2Sx2GuEs0Bth9x4nEu_MONlmIKg7Iq0sllK3mXDj4_vuch93qk2lu2PmQO7VytPTBIeJym8EomX0Vp8Rfw45bm5okW79sEtrYZqPlvGKCTx8WhXCQJs9t98gRwJqUhd78c/s1600/KingCobra.jpg

Trump.com. 2015. Donald J Trump Biography. [Online] [Accessed from 2015] Available from: http://www.trump.com/biography/

Wintour, P. 2013. The Gaurdian. David Cameron: Tories will work hard to win back supporters from Ukip. [Online] [Accessed from 2015] Available from: http://www.theguardian.com/politics/2013/may/03/david-cameron-tories-supporters-ukip

Steven Cooper - Concept Artist

After my confusion with Editorial Illustration, I found out that the next illustrative career path I would be studying would be that of the concept artist. This is a subject that I am quite interested in pursuing, so I was very excited to find out that I we were having a guest speaker. Steven Cooper is a British Concept Artist who has produced work for TV, Film and Video Games. During his talk with us he described a lot of his creative processes, most of which were inspired by Surrealist methods, involving wet and dry media.

Study Number One

My first concept-art-inspired piece involved a rather messy process often used by Surrealists. Decalcomania [1] is a process involving wet paint on a flat surface, transferred to another flat surface through compression and pushing and pulling the material away. In this case I applied a mixture of blue and yellow paint onto a piece of clear acetate, applied it to a blank piece of paper with a little bit of pressure and pulled the acetate away. The ‘capillary attraction’ of the liquid in the paint creates marks and patterns on the page and then the shape that is created is the basis of a piece of work. I decided that the swirling shape and sea-like colour palette reminded me of a breaking wave, so I emphasised this using some blue ink and a tissue to add a sort of mist above the wave, and a couple of biros to draw in a small sail boat over the crest of the wave.

Study Number Two

My second image was inspired by a technique that Steven Cooper was rather a fan of and was also used by surrealists such as Max Ernst. Soufflage [1] is a technique that also uses wet media, this time ink that is blow across a flat surface using a straw. During our talk, Steven mentioned that he liked to use gel ink pens with water to let them bleed and then either blowing them around or letting gravity take hold so that they would drip down the page. At first I used some of my own gel based pens with water but I found that these didn’t bleed very well so I added some black ink which took much better to the water on the page. After I was done, I felt that the shape that was made looked like a large dramatic cloak so I decided to turn it into a villainous costume, using an ink wash, a sharpie and Photoshop to create an evil king. 

Study Number Three

My third piece involved quite a different influence that Steven spoke about. He mentioned that a lot of his figures and structures involving machinery were strongly influenced by the famous concept artist HR Giger, who made the art that inspired the Alien films. With a little bit of research I discovered that a lot of Giger’s work is very overtly sexual and almost always uses a mixture of human figures and features and science-fiction technology. I took one of his books out of the University library and straight away I discovered that he has made a large number of portraits incorporating these elements, for an example see here [2]. In response to this I made the above drawing, using pencil, a black biro and a black fine-liner, later adding a coffee wash and a light enhancement on Photoshop to give the signature sepia-toned effect.

Study Number Four

My fourth and final attempt at concept art brought me back to another one of Steven’s techniques that were also used by the surrealists. Frottage [1] involves taking a rubbing of a textured surface using a soft, dry material such as a chalk pastel or condensed charcoal and a thin piece of paper. The mark that is made then forms part of a drawing or can be left on its own as a full image. Inspired by this I made some rubbings onto a piece of corrugated card, which I decided looked like high-rise buildings and sky-scrapers. I made five of these and using Photoshop I arranged them to form the skyline that you can see above. This was a welcome break from my other studies as I noticed that I made a lot of character and figure-based images in response to this subject and this was my first attempt at something more environmental.

References

[1] Wikipedia.org, 2015.
[2] Vagallery.com, 2015.

Bibliography

Giger, HR. 2015. Vagallery.com. Image of Giger portrait. [Online] [Accessed from 2015] Available from: http://www.vagallery.com/h-r-giger.html

Wikipedia. 2015. Surrealist techniques. [Online] [Accessed from 2015] Available from: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Surrealist_techniques

Eric Fraser and Aude Van Ryn - Editorial Illustration

Of all of the subjects that I have studied during this project, this has been the one that has proved the most difficult for me. At first, I’d never really heard of this branch of illustration and so I was really unfamiliar with the techniques and practices that editorial illustrators use. One quotation that has really helped me understand this line of work is this; ‘The essence of editorial Illustration is visual commentary. Its principal function is to be symbiotic with journalism contained within the pages of newspapers and magazines’. Often these images will be used to describe a concept, an abstract thought or a sensitive subject, without being too cliché or obvious.
One Illustrator who is particularly famous for this type of work is Eric Fraser. Most famous for his work with the Radio Times, his iconic black and white illustrations were used to describe many conceptual topics such as silence, life, death and war.

Study Number One

The first image I made for this category of illustration actually didn’t make the blog. As practice I made a drawing to ‘fill in the gap’ in an article from the Guardian, the title of which was ‘Why your gullibility is a goldmine’. At first I made an illustration describing a rather fashionable young woman purchasing a ‘Gucci’ handbag from a man on the street with a shopping trolley full of ‘real designer wares’. This however was drawn in portrait orientation and after having a think about it I realised that this would never fit into the space provided for an illustration in the article layout. Instead I took inspiration from Eric Fraser’s surreal, graphical style and made this. I wanted to reference something that not many people believe in as a working product, so I cast my mind back to the ‘miracle tonic’ sellers of older times. I also think this image fits in well with Fraser’s archaic style, as much of his work was made in the earlier part of the 20^th century and so a lot of his subject matter refers to religious and old-fashioned scenes. I took a lot of inspiration from this particular image.

Study Number Two

My second study saw me emulating a different Editorial Illustrator, Aude Van Ryn. This artist was a lot more contemporary and in my opinion easier to understand thanks to her graphic, almost diagrammatic style. One technique that Van Ryn uses quite often is the use of silhouettes and basic shapes. Here I used these to loosely describe business, a subject that I feel would feature quite heavily in a newspaper, and perhaps it would need accompanying with an image. I decided to abstract the concept, breaking it down into what I feel business is; buying and selling. This is why I chose to depict a character selecting their desired product from a group of objects, which have been presented to her by another character, a small business owner perhaps?

Study Number Three

My third attempt saw me turn to silhouettes once again. This time I pared my illustration with the image of an hourglass.  Through my research I noticed that the hourglass is quite commonly used throughout editorial illustration, as this is a well known and recognisable symbol of time. Again I tried to convey visually, an abstract or sensitive subject; in this instance the concept was terminal illness. I wanted the figure to represent the illness itself, tampering with or even terminating the remaining time in the hourglass.

Study Number Four

To complete my last emulation, I once again took inspiration from Aude Van Ryn, this time using another of her techniques. I noticed that she uses a lot of toned-down blocks of colour to describe clothing, backgrounds and objects which interact with her figures. For the purpose of this exercise I decided to use a human face with a surreal twist to describe how I feel about my studies at the moment; stressed and confused. I wanted her expression to read as calm and collected, but for the spiral in her head to be almost difficult to read to represent her anxiety and nervousness. The original colours were those in the left hand image, however as I was playing around with the layer settings I noticed that putting the image into negative would actually give an colour palette  much closer to the one that Van Ryn uses to describe her figures. A comparative example of this can be found here [3]. 

References

[1] Male, 2007.
[2] Taylor, 2013.
[3] Van Ryn, 2015. 

Bibliography

Male, A. 2007. Illustration: a theoretical and contextual perspective. Lausanne, AVA Academia. . [Online] [Accessed from 2015] Available from: https://books.google.co.uk/books?hl=en&lr=&id=rlJP8I1cao8C&oi=fnd&pg=PP2&dq=illustration:+a+theoretical+and+contextual+perspective.&ots=flQi81IWUW&sig=zqVNSKRrXieRubV0cVkRyQvUHU0#v=onepage&q=illustration%3A%20a%20theoretical%20and%20contextual%20perspective.&f=false

Taylor, J R. 2013. Image of ‘Silence in Heaven’. The Times. [Online] [Accessed from 2015] Available from: http://www.thetimes.co.uk/tto/multimedia/archive/00410/127121568_Fraser1_410272c.jpg

Van Ryn, A. 2015. Image of silhouette figure. Heart agency. [Online] [Accessed from 2015] Available from:  http://www.heartagency.com/store/images/3542/main/vanryn_lge_11.jpg?1392397481

Sara Fanelli - Children's Book Illustrator

Sara Fanelli, originally from Florence, is a children’s book illustrator who moved to London in 1990 to study. Her experimental, ephemeral style has given her the spotlight in more recent years as one of the UK’s most sought after Illustrators. Using Collage, photo-montage, hand-lettering and freeing materials such as pen or brush and ink, she creates dream-like, surreal images. Her work covers a wide variety of literature and printed media, something that the artist has been very passionate about since her early childhood.

Study Number One

My first study inspired by Fanelli saw me delve into the vast world of collage, something that is very prolific in her illustrative work. On a slightly creased piece of graph paper, I inked a distorted, blurry body, later adding a large number of eyes, an ear and some legs using some black and white photocopies and a scrap of brown paper.  In the foreground of the image I added a torn piece of map paper for my two cowering victims to hide behind and a hand-written piece of text. I am happy with this image as it directly references a number of Fanelli’s illustrative habits; her creation of surreal fictional creatures and her use of collage, particularly with the use of the graph paper.

Study Number Two

My second study saw me once again breaking out the ink. This time I lay down a base colour of a mustardy yellow, a colour that Fanelli seems particularly infatuated with. Onto this I collaged the oven surface and the pot of food, later inking in the ends of the surface and the flames from beneath the pot. I then drew the rather dead-eyed chef using a thin paintbrush. I read in an interview with the artist that her drawings are made with a brush. She said "It's bolder than a pen and I like to allow the mark itself to suggest the direction the drawing should take” [1] so this is why I used this tool specifically. After this drawing was made I then added the collaged phrase, as a humorous touch. I noticed that she uses a lot of strange questions and sayings in her work so I decided to add one to this to tie the image together. 

Study Number Three

This study got a little bit weird. Reverting back to my original study, I decided to create another bizarre creature, this time opting for collage as my only technique. I took to a small fashion magazine looking for eyes and hair. I knew roughly that I wanted it to be a hairy monster but how I got to him/her would be something that I discovered along the way. In an interview with ‘Books for Keeps’ Fanelli mentioned that she ‘very much liked the element of chance and freedom that the process of creating a collage brings to a picture’ [2]. Whilst I also found in a similar article from Varoom magazine that she does ‘plan a general composition, so that she has a guide for her ‘happy mistakes’ ’ [3]. Similarly I had no idea what the end product would look like with this collage but the elements that I found resulted in what I would definitely refer to as a ‘happy mistake’, even if it was a rather odd one.

Study Number Four

For my final study I decided to tackle some subject matter that wouldn’t be too far from something Fanelli herself would illustrate. Using some of my spare collage eyes and a couple of chunky marker pens I interpreted the famous tale of the pied piper. In hindsight I think that the use of the eyes as rats, gives the piece a really surreal, almost sinister effect. Although given the work that Fanelli has produced before, this isn’t necessarily a bad thing. In one interview she said ‘There is an element of playfulness in the surreal side of things that is fundamental for me’ [], and I really think that shows in her work and the materials she uses to produce it. As well as reverting back to the trusted technique of collage, I also tried to emulate another area of Fanelli’s work that is quite specific to her. Many of her images lack spatial depth, especially her characters. One method that she uses to do this is by letting them be drawn straight onto the background rather than inking them in, so that the whole figure is filled in with one colour, the same colour as the background behind it. That is why I let the branches of the tree bleed through from underneath the piper’s face. 

References

[1] Carey, 2004.
[2] Robins, 2012.
[3] Heller, 2007

Bibliography

Carey, J. 2004. The Guardian. Dynamic Doodles. [Online] [Accessed from 2015] Available from: http://www.theguardian.com/books/2004/apr/17/featuresreviews.guardianreview8

Heller, S. 2007. Graphic Gestures: An interview with Sara Fanelli. Wolves, Logic and Happy Mistakes. [Online] [Accessed from 2015] Available from: http://www.hellerbooks.com/pdfs/varoom_03.pdf

Robins, G. 2012. Books for Keeps. [Online] [Accessed from 2015] Available from: http://booksforkeeps.co.uk/issue/195/childrens-books/articles/the-dream-like-images-of-sara-fanelli

Chris Ware - Comic Artist

Chris Ware is an American writer, cartoonist and graphic novelist. His simplified, pictorial illustrations capture the lives of his own original characters, often covering dark and sensitive subject matter. 

Study Number One

This was the first study that I started and the last one that I worked on. This was inspired by Ware’s use of direction in his framed comics. One such example of this comes in the form of his 1991 creation Quimby the Mouse [1]. Many of the pages in this early nineties comic can be read in multiple direction thanks to the ambiguous illustrative style of Quimby himself and the numerous narrative paths laid out in the images.
I tried to emulate this in my own figures and layout, although my image remains unfinished. With the starting point ‘I’m so bored. How do I get out of here?’ I created a short sequence of simplified frames depicting my attempted escape from my desk in the University of Gloucestershire Illustration Studio. At the start I worked from the top left square to the top right and all the way down to the bottom right square, later added the six frames coming down on the left. I feel as though it has a definite feel of Chris Ware’s pioneering layouts. 

Study Number Two

This was my second attempt at emulating Chris Ware. This was inspired by an image of Ware’s called Big Tex, which you can see here [2]. Big Tex was in turn inspired by Frank King’s series of Sunday pages, Gasoline Alley [3]. King was a particular fan of displaying these pages as an image of a single space (a house, a street, a beach), fragmented by a matrix of panels [4]. 

This style of comic really inspired me creatively and I liked the complexity of designing a similar layout to Ware and King’s. I also tried to capture something rather darker in the narrative of the comic, similar to Ware’s writing style. I wanted to give the impression that something had happened to the daughter character, pictured at different ages throughout the comic, but without being too obvious or blatant. I much prefer the ‘reading between the lines’ part of storytelling.
I hand-drew the image before adding colour using Photoshop. I’m really pleased with how I kept the correct colours throughout the image, electing to add squares of colour with reduced opacities to create tone and mood. 

Study Number Three

My next emulation was once again, hand drawn, this time taking on a much less linear form to the previous two comics. I took inspiration from a page that I found in one of Ware’s Building Stories [4] publications, but was actually in his Acme Novelty Library before that. In the image, the protagonist of Building Stories gives rein to her suicidal thoughts, the complexity of the layout describing her excruciating mental battle [4]. The ambiguous swirling, corner-turning layout really emphasises her anguish and I was inspired by this. At first I found the image really difficult to read, mostly as there isn’t really a ‘right way up’, but when it comes to the mind I suppose there isn’t one for that either, so I feel as though this confusing layout is appropriate.
I decided to use this technique to describe my own daily battle, perhaps a more cheery one; getting out of bed to go to University in the morning. 

Study Number Four

My fourth and final attempt resulted in my only fully digital image. This time I documented my own mundane life using a very limited colour palette and a series of very simplified frames, something that I found Chris Ware does a lot in his work. The way he documents time through very basic events and little or no speech is for the most part what inspired this simple comic. Ware’s comics have been described as a “suggestive description of inner life, of the feeling of time, of memory, of experiencing the world” [4] and I wanted to show that through my own simple memory.
I was also interested in how a lot of his work is quite rhythmic in its layout. Ware is known to have compared his art to music, each frame representing a beat or note in a melody. This is why I have separated my frames the way I have. Two large frames and then four smaller frames repeated over and over, giving the image somewhat of a balance and a flow.
I’m really pleased with how this piece worked out as I am not the most confident person in digital media and this was probably the emulation that took the shortest amount of time to make.

References

[1] klarelijninternational.midiblogs.com, 2015.
[2] hoodedutilitarian.com, 2015.
[3] theperiodicfable.files.wordpress.com, 2015.
[4] Bartual, 2012.

Bibliography

Bartual, R. 2012. Scandinavian Journal of Comic Art (SJOCA) Volume 1:1. [Online] [Accessed from 2015] Available from: http://sjoca.com/wp-content/uploads/2012/06/SJoCA-1-1-Article-Bartual.pdf

King, F. 1918. Image from Gasoline Alley. [Online] [Accessed from 2015] Available from: https://theperiodicfable.files.wordpress.com/2011/10/gasoline-alley-1.jpg

Ware, C. 1990-1991. Image from Quimby the Mouse. [Online] [Accessed from 2015] Available from: http://klarelijninternational.midiblogs.com/media/00/01/411625023.jpg

Ware, C. 1996. Image of Big Tex from Acme Novelty Library. [Online] [Accessed from 2015] Available from: http://www.hoodedutilitarian.com/wp-content/uploads/2010/09/Big-Tex.jpg