Archive for the ‘drawing’ Category

Draw & Repeat

The last couple of years I’ve gotten increasingly interested in creating artwork for licensing—especially for surface/textiles and paper goods. I’ve gotten some positive encouragement about this direction from industry folks who’ve seen my work, and I really love making fun decorative imagery. (Plus, who doesn’t love the idea of seeing your work all over cool products!)  I’ve taken a licensing workshop with guru Cheryl Phelps, and a pattern-making workshop with the fabulously talented Julia Rothman at last summer’s ICON7, and slowly (but surely!) have been beginning to develop some new work geared toward this.


I’ve learned that making successfully repeating designs is trickier than it seems! But with a little trial & error out of the way, I’m super excited to have gotten my first pattern working, and just submitted it to Spoonflower’s weekly fabric design contest. I mean, the theme was “mardi gras”…how could I not enter?


MardiGrasSWATCH
MardiGrasPattern

This design will soon be available for sale as fabric, wallpaper or wall decals. Check it out here: http://www.spoonflower.com/fabric/1762737


I’ve also been reading Jessica Swift’s Jump. Trust. Repeat. e-book—chock-full of great tips, insights, and encouragement for building a licensing career. It’s a great resource‚ really inspiring, and so super pretty to look at too!

Illustration Friday—TALL

Re-posting a modified image of my recent stiltwalker piece, as it seemed fitting for this week’s illustration Friday topic :)    

Greatest Show on Earth!

Awhile back, I created a “Fire Eater” illustration, which was actually just a fun side project inspired by a halloween costume I made (you can see both the piece and costume here!)

 

I’ve gotten a lot of positive response to this work in general, but also amongst actual fire-eaters—which I consider quite a complement! :)

 

Recently, a fire performer reached out asking if I would create some similar characters for her new website to promote a variety of entertainment services—including fire eating, fire-dancing, and stiltwalking. Of course I jumped at the chance because it just sounded like pure fun—plus, I totally love this subject matter and could explore it endlessly!

 

These are the 4 pieces we decided on, to be used as character spots on her website:

 

I used this, also, as an opportunity to explore texture in my work a bit further. A few years back I made the transition from using completely traditional mediums to a combination of traditional + digital (to allow for a bit of a quicker work process). Since then, I’ve been finessing my technique, and after reading a fantastic article filled with great tips and resources by Emmeline Pidgen on Ten Paces and Draw, I was inspired to add some new textures and brushes to my existing library & try some new things. I was really happy with how these came out, and feeling inspired to continue to play with this sideshow/circus theme in some patterns and prints I have in the works. Stay tuned!

More sketchbook girls

Just sharing a few last black & white and another color image from my Sketchbook Project submission. I was excited to find out that the Sketchbook Project at the Brooklyn Library was featured last week in the New York Times!

 

 

 

 

Love is…

Been having fun with linework in my sketchbook with my “Girls in Love”, but been itching to play around with some of the drawings in color. Here’s one…

 

Girls in Love

I’m participating again in the Arthouse Co-op’s Sketchbook Project—this time for the 2012 “Limited Edition”, which will include publication in a book the Co-op will publish in the Fall of 2012.

 

This time around I choose the theme “Pictures and Descriptions”; Afterall, that’s pretty much what illustration is all about, right?

 

It also seemed that this theme would lend itself to a good opportunity to combine & experiment with lettering + images together. After a lot of thought about where to derive my content from, I decided I wanted to keep it light-hearted and fun. I found some really sweet and inspiring quotes on love, and felt they would be a perfect pairing with some of the dreamy girls I love to draw.

 

And on a personal level, this felt like an interesting concept to evolve to, considering I submitted a 2011 Sketchbook Project with the theme of “Great Hopes and Massive Failures”—based on the miserable (but funny!) experiences of dating in the pursuit of love. Since then I’ve been lucky enough to fall head-over-heels in love, so it’s been fun to make some pictures inspired by this wonderful side of it! :)

 

Here’s a few pages:

 

 

 

 

 

 
All artwork copyrighted. Please do not use without permission