Japanese Cartoon Art (Sanrio)

I love the simplicity yet effectiveness of sanrio artwork. It's in a very simplistic style which would be easy to replicate and yet still stylistic and iconic.

Shield bug

As bizarre as this may sound, whilst sat outside today a small bug fell onto me from the tree. I was about to brush it off when I noticed it shining in the sunlight and looked down upon it to see a lovely pattern. This inspired me for my project over the summer to do a study of different beetles and their patterns throughout the summer. This will enable me to experiment loads with material and media.

John Burningham

I really like John Burninghams work and was introduced to him at college. The pastel and light colour palette that he uses is very unique and is very suitable for the children's books  which he illustrates. The spray paint used in the background creates a nicely textured background and this is what I like most and like to try and incorpirate within my work.

Amanda Kavanagh

Yet again this is a reference and inspiration on how I am to start keeping my sketchbooks similar to.

Sketchbook

To keep myself working in the break before university I am going to set myself a brief project although I am yet to still decide what this should be upon. Whilst doing this, I am intending to make at least one drawing a day so that my book is full of observational drawings.

Constructivism

This is a new art movement I was introduced to at the start of University, and had never previously never heard of. This has relevance to my current visual problem solving module as it co-insides with propaganda posters and their stylistic qualities.

Nature - Flowers

Flowers inspire me not only with how pretty and delicate they are, but mainly their colour. I love trying to replicate these bright colours and working with them within my work. Georgia O' Keefe's work mainly inspired me as it is surreal and different to how most flowers are presented, focusing mostly upon the colour. Below are some examples of my flower work.

Henna Tattoo

Henna Tattoo inspires me with the patterns that are created to decorate the hands. Floral patterns often appeal to me however the more orient ones which are more decorative have slightly more appeal as there is so much shape and geometry within them. 

Pyrography - Cenevieve Dionne

I was not aware of the method of Pyrography before I discovered this artist. The technique consists of burning images into wood with hot tools such as soldering irons. Usually the image is drawn first so that there are guides to follow. Cenevieve Dionne's work made this technique appealing to me as it delicate drawings and colour is added with watercolour paints or gauche.

Illustrated Life

Once again I will mention this book, but purely to make people aware of it, as I feel it is a very beneficial book to all artists and looking at other peoples sketchbook works and ways they work is always a good way to adapt personal work.

Shepard Fairey

I discovered this street artists work when watching Exit Through The Gift Shop. It really struck me as it was very  similar to the propaganda posters and also inspired my current visual problem solving module. I like the use of a limited panel and stencil imaging.

Kurt Hollomon

I discovered his work in "illustrated life" and I liked how he uses his sketchbook. each page is just full of sketches after sketches as well as lots of notes and thoughts. I need to get into the habit of carrying a mini sketchbook and pencils with me at all times, as you never know when something will catch your eye.

Peter Callesen

This isn't a style of work I personally would do at the moment, however his technique definitely caught my eye and showed possibilities. I love how simplistic the materials are as in just paper, but the images are very eye catching. He achieves this by making a cut out silhouette of the subject and then building paper models to fall out, or hang from and be relief from the paper as if it is real and just falling out. This also links back similar to Sue Blackwell's work yet not with a book. It also opens my eyes to 3D elements being used within Illustration.

Nature - Animals

I used to hate drawing animals as they were so complex however I then received a book from my uncle teaching the basics to drawing any animal and were to start and with practice they have become one of my favourite subjects to draw with the complex and uniqueness to each one. I love the textures, colours, patterns and shapes created by each individual animal. Below are some previous drawings I have done in different techniques.

Illustration Play - The book

This isn't an artist as such although this book has definitely introduced me to a lot of new artists since reading it and also discovered different techniques of working even if slightly bizarre. It's inspired me to start using more unusual material and media within my work for future projects.

Penelope Dullagham

I found this artist within the book "Illustrated Life" which shows many sketchbooks and how artists have used these in different ways and made them personal. I like her work in the sketchbooks with it's naive feel however the thing that stood out to me most was the quote "make something of it". This quote is inspiring to me as often I will draw something and think oh no, it's gone wrong, get rid whereas this quote is making me think differently to just keep working until I get something I like or keep it just for reference and practice to look back upon.

Debbie Adele Cooper/ Sue Blackwell.

I discovered her work when visiting the Quad and seeing the exhibition "Never Let Me Go". The thing that appealed to me most about this work is that the book she was interpreting, she had decided to carve hollow and create a little scene based around imagery in the book within it, with a peeping hole to view inside when slightly opened. The trees on top were also made from pages of the book. This was a newish form of art that I had seen which reminded me of my work I did for my body project at college; however that project was inspired by the work of Sue Blackwell (2nd image). Below Sue Blackwell's work is also an image of the work I created for the body project and a similar idea of using pages within a book to create artwork.

Eleanor Bowley "Watching/Waiting"

This piece in particular stood out to me from her work which is shown in the book Illustration Play: Craving for the extraordinary. I feel this piece stood out to me the most as it is so delicate and pretty, and the detail on the bird is very contradictory to just the shapes and patterns in the background. The use of mixed media and material to composite most of it appeals to me as I like textile work myself. I feel it all works very well to give a natural feel and a very delicate, feminine piece of work. I'm hoping to try this style more over the summer with personal projects.

Propaganda Posters

I have been doing research into these as it fits in nicely with the work I am creating for Visual Problem Solving with people trying to manipulate peoples thoughts etc.
I like the simplistic compositions and imagery within this posters which are far from complex so the message is clear and to the point. I also like the use of a colour palette and this not ranging too much, often with 4 colours being the maximum amount. I am hoping to incorporate similar qualities within my own work, and possibly create one piece very like this.

Jenny Saville

I was first introduced to Jenny Saville's work in college as well. I love her work has she takes controversial issues of gender or weight and these are the main focus within her work. The colours she uses as well within her work are often to portray dead bodies or look like rotting flesh, however the reason why I love her work is for the respect I have for the skill of painting. These pieces are known to be fairly big and yet the whilst the marks look really precise to create the skin, they are very expressive.

Dave Mckean

Dave Mckean is a major inspiration in my artwork and has been since I was first introduced to him in my final year of school (2008). I absolutely love his wide range of work and find him such an inspiring artist as he has tried many forms of different ways to communicate messages and be creative. For this reason I have included my 3 main types of work I love that he has done. The first is of his drawings, my parents recently brought me his book Squink, too many times I can just sit looking through that book for inspiration to just pick up a paintbrush (or whatever medium) and just make markings to try and represent what's in front of me. In this book the only use of medium is black ink. I find this alone incredible as the images still vary quite significantly, as in they have different mark making techniques applied, different styles, and it appears them spontaneous marks. The second image is of his photo manipulation and heavy mixed media images that he creates. This is the first work I discovered by him and it was definitely what has helped to inspire me to be more creative with media etc. The other amazing thing about the piece below is it's sheer size that it was painted at so that it could be used in an a4 comic. The final thing that I have linked is of his movie work that he has done. Mirrormask is by far one of my favourite movies for it's artistic qualities and it amazes me that Dave Mckean just tries his hand at everything, as this is how I like to work, and I hope to have skills in many aspects of creativity.

Natalie Shau

Natalie Shau has been an inspiration to me for a while now since I discovered her work at college. I love the use of photography combined with subtle photography. It helps to create a realistic looking image that is still blatantly drawn. I would like to work in a similar style to this one day or at least try combining photography and drawn images as I like the techniques it produces.

Apologies

Firstly I would like to apologise for the lack of posts in the last month, hopefully all the influences from those days will be uploaded in the next 24 hours.

Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas

I am going to use the imagery within this film as inspiration for my after effects projects of the effects of drugs. The warping and distortion as well as camera angles within this movie are interesting and something I would like to try and replicate similar styles.

"Take Influence from real life"

Today we interviewed one of the third years for the professional studies module. I found this extremely useful as it removed many doubts I had about myself and how the course would progress throughout the years. The main part of this interview I found interesting was "take influence from real life". This was important to me, as when given a project I find it quite hard to at first engage and think oh.. I have to do this.. and this.. and trying to find subject around that area, rather than just taking influence from things which I know and am already very aware about. This piece of advice would be the most useful for future projects, as a blank white piece of paper can often be intimidating to me.

Rebecca Kitchin

I discovered her work about a year ago when looking through for references for fairies. This piece in particular stood out to me as it has a very linear style and yet the washes of colour give it some sense of solidity. I like the subtle, natural colours used as I feel this helps add to the elegance of the image. With the colour only being in washes it looks very weak and not bold which could have been done to suggest the fragility of the fairy in particularly the wings 

Handmade bag.

I wanted to create something unique and cute for my mum for  mothers day and wanted to use skills I had learnt in the past, so I decided to make this bag. I know it isn't an influence as such, but it felt good to connect back to skills learnt in the past and practice these. I like the very simplistic nature of it, and definitely wanted to keep it for myself. The technique of felting was also very good for creating a soft texture to work with to match the theme of cute and soft. This has inspired me to make more of these little bags and possibly sell them on my etsy account. If I was to do this however I would take up their complexity by possibly adding  hand painted motifs of flowers and natural patterns upon them.

Lisa Solomon

I also discovered Lisa Solomon in "Illustration Play" and her work immediately stood out to me as it was in the similar style to the way that I had drawn my heart in my sketchbook for the current visual problem solving module. Her work shows that combining drawing and stitching can be very effective and I love her simplistic use of drawing with the stitching used for bolder outlines. I like the image above (top one) of hers due to the simplistic and decorative quality of a subject which can be drawn so grotesquely. I decided to include an image of my own work beneath to show the similar method of working which I had been doing. I feel that mine however is slightly less pretty and decorative. It's still got the simplistic nature but a little more detail and more colour range to try and define. I may try working with just a simple drawing or pattern to work over the top of and see if her way of combining stitching is effective for me, or if I should stick to this method of working and keep some of the linear qualities I have added to mine. 

Megan Wilson

I discovered her work recently in the book "Illustration Play". I like the inventive idea of creating artwork on the bigger mediums than what paper sticks to. The use of the entire corner of a room being used for this piece is inspiring to me as it shows it doesn't just have to always be small with it being illustration. The thing that attracted me at first was the nature themes as this is a common interest of mine. I also like the mixed media combination of paint and textiles as I like to work in a fairly similar way with incorporating textiles or other ways of working than just the traditional. I would love the opportunity to create a piece to these scale at some point within the future as I feel I would have much more expressive mark-making techniques and more freedom.

Cool Animation

I found this animation a year ago and it has stuck with me since. I find the timing within this animation incredible as it fits perfectly to the beats of the music. I like the collaboration of the illustrator and animator and would like to do something similar to this within the future.

Random Blog Finding

http://saturnonastick.deviantart.com/art/Growth-106494518?q=boost:popular+in:traditional/drawings/abstract&qo=53

I discovered this image on a blog which led to this deviant art. I love the use of linear lines with the washes of paint over the top. I also feel the colour blends are really effective. This reminds me of the work of alex pardee with the linear lines and washes. It also links well to the image I have created for my visual communication project of the army of rioters as a chasm, as these are very linear too with washes of colour over them.

Cherry Blossom

It's spring, which means the blossom is appearing again. I intend to go out with my camera and photograph this whilst it is available for reference to future projects as I find it very pretty and can make very interesting visual images.

Absinthe Adverts (Art Nouveau)

I love the art nouveau style and the style of these images. The lines are natural flowing and no harsh edges so I love this natural element and the use of a simplistic colour pallet. The use of faint outlines is pretty effective in my opinion in making the subjects stand out from the background.

Velvet Acid Christ

I have decided that this music is the piece that I would use for the after effects project. I would like to base the imagery around trippy and psychedelic imagery.

Tim Burton

I have always liked Tim Burton's movies such as The Nightmare Before Christmas, Sleepy Hollow and The Corpse Bride, however it was only fairly recently that I came across his drawn artwork. I quite like his style of imagery with the linear style and minimalism approach. It looks to me as if Quentin Blake would have been an inspiration to Tim Burton with the simplistic imagery. I would like to start using this style of imagery to create sketches and preliminary ideas. 

Wet felting

Wet felting is a technique I learnt whilst at college and had forgotten about as a means of working. I love the patterns that this technique can create and the feel of the fabric that it produces as it is so soft. I recently brought some more wools so I could start doing this technique again to make a few handbags with this technique. This is different from the usual illustration and photography that I like, but hey it's arts and crafts and fun, as well as something totally different that can make me cute things.

Lucy Mclauchlan

This is an artist I have discovered quite recently whilst flicking through an illustration book. I love the natural flowing elements within her work as well as the use of pattern. The images are very surreal and abstract, which helps to create the patterns and yet still extremely beautiful and delicate looking. The use of black and white in a lot of her images is interesting as it shows that colour is not needed to create beauty or pattern and the element of pattern can create a beauty of it's own and simplicity. 

Anthony Goldsworthy

Anthony Goldsworthy is a sculpture that inspires me. Although I will more than likely never work within a 3D element of creating sculptures personally the main influence he provides to me is the use of natural material within his work. I would like to create artwork with just natural materials myself so this is the influence I would take from him. The main thing I like about Goldsworthy's work is that the sculptures are placed within environments that make them look natural and as if they fit there.

Nicoletta Cecolli

Nicoletta Cecolli as been an influence since I discovered her work at college. I love how her work is very feminine but has dark undertones and the media in which she uses. The imagery is semi-realistic has in the shading and 3D elements look realistic however it still has a sense of some naivety to it. I have personally not used any direct influence from her work as of to date, however in future projects I would like to use a similar style to this.

Wumpscut Music Video.

This video will help inspire towards my project for Proffessional Communications. With the speech being about freedom of speech and how power can determine making people follow what you have to say, I feel this is highly relevant as it is looking at a lot of propaganda, and the nazi germany with how they gained control and power. I also like the random viewings of propaganda posters which is something I have been researching into to create a similar style of.

Textiles

After visiting my home city of Nottingham today I am feeling very inspired. I took my regular visit to the Victoria market whilst there and saw my favourite textile shop with so much choice. I want to get back into textile work as well as my artwork and combine the two, so this was a major influence for things I can practice during the summer when I have set my own brief to keep myself busy. I also brought some scraps whilst there to use within my project right now and to collage.

Sophie Ryder

I was thinking back to past visits I have been on, and I thought about the Yorkshire Sculpture Park. This is where I first discovered Sophie Ryder's work. Something about it instantly caught my attention and made me love the work. I didn't know what this was at first, but I think it's the size of the pieces and the material in which these are created. I loved the hybrid hare/women sculptures that were exhibited here especially the one shown above. The scale of this piece was just incredible as it was so big and made it look so powerful and strong.

"Still Bored"

I took out a book from the library today entitled still bored. This appealed to me as it is designs for skate, surf and snow boards, all of which I have an interest in. The design concepts on some of them are fantastic and I discovered that a lot of them are really brightly coloured. This inspires me with my work as I'd like to work with some of the more natural themes within a similar style but also use the brightly coloured work and use of pattern within some of my own work. It also opens up another possibility of where illustration and graphic design can be used as well as within books, magazines, newspapers and artwork for bands etc.

Alex Pardee

This image is really striking to me as it is a contrast to Alex Pardee's usual work of the linear elements and bright ink marks. I particularly like this image due to the clever use of the material being worked upon. The colour of the paper is incorporated into the image and used as the mid tones. I feel this works really well to create a contrasting image which is striking to say that it is very linear. The clever use of white at the bottom draws attention and is made in such a way that the marks look a little like smoke. I feel the image has a quite steampunk inspired look to it, and a vintage style, which is another element which inspires me a lot within my work. I feel the simple use of shading and minimalist style to the drawing actually gives it much more detail than overloading with lots of texture and shows that not all images that are amazing are ones with the most detail etc put into them. I would like to try and create some imagery similar to this at some point and try a more minimalistic approach to see if this provides as good an effect within my work.

Camille Rose Garcia

I absolutely love Camille Rose Garcia's work. She has inspired my work right since I saw it back in my year 10 at school during an art class. I love the cartoonish style in which she draws and the depicted wastelands  to show a negative meaning in her imagery yet the contrast of bright colours to kind of say hey, it's a bad world, but it's so well hidden who cares. This naivety also shows with the drawing style as if it is imagery from a children's book. Another aspect I like is the mixed media elements within her work, and the layering and use of media. The washes of colour for backgrounds contrast well with the bolder foreground elements. The use of mixed media in these images definately inspires me a lot to use mixed media within my work as it looks so appealing and detailed, whilst looking all decorative.