Sarah Young

I signed up for the Artist's Newsletter a couple of years ago, and they recommend and advertise new and upcoming artist, in Januarys issue they had an artist called Sarah Young, I went on her website and loved her work. Young is a printmaker, painter, designer and illustrator, and works on a wide range of materials and techniques, such as silk screen printing, mono prints, collagraph, relief prints and creating dolls. When I especially love her prints as they look inspired by folk art, I love how she has layered different colours and shapes on top of each other to create the piece, and instead of using block colours and shapes, she has created the hens body from different patterns and prints, this adds more depth and interest in the picture. 

Artist's block

Over the past couple of weeks I have found it really difficult to get into the new brief and just don't know what to do, I have chosen to base my work around Mexico and Folk Art, however I am finding it really difficult to get into, it's either lack of inspiration and lack of research as I am finding it really difficult to find research and books about Mexican art and culture. I've been to the college library a few times and been unsuccessful in finding any books that link to what I am looking for. I have also been looking on the internet, but I think that I am one of those people that would rather look through a real book to get inspiration from than looking at a flat computer screen. 

I think another reason why I'm finding it difficult is because for this brief we have to choose the topic and what to do, instead of it all being included in the brief. 

I think I either need to find some inspiration quick, or I need to completely change my ideas and choice of topic, I hope I'm not stuck in this block for long!

Henry Holland

I love Henry Holland collections and I was looking on the House of Holland website to look at his new collections and I found that his new pre Spring 2012 collection has been inspired by Mexico, both the shapes and cuts of the clothes but also the print, patterns and colours of the clothes.
Here are some photo's:

The collection is bright, bold and colourful, the brings mix together stripes, florals and skulls, all inspired by Mexico and the Mexican Day of the Dead Festival. The stripes also have a Mexican feel also he has used shapes and cuts of clothes that are similar to Mexican ponchos. I really love this collection and I am really inspired by the colours, shapes, print and patters of this collection.  

Personal Passions

For our new brief we were told that we could choose the theme and what the project would be about, I decided that I would do my project about Mexico and Folk Art because it is a culture and art style that I have always wanted to look into and draw from. I love the mexican culture and traditions, such as the Day of the Dead Festival, also the colours and patterns in their work and arts.
Here are some research photos I found: 

Toys and Tales Finished

At the start of December we were given our new brief and it was to design a shop window for a children's toy shop, called Toys and Tales. We each went into groups of two, three or four and had to work together to design and make three shop windows, the brief in total was about four weeks long, so it was a lot of work to fit into a short period of time. 
In our group we had three people from surface design and one person from illustration, we had to work together to create ideas and also make things and mock-up's of what the windows would look like, we then had to pitch the idea to the shops owners and they would pick their favourite to actually be the window display. I think that our ideas were good and imaginative, we decided that one of the windows would be aimed at girls and one at boys, and the third window would be aimed at both boys and girls and would be interactive. 

We decided for the boys window we would have a treasure chest and lots of teddies and bears climbing out as if they come to life at night, like Toy Story or Small Soldiers, then there would be a washing line above this with more bears from and also hanging hot air-balloons, rockets and planes hanging from to create more depth in the window, however this would also let in the light. 
These are some sketches of what it could look like from my sketchbook and some small mock up's of what they would look like: 

For the girls window we decided on a fairy, enchanted garden theme and would be made from layers of cut wood in the shapes of grass, toadstools and flowers. And then stock could be placed in-between the different layers to create a scene and would be an interesting idea to display the stock that they have in the shop. 

For the third window, which would be the interactive one we decided on a giant jigsaw theme, and we would make a giant jigsaw that we would stick onto the window with suction cups and then the children could play with the giant jigsaw while they were inside the shop. 

Finally to link all the windows together we decided that we would create vinyl stickers for the windows of toys that are in the shop and the children could match up the sticker to the actual toy in the window. We thought that this would be a fun and interesting idea and would be imaginative and different. 

Overall I really enjoyed the brief, although it did feel a short, I think that we worked really well together as a team and came up with some good ideas and produced some interesting and fun ideas that we think children would enjoy and like to do. I think that this brief has prepared us for the real working life and how we would have to work as a group and team in a company, it also highlighted how important combination was. 

Geninne's Art Blog

Today I bought a set of water colour blocks because although I have used water-colour for work in the past, it is a technique that I want to get better at, and want to use for my next project. So for some inspiration I was looking at other artists who use watercolours in their work, and I came across an art blog called Geninne's Art Blog and fell in love with it immediately. I think that her work is beautiful full of colour, shape, and pattern, her work mostly uses watercolours and sometimes ink. I think that her work appeals to me because like me it looks like she is obsessed with birds, who seem to pop up on nearly all of her works, but each one is a different colour, shape and has different feathers giving each one it's own personality and uniqueness.
Her work has really inspired me to become better at using watercolours, hopefully I will upload some of my watercolour work soon.
Here are a few pictures of her amazing work:

Here is a link to her blog: http://blogdelanine.blogspot.com/ 

The Exquisite Book

For Christmas I got a book by the artist's Julia Rothman, Matt Lamothe, and Jenny Volvovski called the Exquisite Book, when I asked for it I thought that it would just be work by the artist Julia Rothman however when I opened it, it was a pullout book with work from one hundred various different artists and illustrators. They all were given one of ten different themes, such as ''In the forest", "In the Ocean" or "In the City". And then they had to draw an illustration or picture of what that theme meant to them, they would then send this piece to the next artist and they would draw the next section of the picture with the same theme. They either had the option to look at the previous piece of work or they could just follow on the line from the previous piece. Each artist worked very differently for example some would look at the previous work and then follow it with the same colours, shapes or themes, however others made up their own versions. 

Although this book isn't what I expected I really love it, it has opened my eyes to lots of new artists and illustrators, and has shown to me how differently each artist works and how they can collaborate together in different ways. 

Julia Rothman

As part of my last brief I was introduced to the work of Julia Rothman, who is an illustrator, and I liked the style and feeling of her work and thought that it was very interesting and uplifting.
Her work has been used on papers, fabrics, and stationary, using a technique of hand drawing and also digital drawing  giving her work a difference in line, shape and texture.  Her work has also been used as illustrations in a lot of different books.
I love the colour palettes that she uses in her work and think that they work well together and complement each other and her work.

I really like how she draws the same item such as shoes and draws them in different styles and shapes but still uses the same colours, in each of the drawings.