Reflection : an artist first and an illustrator second?

Recently, I have been dedicating more time to self-initiated briefs than competitions. In doing so, I have found myself being a lot more engaged and enthused by my own practice. I am drawing and making what I want, and this has led me to produce pieces of work that really mean something to me on a personal level. 

I think illustration as a discipline overlaps with so many other forms of art practice. For example someone who enjoys more pattern-based illustration applicable to clothing or textiles could be seen as nearly a surface pattern designer. For me, I think my illustration practice overlaps with both design and fine art. I enjoy simplicity and graphic imagery, but recently my work has become more self-indulgent in its content – illustrating an experience, feeling or observation.

In some ways the differentiation between personal practice and client-led or live briefs has clarified to me the benefits of being a freelance illustrator. If I were able to sustain a life in which I could make personal work, and fund myself through client directed briefs this would bring a lot of job fulfilment. On top of this, there is no reason why these two forms of practice could not overlap. An especially open brief or a company that suits my own personal practice could cause the two to merge – money and drawing what I would like to draw! 

I understand that this sounds quite bad - as it is essentially the realisation that I enjoy doing what I want to do, rather than working with in the confines of a commercial brief and this does not offer much hope for the professionalisation of my practice. On reflection, however, I did enjoy working on briefs such as Penguin Random House and Secret 7". I think this is because the briefs offered a set content, but ultimately the final outcome was defined by my own personal interpretation of that content and any relevant research. The breadth of themes and possible visual content offered the opportunity for more in-depth concept generation as well as injecting my own sense of authorship and tone of voice to the final outcomes - as apposed to more commercial briefs like Dog Trust that had a more clearly defined tone of voice to be fulfilled. 

Things to think about moving forward: 

• Maintain a balance between professional and self-initiated briefs to keep yourself engaged in your practice and to facilitate more authentic progression.
• Let projects develop naturally - draw something for fun and then find a purpose/context for it. 

Group Crits

Positive feedback:

• Can really see the enjoyment in my personal projects - drawing the girls and trees. Continue working on this and contextualise girl figures in scenic/natural environments. 
• Like the idea of driving forward with process and using different textures - gives flat/shape-based work more authorship and authenticity. 

Moving forward: 

• Find a way of progressing the Dymkovo project beyond just thumbnails as these are getting you nowhere - you need to be able to see the shapes defined by colour to reflect on how the compositions will actual work when screen-printed - use cut paper or gouache painting? 
• Add figurative elements into Dymkovo prints. 
• Contextualise nude girl figures.

Girls (Personal Project)

Recently I decided to develop a set of sketchbook drawings of female nudes into a collection of A5 prints. I think the combination of stencil mono-print and mono-type really compliment one another, and work well with the subject matter. The chunky, shape-based nature of these nudes derives from my personal interest in figurative sculpture, such as that of Henry Moore. The top image is perhaps a further development in which I may start putting these figures into certain contexts - such as at the park or beach?

Album Artwork Submission

I submitted 2 designs into Secret 7"s album artwork competition for the song 'Help' by London Grammar. By working on this brief I am starting to see a correlation between the kind of projects I enjoy working on and those I find a bit limiting. Alike to Penguin, Secret 7" provides a initial content but ultimately what is illustrated in the final design is open to your own personal interpretation. This kind of open brief lends itself to my tendency to develop concepts surrounding considered research and my own personal reflections on content. 

I like the concept of my final designs - based on this idea on looking for the 'blue sky', representing positivity in times of hardship, and aiming to illustrate the bittersweet beauty of London Grammar's melody. I like how this imagery evolved out of personal experience and, at least for me, communicates small moments of taking notice of everyday beauty in English landscapes. 

This brief also helped me to experiment with a mixture of handmade and digital textures - something I have wanted to work with for a while. I would like to continue to mix contrasting texture in my Dymkovo toy project - taking it a step further in that each texture is made using a different form of screen-print positive. 

Dymkovo Toy Research

The brand name 'Dymkovo toy' derives from their place of origin - the Dymkovo settlement near the city of Kirov, formerly known as Vyatka, in rural Western Russia. 

The making of these clay figurines is a form of traditional Russian folk art, primarily performed by women, which still exists within the region of Dymkovo today. 

They were originally created for ritualistic purposes for the spring festival of Svistoplyaska - 'whistle-dance' - local to the Kirov province. Women from Dymkovo would make whistles in the shape of various animals - such as goats and bears - and these would be played as part of the festival celebrations. During the 19th century rural festivals, such as this one, were big affairs, coinciding with other trade events and would continue on for several days. 

The subject of these toys developed beyond the traditional ancient motifs, of totemic animals, to depictions of characters of 19th century life in rural Russia and traditional folk tales. These colourful figurines, of fat merchant wives and elegant gentlemen, became the most recognisable of the Dymkovo toy trade. 

Late in the 19th century this traditional Russian craft fell into decline, forced out of market by factory-made plaster figurines, made to imitate porcelain. It was revived, however, in 1933 through the formation of a Vyatka toy artel, a cooperative association dedicated to craft, artisan and light industrial enterprises. During the soviet period, this artel then became a workshop of the artistic fund of the RSFSR. Today Dymkovo toys are celebrated in folk art exhibitions and make a popular Russian souvenir amongst tourists. 

These earthenware toys are moulded from a mixture of red clay, local to the Kirov province, and river sand to prevent cracking during firing. First the base of the figure is formed and then smaller components, such as the arms, are attached using watery clay. After being left to dry for several days and fired for 3 - 4 hours, they are whitewashed with chalk diluted in milk and painted with tempura of varying colours. 

The Dymkovo toys are distinguished by their bright colouring and geometric patterns, which denote certain traditional meanings - for instance a wavy line represents water and a circle with a star in the middle symbolises the sun or other celestial bodies. They are also decorated with diamonds of gold leaf, to make them look especially festive. 

Every Dymkovo toy is handmade and unique, each individual craftsmen bringing his or her own particular quality and colouring to the figurines. 

Dymkovo Toys: Personal Project

Over Easter, whilst on holiday in St Petersburg I went to a Russian folk art exhibition in which I was especially taken with a collection of traditional clay figurines, called Dymkovo Toys. I really like the geometric patterns and bright colour palettes. I would like to use this form of traditional form of folk art as inspiration for a series of shape-based screen-prints. 

Things to experiment with: 

• Paper collage of different textures : gouache painted Somerset paper, brown packaging paper, reflective gold paper and sugar paper. etc. 
• Screen-prints made up of different kinds of positives : mono-printed bitmapped shapes, chinograph and ink drawn elements, foiling to mimic gold leaf. 

Products:

• Series of experimental screen-prints / paper cut collages. 
• A zine : containing own photographs and research. 
• Selected designs developed into Large A2/A1 screen-prints for final exhibition. 

Tutorial with Matt

Main thing I took away : Illustration does not need to have a direct message and communicate something as a clear as day to an audience. This is necessary in some forms of illustration such as editorial and publishing, but it can just be telling a story by evoking a feeling in the audience - which perhaps best suits my more abstract and shape-based forms of image-making.

So for this final stretch, I am going to expand upon my COP practical project and experiment with using these forms of image-making to celebrate my own personal love for the English countryside and to tell untold stories of traditional Russian folk art I saw in a recent trip to St Petersburg over Easter.

Submission to Lucy & Yak

Lucy & Yak are a clothing brand, making ethically sourced and high quality dungarees, trousers and pinafore dresses. A fan of their clothing, owning a couple pairs of dungarees myself, I noticed they were running an art and design competition on their Instagram - the prize being your design printed on their thank you cards, as a credited artist, and a £100 voucher to spend on their online shop.  

I decided to do this as a mini-brief because its something fun to do, in which I can experiment with my crafting and image-making skills, as well as potentially good exposure - especially for my Instagram.  

Here is my submission:

Kate Gibb

On Instagram I saw these new risograph prints Kate Gibb has done with Yuckprint House in Manchester. In some ways they remind me of the Hockney prints I was looking at a couple months ago - although less figurative they hold similarities in the use of pattern to define shapes. I really like the fact that these prints are mono-tone and the overlap of pattern and textures, and the contrast of some being highly visceral and others more uniform in their registration. 

Kate Gibb's practice is very experimental and process-driven, describing herself as a 'silkscreen obsessive' and her practice thriving on use of 'chance, hiccups and happy accidents' that occurs when using print-making processes. For me, she is an example of a freelance creative that despite her work being wholly non-figurative and not necessarily communicative in a traditional design sense, she has a had a lot of commercial success working for clients such as Nike or Penguin Books. I like the fact that there is a market for work that echoes elements of my practice that I really enjoy - stuff like my COP collages - demonstrating that there is no reason I could not continue making these and gaining jobs from them on a freelance level.