Illustration

Section

Design Illustration

Swirling Three-Dimensional Script by Designer Alia Bright

Portland-based designer Alia Bright creates interlocking text with bright gradient patterns that combine her background in illustration, fine art, and graphic design. The looping letters are formed from paper and glue, and are created with several different weights and stocks to add a visual texture to the graphic presentation. For Bright, the trick to a successful work is finding the sweet spot where the three-dimensional aspect of the paper highlights the lettering, and vice versa. “I feel a piece is successful when I achieve this, which requires a lot of restraint,” she explains to Colossal. I try to maintain the right level of stylistic simplicity while still creating visual interest through color, pattern, and shadows.” You can see more of Bright’s paper text on her website and Instagram.

Art Illustration

Ceramic Dishes Drawn as Rippling Pools of Culture by Brendan Lee Satish Tang

For his “Swimmers” print series, artist Brendan Lee Satish Tang transformed traditional blue and white ceramic dishware patterns into a symbol for culture: the complex, learned, and shared pool that surrounds us all. Each intricately drawn work features two swimmers (parental figures and children, siblings, and peers) who are seemingly unaffected as they attempt to navigate the rippling waters together.

Born in Ireland to Trinidadian parents, Tang received a formal art education in the United States and in Canada, where he is a naturalized citizen. He has lectured at conferences and academic institutions across North America, and his work has been exhibited and collected at museums and galleries across both nations. Currently based in Vancouver, Tang works primarily in clay to explore themes of tradition and culture with a particular interest in cultural appropriation and hybridity, which he says reflects his own “ambiguous cultural identity.”

The crosshatching and subdued blue tone give Tang’s drawings a sketch-like quality, while the morphing of the ceramic waves show a deeper level of planning and precision. A play on the idiom “a fish out of water,” Tang writes on his website that “we are the fish,” adding that humankind is “always finding our way through our greater culture.” Brendan Lee Satish Tang is represented by Gallery Jones in Vancouver and Elizabeth Leach Gallery in Portland. Check out his website to see where he will be showing next, and follow him on Instagram for closer looks at his latest work.

Art Illustration

Loneliness and Belonging Explored in a New Children’s Book of Poetry and Mixed-Media Illustrations

Author JonArno Lawson and artist Nahid Kazemi recently collaborated to tell a largely visual story about a young bird contemplating its own existence and trying to find its place in the world after losing its flock. Titled Over the Rooftops, Under the Moon and published by Brooklyn-based Enchanted Lion Books, the children’s book features poetic writing by Lawson which provides the framework for its complex themes. Kazemi’s colorful illustrations—a mix of pencil, colored pencil, chalk pastel, and collage—pull young readers into the colorful and curious world.

After studying painting at Art University in Tehran, Kazemi worked as a graphic designer for literary magazines, published children’s books in Iran, and participated in illustration festivals around the world. Kazemi tells Colossal that the collaboration with JonArno Lawson happened by chance, shortly after a move and career restart in Canada.

While looking through books at a library for publishers and authors, the artist came across one called Sidewalk Flowers. “It made me hopeful that publishers in North America were interested in publishing wordless books,” she said. “I searched for JonArno’s other books in the library and felt that his work was close to my own style. I found him through social media – he really liked my work as well, and after a short while, we started to think together about this project.”

The new book is available now on Amazon. To see more of Kazemi’s mixed media illustrations, follow her on Instagram. (via Brain Pickings)

Art Illustration

Atmospheric Collages by Art Duo ‘Frank Moth’ Combine Elements from the Past and Future

Frank Moth is the nom de plume of an anonymous Athens-based art duo. Together the pair creates atmospheric collages that combine elements from vast expanses such as oceans, deserts, and the universe at large. The artists combine these scenic elements with decades-old images of men and women, simultaneously dating the collages and giving them a futuristic feel. Because of this push and pull between the past and present, the pair refer to their work as “nostalgic postcards from a distant but at the same time familiar future.” You can see more of the collaborative’s collage work on Moth’s Instagram and Tumblr.

Animation Illustration

Paper Illustrations and GIFs Explore the Body and Mind in New Work by Eiko Ojala

New Zealand and Estonia-based illustrator Eiko Ojala (previously) creates cut paper illustrations that present shadow and depth through creative layering of colorful pieces of paper. Recently, his editorial illustrations have been focused on the mind and body, like a cut paper GIF he created for a story on heart attacks in the New York Times. Others, like two Washington Post illustrations, attempt to uncover the thoughts and feelings sequestered in children’s minds by layering images inside the shape of a boy’s profile. You can see more of Ojala’s designs on his Instagram and Behance.

 

Illustration

Fantasies and Fears Surround the Beds of Illustrated Characters by Virginia Mori

We love the illustrations of Italian artist Virginia Mori (previously) who adds a subtle hint of dark humor to her quirky illustrations of young women and men. Recently the artist has been drawing scenes that revolve around the unconscious thoughts that spring to life while in bed. Each illustration presents an improbable or unique vision of a bedroom—from a bed composed of live grass, to another balanced on the tips of four trees. The illustrations seem to peek into her subjects’ dreams, projecting their hidden hopes or fears onto their surroundings as they slumber. You can see more of her work on her website, and keep updated with future exhibitions on Instagram and Facebook.

Art Illustration

Blue and White Greenhouse Illustrations Appear like Sun-Baked Cyanotypes

Portuguese artist Ana Frois uses her background in architecture to draft precise structures she fills with imaginative monochrome plants and miniature gardening accessories. The series, simply titled Greenhouses, is created with white pencil on top of deep blue acrylic on paper. The ghostly forms are reminiscent of a cyanotype or faded architectural sketch, as if the clean-cut floating renderings are memories from another time. You can find more of Frois’s drawings on Instagram, and purchase prints of her work on Etsy.