Moving

what i wore today

s'fun to do one of these every once in a while.

iced tea

hello sun! the weather is treating us well on the east coast of scotland today & it inspired me to try making some iced tea for the first time this morning. boiled the kettle, steeped the tea, put in some lemon then left it to cool whilst we went & lazed in the park for a couple of hours. added a little sugar & some ice cubes when we got home & there you have it. easy, cheap & a lot healthier than bottled stuff.

earthly delights

if you're anywhere near minneapolis then you should probably do yourself a favour & visit light grey art lab; as well as it sounding like a pretty great place, they've got an exhibition on at the moment featuring a ridiculously good selection of artists & illustrators, including some of my favourites (somehow i snuck in there).

the garden of earthly delights is curated by ms tuesday bassen & mr pete gamlen. it just opened on friday & runs until 13 july. as someone who currently spends twelve hours a week commuting through the scottish countryside on a train, my piece (above) is inspired by about how much i'd prefer to be out in the forests and fields rather that headed towards an office at 70 miles per hour.

shades of grey

one of the items on my list of things to do this year was experiment with colour pallets; specifically, to exercise a little more restraint when it comes to how i work with colour. i always feel a small degree of awe when i visit the websites of people who constantly work with the same limited pallet. when i'm working, i'm more like a child in a sweet shop, grabbing whatever treat feels right/is closest.

i found this beautiful image by adrienne adams via pinterest the other day. i found myself coming up with a snapshot of a narrative in my head, following the torch light through the bushes to that tiny, hidden snake on the ground. lately, i've wanted to spend some time illustrating some sort of narrative, something more than just a snapshot. adams' image reminded me of a short story i wrote when i was twelve (which, due to an overwhelming and elaborate use of adjectives in an attempt to set the scene, i'll spare you of), where i was lost in the huge public park in my hometown at night, afraid of every rustle of bushes & strange shadow (fear not, i found my way out). after spending today wandering around the forest of our new-to-us local country park, & feeling reminded of reading wildwood earlier this year, i came up with this image.

it might not seem much of an experiment, but there were a few changes in direction for me (using only one colour! drawing the outlines last! a hint of a background!). it feels good to try something new.

new ways of living (i)

the looking for trouble exhibition - mentioned in my last post - opened in nottingham today. at long last (& it really has felt like forever) i can post some new work online.

i produced a small body of work for the show, collectively titled new ways of living; the pieces are an illustrated exploration into the notion of simplicity in modern life. a hint at how convoluted things can get & perhaps a reminder to step back & evaluate. or something like that.

above is a piece titled haircut, an edition of twelve (because at the time of drawing it'd been twelve months since my last haircut) giclée prints. i'll be posting the rest of the work over this coming week.

cape

it feels like it's been a little while since i've drawn something i've liked. a few days ago i had an image of a girl wearing a yellow poncho/cape in my head, so today i brought her to life. there's a twin piece to this that i'll show at some point, but this one is my favourite.

botanic

after a slight break from drawing, i started inking this morning with a bit of a shaky hand. turns out this was in my favour however, & i took the opportunity to loosen up a bit. we visited glasgow's botanic gardens yesterday & now i just want to draw a whole lot of plants.

in other news, my website got a bit of an update last week. there are a couple of new things still to be added already, but this'll do for now.

did not realise how grumpy & disdainful lynxes look until i drew some. just look at this guy.

a brief update

there's been a bit of silence over here, apologies. brief update: currently living on both the west & east coasts of scotland; new flat is rad; just finished up a sizeable illustration job (which i will share soon), meaning i have time for - gasp! - personal projects/printing again (or more paid jobs, i'm down with that too); found two of these whilst packing, next two orders in the shop get 'em; i joined instagram (see above).

hope all is well with you too.

red cat tote

after pretty swiftly selling out of blue cat totes last december, i finally got back into the print studio to make some more, this time in red. due to the unpredictable nature of screen-printing (& the fact that my arms are weak, weeeak), there's a pretty limited number of these kitties available. however, i also stumbled upon a happy accident; i'll reveal more next weekend...

on a somewhat related note, i'm almost at the milestone of 500 sales in my shop. that's kind of incredible. there'll be a small heap of extras going out to whoever lands on five-oh-oh.