Illustration 1: Key steps in illustration- Part 1: Getting Started-Exercise 1: The history of illustration
In this exercise you will explore how illustration has evolved over the past 50 years. Start by choosing one from this list of illustrators:
Edward Bawden
Kathleen Hale
Eric Ravilious Edward
Ardizzone
John Minton
E H Shephard
Then using books and the internet, find out about these artist’s work and the cultural context in which they created their most significant works.
Now find a contemporary illustrator whose work you like. Explore and identify the differences in style, context, production and imagery between the two illustrators. Write notes in your learning log about the work of each of the two artists:
Did the work of the illustrator that you chose from the list seem old fashioned? If so what was it that made it seem so?
What was it about the work of the contemporary artist that attracted you to their work?
How did each artist produce their illustrations – what tools and materials did they use?
Now draw an illustration in the style of each artist, selecting similar subject matter and using similar media.
Edward Bawden:
The role of an artist within an active war sounds horrific and a role that couldn’t of been taken on lightly. Bawden’s expressive illustrative style only adds to the many emotions conveyed through his work documenting moments of WW2.
I continued to read further about Bawden’s role in World War 2 here. I included some of the images shown in the article into a mood board. I found these images particularly striking, the painterly and ‘loose’ documentation of something so horrible and severe is interesting.
I began to look through work by Bawden and after reading many brief biographies I was drawn to his role as a war artist in World War 2.
Kathleen Hale:
Hale was an artist, illustrator and children’s author most known for her ‘Orlando the Marmalade cat’ series spanning across 18 books. Her illustrations are fantastical and full of colour. They are impressively detailed but my favourites I have found are her lino-prints and black/white pencil drawings/sketches.
Eric Ravilious Edward:
Eric Ravilious Edward was an artist, illustrator, painter and printer. Edward was a good friend of Edward Bawdens but was tragically killed accompanying a Royal Air Force air sea rescue mission off Iceland that failed to return to its base in 1942.
The above screenshots are collected from a blog via ‘Discover Goldmark’. Similarly to the previous artists researched I was drawn to Edward’s printing work via woodcuts. They are bold and include interesting, meaningful imagery. I also enjoy his illustration style of looser lines and roughly coloured parts which are rich in texture.
Edward Ardizzone:
I read about Ardizzone here.
The biography mentioned that he ‘doodled a lot on his blotter’ and later saying how his war art captures the people and emotions as opposed to the pure horror of the event. I really like his looser illustration style in black and agree entirely that they seem more emotional and focused on the characters. I created a mood board of my favourite works by Ardizzone.
John Minton:
It was interesting to hear that Minton at the beginning of the second world war was a conscientious objector and went onto serving in the war in 1943, but was later discharged the same year. He also went onto becoming a tutor at the Royal College of Art and illustrating books.
I was immediately drawn in by Minton’s varied styles, in particular ‘the kite- 1940’. I continued to read about Minton and moved onto watching some clips of Mark Gatiss discussing his work, later watching a documentary about Minton’s life.
E H Shephard:
I began to read into Shephard here. I was aware of his work in designing Winnie the Pooh, but was interested in the appearance of his black and white sketches.
Shephard wasn’t initially able to enlist in WW1 due to age restrictions and began to draw/illustrate scenes from the war for the Illustrated London News and London Opinion. these illustrations reminded me of Bawden’s in a way, but seemed less emotive/serious.
Tom Hodgkinson:
I chose to compare Hodgkinson’s work with Minton’s.
Tom Hodgkinson is an artist specialising in collage. I had more recently came across his work via Instagram and was immediately interested in his creative use of mix media materials and bold colours with black and white imagery to create abstractions.
Minton’s work is more ‘old fashioned’ especially when compared to Hodgkinson’s. Minton’s black ink drawing and portrait paintings seem ‘older’ than the other works, even compared to other works by Minton. This is due to the use of paint and ink, 2 more classic materials used as opposed to collage/mixed media. The colours he used here are more muted and are works derived from ‘real life’ as opposed to abstractions leading them to feel more ‘old fashioned’. The portrait ‘Raymond Ray’-1954 of the figure in the chair was painted towards the end of Minton’s life, yet appears ‘older’ than the others. His style of painting seemed to become more classical the later in his life yet still had more contemporary, interesting uses of colour/shape.
The painting is very emotive, evoking a deep sense of sadness. Despite the huge differences in work a similar feeling is evoked from some of Hodgkinson’s collages. In particular the face of the statue used in the bottom right of the 1st mood board. The use of the statue evokes a cold feeling, and the expression of the statue’s face is similar to that of the figure’s in ‘Raymond Ray’. I am really interested in how imagery/colour/mark making can evoke emotion and develop meaning and both artists present this in sophisticated ways.
Minton’s ‘The Kite’-1940 (top left on Minton’s mood board) is a dream-like abstract landscape in rich blues/pinks. The figure in the painting is lay on the floor with a facial expression of exhaustion, appearing as if they have given up with their shadow surrounding them. The fantastical landscape evokes similar emotions to the top left image in Tom Hodgkinson’s 2nd mood board. Again these works are massively different, one using paints, the other; mixed media, paper, paint, imagery, mark making. Despite this the appearance of the silhouette in Hodgkinson’s work is empty and black with a black line extending from the figure into the landscape appearing as their shadow. Both images evoke a similar sense of sadness despite their bright coloured landscapes through their use of mark making with both figures’ shadows extending into the landscape, a nod to the Jungian shadow.
I decided to focus on Tom Hodgkinson for my first illustration. I chose to focus on the word ‘shadow’ and inner thoughts, which I felt linked the 2 artists together. I began by writing words related to shadow, without limiting my thoughts or ideas. I then went onto looking for imagery related to these words, I looked through many old/magazines collecting interesting images and typography. I scanned in the materials and reprinted them, my printer ran out of ink during this which was a ‘happy accident’ as it printed some interesting textures. Before it completely ran out of ink I printed as many as I could, rescanning and printing again, solely interested in the textures it produced.
I continued to test with some physical collaging but settled on a version made in Photoshop. I then printed, scanned and re-printed multiple versions of the design in hope of some more interesting textures. This eventually created the printing lines which I liked. I printed a few more versions and added some mark making using charcoal, pencil and paint.
Again with this next illustration inspired by Minton’s work I wanted to represent a more lonely feeling. I wanted to draw a person walking alone holding a bag on their back- a large weight heavy on their shoulders. I am not very good at drawing nor have I drawn in years so I watched a few videos as a refresher and attempted to layout the pose many times. As I started I got quicker and would continue to practise with this over the next few days.
I continued to practise, eventually coming to a sketch I could move forwards with. I then scanned/reprinted the sketch very lightly, going over it in a pen. Ideally I would’ve used ink as it appears Minton did, but continued with what I had (pen and water colour). The final result was interesting and it was definitely a fun challenge to actually draw something! I guess it roughly resembles a Minton sketch….
I played with various layouts in Photoshop, layering images/colours. I focused on the colour 'blue which gives a more sombre feeling, better representative of my focus word ‘shadow’.
I wanted to produce an illustration highlighting the darker sides of Hodgkinson and Minton’s work, linking them together focusing on the word ‘shadow’.
I ended up choosing quite violent imagery to represent the internal battle of ones mind, being particularly affected by the documentary I had watched about Minton and his untimely death.
The numbers used were from an old illustration in a book showing different parts of a diver, this in itself I liked because it was as if I I was ‘diving’ deeper. The numbers in the context of the illustration appear as if they are part of a plan (military or within the mind) but are random in order.
I really liked Hodgkinson’s use of silhouettes and included one within this illustration, I really like the negative space of Hodgkinson’s work and attempted to use this within my own to represent the ‘shadow’.
Overall I was relatively pleased with my outcome. I feel like the design isn’t very well balanced, with the blue being on one side and none within the other part of the illustration. I tested with using some blue for the number ‘7’ section, which didn’t work well. I wanted the design to appear chaotic but feel as if there may be too much mark making. I also intended to tie in the design with some text or handwriting on the white background, on it’s own it appears incomplete.
I found the research section of this task very interesting, informative and straight forward. I enjoyed briefly analysing and comparing the artists works. I particularly enjoyed the second section, moving forwards with inspiration from Tom Hodgkinson and John Minton I created 2 designs pieces of work inspired by them. I found this section quite challenging, especially the drawing/representation of Minton’s work. Drawing is something I don’t feel very confident in at all, which I will work to improve upon during this course. As suggested by my tutor I will begin a sketchbook to practise drawing alongside my other OCA work. This is a good idea, especially to force myself to draw daily and test using different materials/mediums.
After Tutor feedback:
After receiving suggestion to experiment further with different styles of drawing, I gathered some inspiration from artists I like and began to test drawing the same character inspired by Minton. I created a mood board including the works of Richard Haines and Isabella Cotier, 2 artists I really like the expressive style of.
After receiving feedback for this section my tutor suggested making the tone of blue darker and adding some blue to the right of the Hodgkinson inspired illustration.
I placed my original illustration into Lightroom and began testing with darker/more saturated blues. Immediately I felt that the design was improved, appearing bolder and of more contrast. The blue on the right made the illustration feel more balanced.
Looking back at the design after being away from it for some time was also a benefit, a fresh pair of eyes was definitely needed.
Testing further with different colours/tones/hues will definitely be something I come back and try with future work!
