My Work // Gretchen

Here’s a little piece that I’ve just completed. I’ve named her Gretchen, after her collection of pearl-like jewellery. After months of practice, experimentation and research, I feel I’m now at the place where I not only am developing my own style, but my illustration skills are at the level I’ve been working to reach.

What I’ve been aiming for in my illustration has been largely realised here. A strong, realistic drawing of a woman with a character-filled face and expression. A visual style influenced by Art Nouveau, and the 1920s in general, which jumps off the page, part in thanks to the thicker line that goes around its outer edge. And a soft but lovely colour palette; picking a good set of colours has long been one of the most difficult aspects of illustration for me, but I feel I’m getting there now.

I have another illustration along the same line, that I will share in a few days (though you can already fine it on my Folio page as well as on my Behance account), and I’m excited to continue work along this vein. These two pieces will most likely make up my first pieces of art on my Etsy and Society6 stores, so people out there can purchase a print (and maybe more) for themselves. I’m actually going to print out a few copies and send them to Papergirl Belfast, where it will hopefully be given, by someone on the back of a bicycle, to a random person walking about Belfast.