I just had to draw a mosquito. I’m working on a booklet about ‘waste sensitisation’ for Rotary International. And, I feel a bit itchy!
It’s a female Anopheles gamblae, from Africa.
It’s a funny old world…
Mar 142017
Jan 182017
Baudelaire paints striking pictures with his poetry. Recently I’ve been trying to learn french and was given the poem Les Hiboux, from Les Fleurs du Mal, to translate. The words weave a spell, entranced I decided to try to illustrate them.
Les Hiboux
Sous les ifs noirs qui les abritent
Les hiboux se tiennent rangés
Ansi que des dieux étranges
Dardant leur oeil rouge. Ils méditent
Sans remuer ils se tientront
Jusqu’à l’heure mélancholique
Où, poussant le soleil oblique
Les les ténèbres s’éstabliront.
Leur attitude au sage enseigne
Qu’il faut en ce monde qu’il craigne
Le tumulte et le mouvement.
L’homme ivre d’une ombre qui passe
Porte toujours le châtiment
D’avoir voulu changer de place.
This is my handwritten attempt at a translation and initial notes for picture ideas. I don’t usually have the time for personal projects but the owls have been haunting me. I’m hoping that the design will mark a change in direction for my illustration work to a more individual style.
Update 02/05/17
This is a rough sketch of Baudelaire and Jeanne Duval en ‘le tumulte et le mouvement’. I’m now constructing the rest of the world of the poem around their motion.
May 232016
I recently did some work for the Battlefields Trust Part of the project involved making some maps that would look like old print maps. I based my new versions on the work of the cartographer John Speed and I really enjoyed trying to recreate Speed’s style of drawing.
Mar 112016
I haven’t been maintaining my website as often as I should. It’s difficult when drawing time is such a precious commodity! ‘Must try harder’, inscribes my inner critic.
So, to begin the catching-up process, here is a picture map that I made for the Clearmapping Company. I started freelancing for this Falmouth-based cartography company about two years ago. Although a lot of the work has been standard map-based illustration I do get the odd commission which allows me to use my imagination and drawing skills-which is fun!
This client wanted a map of their land which is next to Coniston Water in the Lake District. The original map is totally black and white, but I’ve added a bit of blue in the sky and the water, because I can… It’s actually drawn to scale ~ at least the land features are, not the houses, trees and sheep!
