Promo 2

I have designed a proper version of the Illustrious' website which is awaiting to be put on line. Nothing too sophisticated as I am still at a learning stage of Dreamweaver but I think that it's simplicity should be effective. I am including a little sneak peak and as you can see - I am keeping the blog!

Promo

Some promotional materials (magnetic cards) for the Illustrious arrived! I have immediately stucked some to an office cabinet and I have been admiring them ever since. Hopefully clients will like them too. Especially that Mr President has just hit the 100th day of his reign.

Experiment

I have been experimenting recently with combining my photography with illustration. This post shows another example.

Superman

After listening to doom and gloom comments on Alistair Darling's new Budget (my favourite nasty comment today was on Radio 4 that the only thing in the British economy still in the black is the Chancellor's eyebrows) I am afraid that we might need some help from Superman.

This is a bookcover for Umberto Eco's essays "The Myth of Superman" where I created a drawing of an arm and designed the cover. I sometimes work in Illustrator and this is one of my favourite examples of working with this programme.

More

I am looking at Edgar Degas' soft pastels, writing this with a huge book of his works on my knees. He was experimenting with various techniques of using the soft pastels crayons to that extent that some of his works got destroyed in the process or were beyond repair when art museums got them for their collections. If you will be visiting Musee d'Orsay have a careful look at his work in soft pastel technique set up in the darkened section on the top floor. But my favourite work of his (oil on canvas), red La Coiffure, is in The National Gallery's in London collection - I am planning a visit this summer. 

I hope my works are doing well on the walls out there!

First ever

Drums please!

These were my first ever commissioned illustrations! It was couple of years ago when I got a phone call from a posh, glossy wedding magazine (where my friend worked as a stylist). I was to illustrate an article about marriage contracts. Within a very short deadline (was it a day or two? I cannot remember now) I produced two 50 cm x 70 cm (18" x 28") soft pastels. Editor could not choose between them so she decided to print both.

They did not know what had hit them...

Baby soft pastel

A special gift for a pregnant friend. Please do not forget to click on the image to enlarge it!

Coffee flavoured still life

Still life with coffee and tulips

Soft

Having a blog is a great place to show some of the works that I would not be able to show otherwise. I will post some of my soft pastels - they were usually bought/created on commission to decorate walls of homes of private collectors and all I have left is a reproduction of my work.

Congrats to their happy owners! I promise not to do an Edgar Degas one day and take them from you for eternal corrections but it would be nice to see them all gathered in one place!

Happy Easter!

I definitely seem to be having some weird health issues these days - first was this odd (stomach, I suspect) bug and today while I was lifting a camera bag (well, with a Mamiya RB67 inside which is quite a hefty bit of equipment) I felt a terrible pain in my back and whole constellations of stars exploded in front of my eyes. I was not able to catch my breath for a while but as I wanted to continue working I did not have much choice. Maybe I should have an early night tonight and have some more rest.

While I am having several ideas how to picture these health incidents I am presenting my Easter card for Spring 2009. The printed version is slightly different than the one featured here but I really could not choose between this one and the other. However Eleonora features in both versions. Happy Easter then and may you find your chocolate eggs quickly.

As usual, please click on the image to see it bigger.

Alaska - the frontispiece

Alaska - continuation

I designed the front page and also dividing pages of the chapters.

Looking for Alaska - picture heavy

I am haunted by a tummy bug at the moment so no posts for couple of days. However I have managed to crawl out of bed to post several images of John Green's book (previously here) in REAL life :