M' Website.

     As I mentioned a while back, this semester I've been working on getting me'sen a lovely new website like a proper professional.

     It's taken me a good while to work out the kinks and get it nice and presentable since computers aren't exactly my forte (expect improvements and additional content over time) but here it is so far...

Give it a click, it's also a link to the real thing.

FMP.

     Currently working on another piece to pair up with this one and some other bits and pieces (objects, drawings, tattoos, stickers) to go alongside.

     Hoping to print this piece and its counterpart in a couple different colourways on some fancy, possibly textured paper and whack them in some frames for the end-of-year exhibition in a few weeks.

Work in progress, fineline pen on paper.

"...black really is better"

     I found a nice little quote about Guy Le Tatooer's work in a book called "Forever: The New Tattoo":


     "I worked a long time in colo[u]r, but after some time I think black really is better", says Tatooer. Everything is distilled, simplified, but at the same time complicated by studied explorations of iconography and symbol. Progression comes in mastery of the medium. The effect is a move toward timelessness. (Schonberger, 2012)

     I think it sums up quite well why I'm not exactly keen to introduce colours into my own work "...Progression comes in mastery of the medium."

Portfolio visit with Fig Taylor.

     In February(ish) of this year I had the opportunity for a portfolio consultation session with Fig Taylor; author of the book "How to Create a Portfolio and Get Hired". After around twelve seconds she handed back my portfolio and told me that if I wanted a job in illustration I needed to use colour in my work.

     She was right of course; how often does one see a black and white Children's book or newspaper editorial these days? Not very, that's how often.
     Colour reproduction is incredibly cheap these days and if a business bloke is going to throw his business money at something, he will of course want all the sides and condiments thrown in, whether they are necessary or not.

     The fact is however, I don't like using colour in my work; I like making marks. I spend hours trying to perfect the quality of line in my work so that it looks and feels organic and further hours implementing the simplest of marks: dots, into an arrangement that itself represents tone, texture and form. This, at least right now, is all I'm interested in.

     It was toward the end of this consultation with Fig Taylor that I realised two things:
One - I have no desire to be a freelance illustrator.
Two - I like to have control over how I work, which is probably clear from the above. Suggestions are fine, instructions; not so much.

Hopes, Fears and Opportunities Mk. II

     In the five months it's been since the first post on the topic, very little has changed in terms of the nature of my hopes and fears: I still hope to succeed in accomplishing what I want and fear the opposite.
     Opportunities however are cut from a different cloth; they are the pathway between the two and just like any pathway, we decide the course that we take.

     As I mentioned in the last of these posts, the briefs I have had recently have been self-directed. These opportunities, together with the revelation that I am not one for the world of freelance illustration, have meant that I could steer my work in the direction I do want to take: the path toward becoming a tattooer.

     My work has been influenced by the world of tattoo for a long time (a quick scroll through these pages gives testament to that) however, for an equally long time I have been trying to ram my tattoo shaped work into an illustration shaped hole.

     The two are equally concerned with imagery and it's production of course, but the avenues and audiences relevant to each are very different, and it happens that I am far more interested in the bespoke, one-off production of images that comes with proper hand-made tattooing than the mass, multimedia reproduction that often comes with freelance illustration.
     With this in mind, it's fairly obvious what I hope to do after I graduate. I'm not yet entirely sure of the steps available to me to take, but steps will be taken nonetheless.

Portfolio visit with Dayjob.

     While in London last week we had the pleasure of meeting up with some of the folks of Dayjob collective in their studio, which may or may not have been in Peckham (results were inconclusive).

     As graduates from just two years ago they really knew what they were on about in terms of what to expect after uni and their honesty made them incredibly easy to relate to. While we were there we had the opportunity to nosy about their studio space, sit on cushions shaped like foodstuffs and have a good old fashioned Q&A.

      Afterwards we had the opportunity to flash our portfolios at them and get some insightful feedback; peer-to-peer.

     On viewing my portfolio, without prompt, they were quick to pick up on the influence of tattoos; despite the fact I was convinced the images I'd selected were illustration-y.
     Not only that, but of the images in my portfolio, they preferred the weirder, less constrained images that were more personal to myself and my style, going on to state that I should just do what I do rather than altering my working methods in an attempt to achieve 'illustration'. This of course was music to my ears, and upon the retrieval of a book of drawings of mythical creatures that my work had brought to their minds, I could tell they understood my intentions through my work, and weren't just being nice.

     To hear from what were essentially strangers (of the knowledgeable and well-rounded sort, mind) that the work I had enjoyed producing the most, was also the most intriguing and "best work" to them, left me feeling rather chuffed with myself.
      I must be doing summet right. 

Contact with Practitioners.

     As part of the contact with practitioners part of PDP, I decided that I would have a go at aiming high and sent an email with a short few questions to tattooer/illustrator Liam Sparkes.

     Questions were mostly concerned with his career path; from designing flyers to making tattoos, and how he progressed from one to the next.

     Unfortunately, since he's a busy chap these days: travelling allover the world and what not, I 
haven't received a reply.

     Fortunately however, I recently found a Russian website "SABRA" that has interviews with tattoo artists such as Scott Move, Maxime Buchi and, luckily for me: Liam Sparkes. The questions posed by the interviewers at SABRA are not too dissimilar from my own, so in a way I suppose I've gained some of the insight I wanted.

     If you fancy, click the image. That's were these interviews can be found: