Real Life "Bambi" and "Thumper"

It may seem completely irrelevant to my Art work but I don't care in the slightest, it just made me smile, okay?
  Here are some photographs I stumbled upon online of a real life deer and rabbit double act. Not only is the photography beautiful but they also appeal to me due to my love of cartoons mixing with the real world. I'd be so happy if I stumbled upon this. I love it even more that the picture I've chosen to display is of the duo in the snow, mimicing the iconic ice-skating scene from "Bambi".

To view more of these photos visit http://www.jokelibrary.net/animals/d_to_z/rabbit-bambi.html

Just to end on a nostalgic note, here's a video of one of my favourite characters of all time, Thumper. Of course it also includes the debut of the fantastic Flower: "He can call me a Flower if he wants to... I don't mind..."

"What Kind Of Drinker Are You?" Brief - 26th January 2011

For the last week I've been working on a brief advertising the dangers of alcohol, focusing on the idea that all drinker fall into one (or several) of the following nine drinking categories:

• De-stress Drinker - Drink to calm down and regain control of their manic life. Typically from a middle-class background with a stressful home life or working in a high pressure job environment, making them feel burdened with responsibility. 
• Conformist Drinker - Driven by a need to belong and seeking a structure to their lives. They are generally males, aged 45 to 59 in clerical or manual jobs. Regular visits to the pub are a part of their routine.
• Boredom Drinker - Solitary drinkers who drink to pass the time. Alcohol makes them feel comforted and secure but they also drink as they seek a degree of stimulation. Boredom drinkers are typicall women, aged 35 to 50.
• Depressed Drinker - These people crave comfort, safety and security. They aren't from any age, gender or socio-economic group in particular. They feel their lives are in a state of crisis and tend to drink heavily and often, more often than not whilst home alone.
• Re-bonding Drinker - Driven by a need to keep in touch and re-connect with those close to them, re-bonding drinkers want a release and stimulation, generally drinking most evenings. They don't have any particular favourite drink but will indulge in whatever their drinking partner is knocking back - Everything is about reflecting the actions of others.
• Community Drinker - Motivated by the need to belong, community drinkers seek stimulation and release from the grinds of every day life in the company of others. They are usually lower/middle-class men or women who drink in large friendship groups. They tend to drink many, many pints of European larger.
• Hedonistic Drinker - Crave stimulation and want to abandon control. They want to stand out from the crowd and frequently drink to get drunk up to three of four times a week. They tend to be divorced with grown up children, drinking cheap spirits with energy drink mixers.
• Macho Drinker - These people almost live in the pub. They're mainly men and feel a need to stand out from the crowd, drinking to feel a release. However, they also drink to feel control (of others rather than themselves), playing alcohol themed games, downing beer and spirit concoctions, alongside "challenging" chasers.
• Border Dependants - Consider the pub a home-from-home. They make regular visits to the pub during the day and the evening, on weekdays and at weekends. They drink fast and often. They drink the bar dry in an effort to quell their boredom and conform.

I decided at first to pick out just one of these categories, focusing on macho drinkers. My idea was simply to take iconic macho figures and impose them in the lifestyle of an alcoholic, illustrating the dangers that alcohol can have and that nobody is immune from it's influence.
  Due to my love of graphic novels and comics there was only one idea to pursue in my eyes when thinking about iconic macho figures - Superheroes!
  Here's my first coloured drawing of some of the greatest of all time at their AA meeting. I'll keep you updated on my progress!

Promise this is my last post of the day...

I don't know if it's my love of Disney, my interest in classical cartoons or my passion for comic books but whenever I paint (or draw for that matter) I prefer to use flat, block colour with big thick black outlines. It's a lot harder than it looks, it is incerdibly frustrating trying to get every single centimetre of paint completely flat and with as little evidence of crush strokes as possible... It's definately worth the hassle though. I love this style of painting and it's why I love the old school pop artists such as Lichtenstein and Warhol. 
  This particular painting is of a photograph I took of my friend Jessica Bailey. In it she is modelling a denim jacket I made myself. This is one of my favourite paintings I have ever done and I think it shows off the fact that I am quite a good colourist as well (I apologise for the poor quality of the photo, it's much more impressive in real life... Promise!):

A Little A Level Work.

I know this might seem a bit dated but I can't boast about this work enough. This was one of my favourite projects of all time. Inspired by British Artist "Robert Bradford" who makes sculptures from toys I made these sculptures of my own:

The first was this puppy made from jig-saws:

After this came the "Button Bunny". Yes, you guessed it, a rabbit made mainly from buttons (the most tedious and time consuming piece of work ever):

For my final exam piece I did a series of three smaller sculptures representing different age periods throughout a person's life. The first is a giraffe made from mainly sweets and other things associated with childhood, unfortunately I don't have photographs of the second one but that was a rabbit made from bottle tops from alcoholic drinks and other things associated with adolescence and the final in the series is a small puppy made from jig-saw pieces and other items associated with old age such as glasses and tablets. See what you can spot in the images below, I like to think some of the items are quite clever and witty:

I think I found this project so stimulating because of my obsession with nostalgia. I really enjoyed playing with the jig-saws, toys and other bric-a-brac I worked with throughout this project. To have a look at Robert Bradford, the artist who inspired the project, take a look at http://www.robertbradford.co.uk/. Very impressive stuff!

One of my biggest inspirations.

How could I claim this blog is about my artistic inspirations if I never included a clip of this? "Who Framed Roger Rabbit" completely baffles and amazes me every time I watch it (which is very, very often, I assure you!) This scene is just the ultimate character reveal for me. Jessica Rabbit is the ultimate woman, even if she is just watercolours and pencil.
  Old style cartoon are such an inspiration for me, none more so that "Who Framed Roger Rabbit" due to the way they are manipulated to interact with the real world. An epic film, has to be watched!

Guerilla Advertising

This has definately been my favourite project so far. If I could make a living from making huge faces for trees, trust me, I would.
  This project encouaged us to explore how to advertise a campaign without the use of standard advertising media e.g. posters, flyers and business cards. I chose to focus on a campain regarding reducing the effects of global warming. After exploring causes of global warming I decided to focus on deforestisation as I think the figures of how many trees are unnecessarily forested in the rain forests every minute are disgusting. I wanted to appeal to the target audience of teens as before my own work I can't remember any campaigns regarding gobal warming being aimed at this target market and thought it would be an interesting challenge to take on.
  To do this I looked at old style cartoons (although I admit that this was partly to indulge myself, I absoultely love anything Disney or Looney Tunes!) and developed this style into a 3D format to draw the viewer into looking carefully at the campaign and then recieving the message in this way.
  I made 4 pieces and here are some photos:

Number one: The face is made from adhesive vinyl. This really got me excited about the project!

Number two: Scrapped the vinyl idea. It was effective but I wanted to incorporate the use of products of deforestisation. I just had to use cardboard, didn't I!

Number three: How could I study old style cartoons without looking at Jessica Rabbit and Lola Bunny? Here is the grand finale, the femme fatale of trees, recycling in style!

The Wonder of Bleach.

Who knew bleach on card was such a nice effect? These are just some pieces of work I done for the 3D typography brief, looking at the word "Threat".
  Below the pictures of 2D work are some of my 3 dimensional "rat" toy I made and yes, it is meant to look quite un-threatening. It's an oxymoron of course!

And now for my "Rat" toy (in the context of a real life rat):

Bonding in Borrowdale!

Just some genuinely pretty photos of our bonding trip to Borrowdale - See, I don't hate nature all of the time...

Stefan Sagmeister Day - "Expect The Unexpected"

These are just a few shots from "Sagmeister Day", one of the funnest and most productive days I've had in a long, long time!
  The work was inspired by Austrian Graphic Designer Stefan Sagmeister. Sagmeister has recently brought out a book titled "Things I Have Learned In My Life So Far" with graphic descriptions of important lessons he has learnt throughout his life. We took inspiration from this and worked on the quote, "Once you learn to expect the unexpected everything starts to fall into place".
  To show this we rented out elaborate costumes from the University library and did everyday activities in Carlisle city e.g. shopping, visiting cafes, taking walks around the park. It was really fun to document how people reacted to seeing people in costume in an unexpected situation.
  To look at other people's work based on Sagmeister's book visit http://www.thingsihavelearnedinmylife.com/. Some really clever and amusing work!

Finally I have gave into the pressure of the blog.

At long last I have finally gave into the pressure everybody has forced upon me and I am blogging. I'm just finding my feet at the moment (with the help of Lauren and Andy) and will get as much stuff on as fast as possible. I know, it looks lame currently, but I'll get my work up and some of my inspiration as and when I hunt it down, even if it isn't in chronological order!