IF - Sweet

This is the final illustration for my book of the fairy tale 'The Golden Hero Dragan'. In this scene the hero gets to marry the princess after the usual hardships he has to overcome to prove his being smart and courageous.

I always wanted to do a still life, even during my art studies. Though at the time it was the last thing to do because then 'Die Jungen Wilden' where the hottest thing. So we were not to learn any techniques but rather be inspired on our own (like the true artist...) and then learn the method required for the relevant project. So I missed a solid education in different art techniques. It also meant that my visits of the still life branch of the museum had to be done secretly in hope of not being detected. But I so admired how the ancient masters did fruit, especially grapes, plums and peaches. How could they convey the exact feelings of the different surfaces and the light?
I am still amazed at their skills. They may not have been innovative but it shows their love for the painted subject. I always feel the same when I am drawing (or should I rather say painting?): there can't be any ugly or inferior item. As soon as I get intimate with all the details, I begin to see it's beauty. It's almost like falling in love. Of course it requires a lot of time and effort and is not considered very much like art, rather like some craft or as a lector recently asked 'Don't you have anymore artlike stuff in your portfolio?' Uggh!

IF - Tribute

Much to my regret I learned that Penelope Dullaghan is not attending to Illustration Friday any more. I think she did a great job in launching this blog and thereby giving us all the opportunity to have fun in illustrating an issue every week. I especially enjoyed the quotations she gave along with them in her newsletter. Through posting and following other entries I also met some very interesting people I would be very sad to have missed. Knowing Thomas James from past times of Escape From Illustration Island (which was another favourite of mine) I am sure he will give this blog as much inspiration as Penelope before.

As a tribute to Penelope I experimented with this illustration. The rose itself was done for a Valentines's card some time ago. I have now added a texture as the 'pure' rose seemed somewhat 'naked' to me. As I have never worked with textures before, I am still in the process of learning how much is appropriate.

IF - Farewell

This time I think the illustration says it all, there is no need to add any elaborate written add-on.
Suffice it to say: Farewell to you, my illustrations and may you be welcomed warmly to the world of books.

IF _ Wild

This is not yet the finished illustration, it will follow later in the day.

IF - egg

This egg comes as a surprise: whenever one has cracked, another is appearing inside. Will the purple one be the last?
I have always been intrigued by Russian matryoshka dolls, so I simply had to make my Easter egg working after the same principle.

I also made some yummy Easter cookies including egg-shaped ones, which you can see here:

Everything just had to be some shade of green to at least feel a touch of spring inside the house because guess what I saw when I raised my shutters on Saturday?

That's a view you'd expect on Christmas, not on Easter. I hope that at least some of you have enjoyed a more spring-like Easter.

IF - Swim

This lazy little gnome is sort of a double feature as he enjoys swimming in a bubble while also wearing eye glasses.

On second thought I added some more colour to the water.

Which do you prefer?

I love garden gnomes (Though NOT in the garden!) and have already added one to an illustration for 'Heimat' (the English 'home' is not exactly the same) as it is one of many kitsch items representing Heimat for me.You can see it here:

On researching garden gnomes I stumbled upon this hilarious book: How to Survive a Garden Gnome Attack. 

IF - yesterday

Yesterday this ruin might have been inhabited by knights and kings (who knows?). At closer inspection it is today's new home for flora and fauna.

Can you find the animals below?

IF - Talent

Chameleons are auch wonderful creatures and so adaptive to their environment, I just had to draw this extremely talented specimen.

IF - Talent

The talented elephant girl above is part of an outline for a logo of a shop for children's wear.
Below you can see the complete draft.

Unfortunately the shop was never opened. Also now I would do it much more abstractly, like an icon. I still like the concept, though.

IF - Wool (2)

Though I have already posted for 'wool', as you can see here, I had to do a second illustration of the topic.
Speaking about wool with my (nine-year-old) son, he came up immediately with the nice idea to show a sheep whose body is a wool skein and only its legs and head sticking out. Isn't it wonderful, how creative kids are? Though his creativity went not so far as to draw it himself. Unfortunately drawing is so not his 'thing'. He certainly did not inherit this gene from me. He is more into maths.

IF - wool

As it's still winter this chicken has dressed its eggs in cosy wool sweaters to keep them really warm.

IF - Storm

Happy Valentine!
This time I did a combination of storm and a love motif for Valentine's Day. I think it's not too far fetched, as true love will carry you through many storms ...

In my new blog '99 Sheets Of White Paper' you can see another small Valentine's item. Just have a look here, if you are curious.

IF - Wings

The raven above is an illustration of my book 'The Golden Hero Dragan'. In this scene the raven comes to help the hero in a desperate situation.

I am very fascinated by wings and feathers in general as you can see on my homepage.

IF - Myth

For 'myth' I chose a cyclops, a creature I have been fascinated with for a long time. It began when I first read the Odyssey and reawakened only lately when I read it to my son. I never realized how bloodthirsty Greek mythology is. Only when reading, it dawned on me that maybe it might not be suitable for a nine-year-old. However my son seemed completely unimpressed by any bloodshed.

Shortly after that I read Cinderella to him and I must confess that this fairy tale seemed even worse to me with the cut-off toe and heel of the evil sisters. As neither Greek mythology nor fairy tales have done any serious damage to me, I begin to think that adults sometimes make to much of a fuss about this kind of incidents in stories or mythology. Children just visualize them differently. However, this is not meant to be an invitation to more brutality in stories for children. It just shows that children are capable of more distinction than adults normally credit them for.

IF - ocean

For 'ocean' I chose to show a desert which resembles an ocean in its vastness and its wave-like dunes. Even the shadows are bluish. The camel I added is called 'Wüstenschiff" in German which means desert ship, a further allusion to ocean. In consequence this camel finds a message in a bottle - right in the middle of a desert, of all places.

IF - New

Let's see what is in store for us in 2013. Hoping for the best I have wrapped it in gold.

I had a very hard time with some new paper I used for this drawing. Eventually wanting to draw on high quality paper, I bought some at the local art supplier. They refused to sell single sheets to try it out. Unfortunately it turned out to be slippery and grainy at the same time. While slipping off its awful surface, I couldn't get the drawing as smooth as I normally work. Well, I certainly won't take it again. Which leaves me with 99 pages of very expensive waste paper, unless I find some other purpose for it.

Wish you all a happy, healthy and eventful New Year.

IF - Glow

The entry for this weeks topic 'glow' is also part of my current Advents Calendar.

It shows the four candles for the four Sundays before Christmas. While looking for inspiration for this illustration I found several Advent wreaths with three purple candles (Did you know that purple opposite to violet is a non-spectral colour together with grey?) and one in pink. Becoming curious whether there is a purpose behind this colour scheme, I deciced to look it up in Wikipedia. And there actually is no topic you cannot learn anything new about. In this case I found out that the lithurgic colour for the time of Advent is purple. As the third Sunday is called 'Gaudete' (rejoice) the candle for this day is pink, considered to be a happier shade of purple.

For me one of the best things in illustration (apart from inventing and drawing) is looking up on issues and discovering so many interesting news even about the most ordinary topics.

Have a wonderful Christmas time!

IF - Snow

Finally here comes my last entry for 'snow'. Of course it's also part of my Advents Calendar.

As you can see, the ilustrations have simplified, with the nearly realistic snow cristal, the partly realistic snowman (though this hardly shows after scanning) and this almost abstract rendering of a for tree. Which one do you like best?

Wish you all a wonderful Christmas time.

IF - Snow

For the current topic 'snow' you can see the most recent entry of this year's advent's calendar on my homepage.

It 's such a nice coincidence (though pretty obvious, too, considering the season) that I wanted to do this illustration for the old German Christmas song ' Schneeflöckchen, Weißröckchen'. The calendar presents different old German Christmas Songs every day with the lyrics underlying the illustration.

Unfortunately all snow we had last week melted away, with no prospects for snow on Christmas either. Let's hope for the weather forcast to be wrong and enjoy a white Christmas.

IF - Sky

For 'Sky' I am showing you an illustration out of my project 'The Golden Hero Dragan'. Sun and Moon have been stolen by dragons so that night has been reigning. To gain the love of the princess, Dragan decides to find them back, which of course he succeeds in.

In this double spread ( 2 x A4, i. e. 59.4 x 21 cm) you can see how he has reinstated them into the sky.