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eloise narrigan is sweet with an edge.
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Or, you know, a literal one.
A finished painting to go with all of those sketches from earlier.
It was a blast to get back to my paints after such a long time away, and I finished this piece with no major disasters. I got the dark, saturated color I was looking for, and I think that the color directs you to my central characters in a way I haven't really done before. (I do a lot of warm/cool focus, but it's mostly blue versus red. This has a lot more secondary color and doesn't just rely on warmth, but also saturation and value.)
I darkened the pony, since without the noise that was graying him down in the sketch, it was all "look at me! I'm bare watercolor paper! I'm bright!"
I also spent an entire afternoon painting the tattooed man, mostly trying to get the muddy (and, at least to me, very pretty) colors I associate with (old) tattoos to jive with the vibrancy of the rest of the piece.
In other news, I got into the Spring Alumni Sale! Look for me (with some new adorable animal merch) on May 1st. (And if there's a papergood you wish had my illustrations all over it, let me know.)
It's true! I finished illustrating Integrated Chinese: Level 2, Part 2 way back in November, but got to pick up my copies of the book just last week.
I'm still a little giddy about it, especially this:
Proof! And the illustrations look great! The color translated well, and they didn't have to do too many post-production fixes.
Looking at the book, I feel lucky that I was given this opportunity, that the publisher liked my work (and my personality) enough to commit to the entire book. But I also see all of the work I poured into it. Over the three months it took to produce the 140 illustrations for the textbook and workbook, I skipped a lot of outings, a lot of sleep, and a lot of knitting time. But it was totally, totally worth it.
Plus, I was allowed to indulge for a couple of illustrations. For instance, my tendency to draw lots and lots and lots of stuff:
and adorable animals:
and, if called upon to create a female character that spends too much time staying up late and studying, to draw pale, skinny brunettes:
0 Comments on Eloise is now a Textbook Illustrator as of 1/1/1990
I'm in Spoonflower's weekly fabric design contest, for this design, "Giraffe Spots and Stripes:"
You can vote for it, and any other charming fabric designs that move you, by following this link.
If I win, I get five free yards of fabric (and, more importantly, posterity!), so vote early, and tell your friends often, since voting ends Tuesday. (And you don't even have to register!)
Here's the link again!
UPDATE: I didn't win, but want to thank everyone who voted. I'm thinking I'm going to get back into designing more textiles. It's fun!
Oh, poor, neglected blog. Both craft sales were a lot of fun; I love actually talking to the people who buy my stuff, and it's even worth the lifespan-shortening stress of watching person after person walk by my booth (when a sale is as big as the alumni sale, you can't take it personally that not everyone is in the market for kitten postcards.)
Since the sales I've been buried until the usual Christmas madness, including knitting socks, sewing skirts, and dusting off my knitting machine so that we can really spend some time together. And I'm trying to keep in mind that not everyone loves the racket of a knitting machine on Saturday morning.
I've also been having great fun with a particular piece. In the interest of blog fodder, a bit about my process:
I start by scribbling little thumbnails until an idea or concept emerges. These are incomprehensible to most (including me, sometimes) so no images for that step. I then turn to the next page in my sketchbook and do a full sized sketch.
This is an ugly process and takes about the same amount of time as painting. I sketch the basic composition, futz with each figure, take reference photos, fix each figure, change my mind and erase and redraw at least a quarter of the piece, and add any important details. Some parts of this sketch are out of proportion in an unsettling way, but I usually save fixing that for later (I leave myself a little note, though). I do fix anatomy issues in this step, though, which this time included pulling out my anatomy book to add mass to my tattooed man.
Next, I scan the sketch and move everything around in Photoshop.
At a certain point I flipped the whole image by mistake and liked it a lot better. (I'm a big fan of the theory that since we read left-to-right, an illustration--especially when things are going well in the narrative--should also read left to right. Here, the big reveal, that our girl is talking with a snake charmer, is nestled into the lower right, surrounded by all the excitement of the circus.) I'll print this out and trace it onto watercolor paper (using graphite paper), fix the remaining anatomy bits, and paint it.
Since, at this point, Photoshop is already open, I'll do a quick color study, mostly to organize my colors and experiment with a few elements that don't have a clear color already. (I went through at least 6 colors for the benches in the background before I found the one that felt right, which isn't something I can do in watercolor.)
My color studies tend to be darker than my paintings, but one of my goals for this piece is to be less dainty with the waterc
I have been doing a lot of work these last few days/weeks, but I'm not showing any of it today! (Well, kinda. You'll see.)
Instead, you can come see me in person in 3 or 4 short weeks, because I'm doing back-to-back art sales. On December 5th and December 12th, I'll be hawking adorable papergoods at two very different events:
The Brunch & Buy is a tradition that my arty mother and some of her arty friends started many years ago. (The first one I was probably 12 or 13 and I made about $60 selling...journals? It was, at the time, a lot of money and very exciting.) This year, I made the flier.
It's out in Springfield/Longmeadow, but if you're in the area, you should stop by to see the house I grew up in (kinda) and meet my mom and some other amazing artists and also to eat some delicious food and buy some gorgeous work. I will be bringing banana bread, if that makes the decision to go easier.
The RISD holiday art sale is a different bird altogether. I'm sharing a booth with Kate Walsh (of the gorgeous jewelry) and Zoe Brooks (of, we hear, plates, cards, and all manner of classy home goods). Admission is $7 (free if you're under 14 or a current RISD student), but it's at the RI Convention Center at One Sabin Street in Providence, we're right by the entrance, and I know at least one booth will have delicious free candy. (You see how I bribe you with food both times?)
See you there!
Today I uploaded (what may very well be) the last illustration of the Massive Freelance Project to the company's server. I took today to rest up from the project and clean my studio up, a job I've been ignoring for essentially three months. Here are some before pictures:
And after:
The file folders (the low green cabinet) came from a friend of a friend of a friend; an illustrator who might be moving to Jamaica Plain and is getting rid of some old equipment in the meantime. The cabinet is inhumanly heavy (which is why it is on the floor and not on the table, as in my original plan) but the drawers slide nicely, and I was able to fit all of the work that Josh and I had hung onto from RISD.
Looking through my past work...well...has me feeling pretty proud of myself. Sometimes illustration is a struggle for me, and I'm still finding my voice and my style, but I feel very, very lucky to have learned from teachers and fellow students who took me seriously, and taught me so much, despite my (obvious, gaping) weaknesses.
Coming next week: I'm either going to post work from the Massive Freelance Project or some of the less embarrassing RISD stuff.
0 Comments on New Month, New System as of 1/1/1990
Last summer, an awesome designer I worked with at Merida (where I interned between my Junior and Senior year) asked if I'd like to be a part of a little start-up stationary company. I talked to the company's founder, created some designs, and the rest? Well, the rest isn't history, exactly. The rest is now available online:
Visit Little Harbor Press.
And just as a sneak peak, here are a few of the motifs I created for the company.
You can expect more in November, when The Freelance Assignment is complete. In the meantime, explore the site, check out the other designers, and if you happen to buy anything, plug in the coupon code "HOLIDAY10" to get ten percent off your order.
Between working on parts of the mad illustration project (MIP for short) I've been doing some small projects, including creating a placeholder page for a little business venture. I did the logo for them a few months ago.
Anyway, the logo started with this:
And ended with...well, you'll see.
I am currently embroiled in a gloriously, terribly huge freelance project, which has shot my already bad blogging habits to hell. Hopefully I'll be able to post what I did when I'm done, but at the very least, I'll make sure it's public knowledge that I'm finished with the project. In the meantime, here's a hint.
I do have two little things to show off. First, a fellow graduate, the indomitable Margaret Middleton, ordered a print of my Kittens in Mittens painting and was nice enough to send me some pictures of it framed in her sewing room. Ta da:
And secondly, I went home last week to celebrate my Dad's and my aunt's birthdays. I'm frantically knitting something (um, still) for my aunt, but I got to make this card for my dad.
I cannot express how nice it was to put aside the work on this freelance project and paint adorable animals for an hour. I even enjoyed painting on coldpress, although I still haven't figured out how to scan it in a capable way.
The card said "It's your birthday!" on the outside and "Eat whatever you want." on the inside. (My parents thought it was funny...)
While doing some research for an upcoming project, I happened upon this little weirdo, the Stork-billed Kingfisher.
I wanted to experiment with some cold press paper anyway, so I did a little painting.
The process reminded me why I use (and love) hot press paper, but it was also fun to pull out the gouache to save this painting. This little guy was surprisingly difficult to draw, since he doesn't even look very believable in photographs. I fudged the color on his neck to that he looks a little more unified, but the proportions are all correct.
Here's a link to more thoroughly weird photos, from a really excellent website, Surfbirds.com.
But what is the upcoming project, you wonder? For now I'm keeping it secret, but I'm hoping it will be ready by the end of the month.
PS: My Etsy store has been so lonely lately. Drop by and say hello to the postcards, prints, and original paintings, will you? (And tell me if there's other merch that should join them.)
About six months ago, I was looking at apartments in Boston and spending a lot of time with fellow illustrator/recent grad Kate. We were talking about making portfolios and postcards and realized we were doing very similar self portraits to blow off steam. Constructing a lot of stuff that says, in a demure and subtle way, "I am so awesome you want to pay me lots of money to do all this for you" is stressful to me, so I drew a piece that said it explicitly. (Kate was painting herself as a saint.)
Actually, the piece includes a lot of what my work is about: anteaters, yes, but also bright color, pattern, a generally light mood, a healthy dose of cuteness, and stylized but accurate and researched anatomy.
Like I said, I thought of the composition in December, took about a month (and a lot of embarrassing reference photos) for the drawing (and one night to ink it), colored it, hated it, put it away for five months, and pulled it out today to finish it. I wanted to do this piece digitally since the beginning, but it's been a struggle to find a level of finish that isn't fully rendered or shaded but still shows all the forms I want it to. For now, I'm pretty happy with it, and hopefully it will kick off some rather breakneck portfolio building in the next few weeks.
I've added some more prints to my Etsy shop. I still have some original paintings and I want to list my Spoonflower fabric as well, but that will have to wait a couple days. I can only list so many things on Etsy before I start making silly mistakes.
I also wanted to show off yet another aspect of my growing internet presence (ha!), my public profile over at Spoonflower: ta da!
I hate to make a post without images. Rest assured, I have a couple sheets of watercolor paper stapled to boards and drying on my floor. Assuming nothing unexpected gets in the way, I should have some new work to show off soon.
This Saturday I will be half of table #59 at the RISD Alumni sale.
I'll be selling the stuff I offer in my Etsy store--prints and greeting cards--and some other goodies will be making a premier: awesome, awesome postcards, some original paintings at bargain prices, and fabric!
I've been preparing for the whole display and packaging and everything, and will post pictures of the set up after the event.
(If you can't make it to Providence, that's okay. I'll be listing the things that don't sell on my Etsy shop when I get home.)
The sale is from 10 to 4 this Saturday, May 2nd, on Benefit Street. I've been doing ceremonial dances to ensure that the weather continues to be as wonderful as it is right now.
Also, I finished a painting: (prints and the original will be, you guessed it, available this Saturday.)
This is based on a Hans Christian Andersen fairy tale called The Elderflower Witch, although I took some liberties, mainly removing a character and changing the appearance of the witch from an older Norwegian. Consider this the beginning of my campaign to quit drawing pale, skinny brunettes (except for actual self portraits, of course) and introduce a little diversity into my work.
I have new work to show, but first, an extremely compelling answer to the question, "Where have I been for five weeks?"
Where I started:
Where I ended:
This year, I did my taxes by myself, for the first time, start to finish. My Dad gave me a big maroon binder, recommended Turbo Tax, and answered my (occasionally panicked) questions. Today I mailed off five envelopes and a lot of money, and I feel great. The best part is that as a freelancer, I'll pay my taxes quarterly from now on, so the task will never be this insurmountable again. Never mind that I'll have to do this four times as often.
To celebrate my mathematical triumph and in an effort to revive my limping checking account, I've stocked my Etsy store with a fine selection of prints, including two Brand New Pieces. (I'll blog about these later this week, including the exclusive location where I'll be selling the originals, but for now, visit my Etsy store
The other day I realized it had been a while since I had painted anything. I took a few hours and did this.
If you haven't seen My Neighbor Totoro, I would set aside the time to do so immediately. Also, I am truly terrible at chess.
On a related note, I made this last summer:
I'm hoping to find some cheap bulky yarn and make a larger one someday soon.
I finally finished my first pair of knitted socks recently. I love them; they're comfy, warm, and, if I do say so myself, terribly cute.
If you happen to be a knitter, you can download the color chart I used and put my bunny motif on whatever you like. The teal dots mark where I made increases when making my knee socks.
This weekend I managed to avoid going out into the sunshine and taking pictures of knitwear (again) but there will be a lot to show on that front sometime soon.
In the meantime, I made this as a very late XMas present for Josh's parents. They like Southwest Native American Art, and I like anteaters.
This is in Pelican Opaque watercolor. I like this paint a lot, but its really lovely blues tend to influence my color choices.
I found out a little while ago that I'll be in the RISD Spring Alumni Sale on May 2nd! If you're in Providence that Saturday, stop by and say hello in real life. I'm going to be selling prints, originals, cards, and possibly fabric and other goodies. I'll be sharing a table with the truly charming Kate Walsh, and I'm very excited.
I'm finding that the hardest part about being an illustrator--aside from the constant quest for new work, which I think I'm getting used to--is the balance between creating a piece that meets the needs of the client and that you can be proud of.
My first paying illustration gig met the needs of the client decently, but I was really in love with my earlier sketches. They're more dynamic, more fun, and, frankly, a little badass. Having to part with my best friend, line, to do the finished piece made it even more of a challenge.
Luckily, a modern-day patron of the arts found me through Etsy and my blog. She loved the sketches too, and commissioned an ink drawing.
Does it show that I had a ridiculously fun time doing this? By default I draw things from above, and it was a nice challenge (that involved some really unflattering reference photos) to draw from below.
I've got quite a little backlog of work to show at the moment, so check back here soon.
I spent a cozy evening this week tinkering my with my website, and now I can officially say that my site is compatible with Internet Explorer! Ha! (It turned out the secret was a couple of key attributes: "header tags"--bad--and "absolute" positioning--good.) This is something I've been meaning to do for months, and I'm happy to have a website I can be really proud of.
Oh! I painted, too. This is another vignette, meant to fit in with my knitting pieces. It's about the absolute magic of spinning, and it was a lot of fun to figure out how a spinning wheel is operated (and to look at lots of intricate sweaters as inspiration for the sheep).
