A bit of background into my chosen illustrators..

Tanya Ling

Tanya Ling was born in Calcutta in 1966. She works as an artist and illustrator. She studied at St Martins School of Art, studying fashion and textiles. After graduating, she moved to Paris to work as a designer for Dorothee Bis and Christian Lacroix.

She returned to London to set up a contemporary art space called “Bipasha Ghosh” in 1996. She also She also produced her first exhibition of drawings in artist Gavin Turks studio on the

Charing Cross Road.

 

This exhibition led to her commission from British Vogue. From here, she has since worked with Harpers Bazaar and US Elle producing six award winning trend reports (1999-2001) other work commissioned was for Diane Von Furstenberg, Jill Sander, Louis Vuitton, Selfridges and Harrods.

By 2002, she produced her debut ready to wear collection presented at London’s premier pop art and surrealist gallery. It then featured in windows in Henri Bendel on NYC’s

Fifth Avenue

2003’s British Vogue named Tanya Ling one of the important trend setters. The Observer named her designer of the year in the same year.

Montana Forbes

American illustrator Montana Forbes studied visual communications in AIU (American intercontinental university) but now lives and works in London. She grew up between the USA, South Africa and the UK.

Her inspiration is from the female anatomy, fashion and other artists. She calls Stella McCartney her fashion design hero. She would describe herself as quirky and inquisitive. Montana gets her ideas from magazines and art galleries. She also collects feathers and leaves from taking long walks in London.

Forbes’ work focuses on form, line and an intrinsic sense of colour. Each artwork is sketched in pencil or ink then transferred into Photoshop for further reworking and colour additions.

Her clients include BBC TV, Benefit cosmetics, Elle, Gap and the UK and German Times. For the last four years, Montana has worked for The Times Style Magazine on a weekly basis producing artworks.

A work in progress

My two chosen illustrators are named Montana Forbes and Tanya Ling. They are two very different illustrators in their styles, but both very successful and interesting.

Heres examples of their work...

Montana Forbes:

personally i think this girl looks like singer Katy Perry?

Heres a bit about her work and how it's made up:

Montana Forbes is a modern pop art inspired illustrator

·         Pop art style, flashes of bright digitally enhanced colour against whites.

·         The eyes and eyebrows; scruffy/squiggly lines for eyebrows. The eyes are a half
         moon/oval shape with, again, white backgrounds and bright enhanced colours.

·         Nose; quite big, made up using lines and large nostrils

·         Lips; full and always coloured.

·         Hair; made up of pointed lines, mostly coloured with areas of white.

·         Lots of use of contrasting colours.

·         The poses are quite sexual and use the female anatomy very well. Lots of skin and curves normally on show.

Tanya Ling:

Note how different Tanya Lings style is compared to Montana Forbes.

Here's some information on the break down of her work:

Tanya Ling uses a distorted approach to the female body;

·         Long fluid limbs and unfinished features

·         Sketchy lines along with painted lines (water colouring features heavily)

·         Big eyes with thick lack lines surrounding them, looking away from focus, yet still detailed.

·         Nose; pointy lines with big spots for nostrils

·         Lips, unfinished at edges with a black distinguishing line to separate lips.

·         Angular poses with detail on elbows and knees bending

·         Big hair, a very distinctive element to each illustration. Lots of waves/curls created through water colouring. Messy looking and rarely one colour

·         Skin tone normally white

·         Outfit details represent high fashion yet they still remain sketchy and unfinished

WELCOME

Hello!

Welcome to my blog!
The aim of this blog is to display the progress of my first design assignment for design research and conceptualisation. The object of the assignment is to research two illustrators and create my own unique style. This will be done by breaking down each illustrators features.

This is my first piece of inspiration i found online. it represents the type of illustrator i will be looking for.