Christmas Cards

Recently I have been doing a LOT of Christmas cards of various sorts and it looks as though they may be complete (or at least nearly there) HURRAH! I am fond of both Christmas and cards, but will be glad to do something different now and have a break from festive things until the day arrives. Having said that, it looks set to snow very soon round this neck of the woods. EXCITING!

I will introduce my new creations in reverse order, because that's how I roll.


Happy yule, y'all!

Hallmark

I had to miss the last day of the Islington fair and send my father careering like a lost thing around London to find the gallery and take down my work, while I got the train oop narth (that's up north to us Southerners) for two weeks on a work placement on the Illustration team at Hallmark Cards. This was a good decision. While the Islington fair was good, and the journey was horrendous, this proved to be a very very enjoyable two weeks indeed. I learned many things, one being that if you want to draw Forever Friends bears you have to have curly hair, and another being that when you are plunged into an environment like this it can turn you into a trembling lost little kitten.

Anyway, I met some lovely people there and learned a lot about working to an actual brief. I EVEN found myself drawing pretty women with flowing locks and high heeled shoes. It's okay though, I have drawn plenty of awkward looking big-nosed funny-haired men since.

These are some of the cards I designed there.

Islington Contemporary Art and Design Fair

The last few weeks have been rather busy, although that is no excuse for correspondence to have been so lacking as of late. Please accept my apologies.

I shall start with the Islington Contemporary Art and Design Fair.

This was the 8th to the 10th of October at the Candid Arts Trust gallery in Islington. I should quite possibly have told you about this while it was still on so that you could actually visit, but that is not my style.

It was very enjoyable anyway, and a nice little confidence boost having people say nice things, and even spend their hard earned money on my little creations :)


The exhibition was also the incentive I needed to finally get round to making those screen prints I was banging on about. It was SO FUN and I will definitely be doing more of these very soon.

Mademoiselle De Maupin

This is the third (and final for now) of the illustrations I intend to make into screenprints. This is Mademoiselle De Maupin, Theophile Gautier's take on As You Like It, in which the title character disguises herself as Theodore in order to experience the side of men that they will only reveal to other men. She gets herself in a bit of a pickle though as she finds herself in something of a love triangle, trapped between d'Albert and Rosette who both fall completely and utterly in love with her.

Anyway, here she is at her window looking melancholy and wistfully picking at the petals of a yellow tulip. Poor dear.

I'm making some screenprints

I have a few exhibitions coming up and it has occurred to me that since my parents run a screen printing business, I ought really to try my hand at the art and produce some nice limited edition prints to sell.

Since I have recently become rather enamoured with Victorian French literature, I thought a good place to start would be to make some screen-print-friendly illustrations for the novels I have been reading.

And so here they are! Starting with Huysmans' A Rebours and Zola's Therese Raquin. These are just photoshop mockups and I will post the screenprints when they're done, if they are worth posting!

Capture Cure

I have created this image for Capture Cure, an art auction in aid of Breakthrough Breast Cancer. This is a cause that is very close indeed to my heart and it means a lot to me to be able to do something to help that involves Illustration, so please spare a moment to become a fan and click 'like' under my image to give it a chance of appearing in the auction. All the proceeds from the auction go to Breakthrough Breast Cancer.

PLEASE CLICK HERE TO VOTE

The King in Yellow

Wow, it's been a while.

Well anyway, I'm all graduated now, and have been thrust with quite some considerable vigour into the wide world of adulthood.

As a nice little bit of easing into the real world I have reworked my King in Yellow illustration for a concept album my uncle is doing. I think I prefer it to the original image and it's made me realise how nice it is to be able to do something that won't end up being judged!

Quote Illustration

This is my page for the Quotes and Sayings book that the University College Falmouth Illustration course publishes every year :D

It is a quote from The Picture of Dorian Gray, "noiselessly, and with silver feet, the shadows crept in from the garden". At this point he has just found out that Sibyl Vane has killed herself because of him, and he is contemplating his actions for so long that darkness creeps in without him realising. I haven't seen the film yet and wasn't sure if I wanted to but I think I may do now if only to see if their treatment of this scene is anything like mine! I know for one thing that they have given him straight dark hair when Oscar Wilde specifically stated the opposite.

Also, Illustrators, don't worry I've only put them text there for show :P

I have quite enjoyed doing this and am thinking it might be quite fun to doing something else Dorian Gray related...

NEW WEBSITE!

www.nicolapatten.com

HOW EXCITING!!

Conclusion: Dreamweaver is the most ridiculously complicated software I have ever encountered. I think it would actually have been simpler to learn html!

Anyway, hope you enjoy it :D

PROJECT X

It's Project X Time! My mission was to complete an illustration for Captain Cuthbert's Travelling Flea Circus that would be used on the side of their van and could be adapted for a letterhead. They're not really a flea circus but I like to imagine they are and I like to imagine they look like this.

The King in Yellow

A book cover for The King in Yellow, an 1890s collection of short gothic fiction stories by Robert W Chambers.

Type 1 Diabetes for Children

My latest project, a 6cm x 10cm booklet for children diagnosed with type 1 diabetes. This booklet would be sold on the Diabetes UK website to parents looking for a simple and interesting explanation of the illness for their children.

Bad Mood Moose

Long overdue, photos of the finished Bad Mood Moose! Complete with the third final double page spread that I didn't upload before.