Nostalgic Treat - Liquorice

I have great childhood memories constructing houses out of these Liquorice Allsorts sweets. It was a pleasure to paint them. I'm also a fan of the red liquorice versions they have now.

Monthly Muse - December

Here is December's monthly muse painting and poem collaboration for the Wide Island View magazine. I painted a yellow bellied fly-catcher.
Painted with Holbein watercolour paints on Wirgman 320 cold press watercolour paper.

Featured in Artists & Illustrators!

Hello and happy December! It's icy cold here in my Japanese apartment, being a productive human being right now is near impossible! But nevermind that, there is some awesome news which I'd like to share. In the January 2017 issue of the Artists & Illustrators UK magazine (which is out this month), I got a two spread feature about what it was like painting my 30 Days of watercolour project!

I never expected my work to be featured, it's a good feeling. If you live in the UK, make sure to pick it up.  After reading the article though, I realized that my self deprecating sense of humor comes off little on the harsh side.🎭 So I think my new years resolution is to be a little more kinder when talking about my art and myself in general.

UPDATE: December 20th 2016
My friend Amy, who works with me in Kure city has traveled back to the UK for the December holidays, while there she surprised me with this photo! She spotted my article and kindly got me a copy of the magazine! LUCKY!

Monthly Muse - November

This illustration of Koi fish in the sky, is my monthly contribution to the Wide Island View webzine which is run by a team of JETs in Hiroshima Japan. Here's Akilah Bel's beautiful poem, Last Night I had a Dream.

Before painting the final illustration, I first did a few fish studies of goldfish and Koi in my new 200gsm cold press Moleskine watercolour sketchbook. Here are my studies which were much darker and dramatic compared to the light pastals I ended up painting.