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.

Merry Christmas 2016!

Hello and Merry Christmas!

Despite my lack of Christmas spirit this year I ended up painting some holly for one of my school's vice prinsiples. Perhaps once the school holidays start I'll be able to relax more.

I took this painting as a chance to try a different technique with the way I approach highlights. I went for an obvious speckled effect with the masking fluid. I think it was a successful experiment, I'll see if I can use it more in my own paintings.

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!

Laboratory Watercolour

This week, I managed to finish up a painting which I've been working intermittently on for the month of November. I plan on giving it to my extremely cool and arty hair studio, called Laboratory. They have a cool logo design which I painted realistically.

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.

Business Cards

Recently I received business cards which I ordered from a company called Moo.

This was my first time ordering business cards and I think my expectations were perhaps low, I'm VERY happy with the quality of the print and feel of the cards.

The reason why I chose to order from Moo was because of their Printfinity option which most printing companies do not offer at all. When you order a pack of cards you can have a different design on every card at no extra charge! That's a game changer if you ask me especially for artists, every card is basically a mini artwork. So, if you are in the market for business cards, postcards and such then I highly recommend these guys. They are doing things right.

 

Halloween Watercolour Challenge: Paint Yayoi Kusama’s Pumpkin Sculpture

Hey everybody, I hope you've all had a spooky cool halloween.
Today I want to share something awesome. The super nice people at Artists and Illustrators Magazine posted a Halloween watercolour challenge of my painting of Yayoi Kusama's yellow pumpkin sculpture! #HappyDance

They were very kind to let me share the how to tutorial here on my blog.