Posts Tagged ‘ Illustrations ’
“The Batman” looks set to be a DC Comics movie like no other, and if the early buzz is to be believed, it stands a chance of being the Caped Crusader’s best big screen adventure to date. Shifting the spotlight to what makes Bruce Wayne the World’s Greatest Detective is an exciting approach to the character and with Catwoman, The Riddler, and The Penguin set to appear, director Matt Reeves is clearly embracing the source material. Now, DC Comics has returned the favour with an awesome series of variant covers inspired by the movie illustrated by some of their best artists.
Dreamed up by Carlos D’Anda, Lee Bermejo, Jonboy Meyers, Rafael Albuquerque, Jenny Frison, Puppeteer Lee, Ben Oliver, Ricardo Federici, and Simone Bianchi, each of these covers offer a unique take on the movie’s heroes and villains. Some are clearly based very directly on the imagery we’ve seen from The Batman, while others are a little more stylised and unique.
The paintings of Slovakian artist Katarina Janeckova are soused in sex. Three lovers romp around in bed; a brunette poses for naked photos in a swimming pool; a woman spanks her partner with a hairbrush. But there is one thing lacking from her provocative tableaus—men. Instead, the women couple up with brown or black bears, rendered in woozy watercolor or acrylic brushstrokes. “For me, the bear is a perfect substitute for a man,” Janeckova explains. “I paint those bears as simple, strange dark figures, because it allows you to fantasize.” It also allows the women to become the central figures in her works, and for Janeckova to present them as strong and sexually empowered. “It’s a stereotype that pretty women are usually submissive, so I like to play around that,” Katarina says. “Sometimes it’s less visible and more in my head, sometimes it’s obvious or exaggerated.” It’s most apparent in some of her recent works, which portray the massive muscles of female bodybuilders. Katarina honors their forms by depicting them on the side of a Grecian urn, or even turning a container of Muscle Milk into a flower vase. “My ideal of female beauty changed,” Katarina discusses in the following interview, along with sex, symbols and her current exhibition, How to Make a Bear Fall in Love, which is currently on view at Studio d’Arte Raffaelli in Trento, Italy.
Recently I came across the fantastical illustrations of artist Stephanie Lopez of Wilmington, CA. She’s a CSUEB grad who has a passion for basketball (that definitely translates into her work). Having an extremely detailed, and slightly caricatured style of drawings, the artist better known as “2Craft” and her works tend to reflect athletes from basketball players to boxers. From famous movies, to great moments in sports to celebrities, her “Michael Tudor-esque” style of art is definitely work checking out further. Luckily… you can do that right here.
It hasn’t been until recently that the team discovered the work of Thomas Cian, but when we did, we were blown away by the intricacies of his portraits. Take a look below of his incredible pencil work, and creative portrait design.
For their affiliates, HBO (Asia) creates a calendar highlighting movies and series broadcasted on the channel. Florian was commissioned by Patrick Tan (Art Director at HBO) for the realization of the 12 illustrations. The work speaks for itself.
AM Fremantle has come up with some amazing skateboard designs in the past, but the “Spritz Party” collection is one of the most recent. AM Fremantle specializes in screen printed skateboards fresh out of Vicenza, Italy that double as works of art. We’ll definitely have more to show from them down the proverbial road as it were, but check out the ‘Spritz Party’ boards below for now.
Visual wizard David Nakayama has quite the incredible collection of comic based illustrations. His wildly detailed and diverse style has been used to draw a wide range of characters from comics to fairy tale characters. Check out just a sliver of his woman based work below.
Master illustrator Simon Prades, seems to have his work all over the pages of some of the most well regarded publications on the planet. His extremely intricate line style, in contrast with his minimalistic coloring makes each and every one of his works stand apart. Prades work has been featured by Esquire, Variety, and The New Yorker, just to name a few. Check out some of his digital portfolio below.
Nielly Francoise has been prominently featured on this blog more than once, and the work continues to speak for itself. Check out a new 2016 collection.
Spanish artist Josan Gonzalez has an incredible self published art-book “The Future is Now“. Gonzalez describes it as “A vision of a dystopian near future” that includes full color illustrations and black and white sketches. 64 pages, A4 size landscape and soft cover. If you’re interested in seeing more than just this little glimpse, click here to purchase. (However, word on the street is the art-book may be sold out, however, if it is, reprints and even a second edition should be available by March 2016)
Different iterations of popular characters have been drawn over and over and over again, but there’s just a little something special about the illustrator ‘1000Day’ and his cartoon displays. From The Joker, to the Simpsons, the presentation, representation, and most importantly the illustration of all of his works of art are impressive. Check out a small multitude of the characters ‘1000Day’ has chosen to re-imagine.
The works above are just a taste of his work, there are many more pieces in that can be found in galleries as well…
Belgian artist Raphael Vicenzi caught our eye recently with some of his amazing illustrations. From the water colors, to the splashes of graffiti, the composition of his unique works of art are beautifully striking to say the least. Check the method.
The artist known simply as Clog Two, hails from Singapore City, Singapore, and has done something that Micheal Bay, and $125 million dollars couldn’t… Reinvent the Ninja Turtles, and make them look good. The new look of the Turtles in this years summer fiasco was something many classic fans had issues with. (It was stated that using facial motion capture wouldn’t translate properly if the digital turtles didn’t have nostrils and lips like their live action counterparts.) But Clog has managed to do them justice, illustrating the TMNT heroes and villains with tattoos and accessories that compliment the characters. If you want a print for yourself , hit up Clog at clog02@electrocaine.com, they sell for around USD320.
Every style of original illustrator has a unique qualities, but Baran Sarigul’s collection of commercial and personal illustrations is more than striking. Every drawing has a level of structure and detail that’s truly remarkable. Check the method.
At the Columbus College of Art and Design, two rogue college students are creating quite a stir… but not by any normal means. They aren’t cheating or stealing, they are causing a creative riot. The anonymous duo, who go by the name Dangerdust, sneak into a classroom each week and create a masterpiece out of nothing but chalk. The pair are both seniors in Advertising & Graphic Design, and they are probably busy with a larger than life course-load, but they still remain passionate about their weekly chalk art. These two create some of the most beautiful (and inspiring) art you’ll ever see.
Andrés Maquinita, a brilliant illustrator hailing from Colombia, has conceptualized and brought to life Blook, The Turtle Rider. This incredibly unique character comes complete with his own world thought up by Maquinita, and shows that with the right set of skills you can bring any creation to life. Check out Blook’s Story Below.
Beside the gloom forest lives a small community of blue ogres. Probaly the last classic “hooka blue town” of the planet Glook. This kind of special blue creatures have a beautiful tradition. Their lives are very short like a dog or like a purple phonix. But hundreds and hundreds of milleniums even before the “hex”, They’ve found the way to make it longer building a frindship with the inmortals and lonely Cloopa turtles. For ages, this has been one of the most beatiful relationships between two very different beasts.
Dark, haunting, and disturbing. Yet, at the same time, beautiful and compelling. Diana Dihaze‘s images have the power to draw the viewers in, to look past the disturbing aspects of the photographs and figure out the things that happen to the subjects of her artworks.
Dihaze is a self-taught artist from Odessa, Ukraine. She uses her camera and Photoshop to create her series of surreal photo manipulations. Many of her artworks are inspired by her personal nightmares and phobias. For that reason, she is able to infuse strong emotions into her haunting images.
Rory Kurtz has been illustrating since he was old enough to hold a crayon. Self-taught and focusing in pencil, ink, and digital paint, Rory has carved out his niche as a unique voice in the illustration community. Working with digital media allows his paintings a greater amount of versatility, and faster production time, which makes all the difference when meeting deadlines. His influences are spread out across the respective wolds of literature, fashion, art, film, & music. His work isn’t necessarily easy to define, as he tends to shift from one style to the next and back again as fits the assignment, but the individual pieces seem unified by a shared sense of fantasy in a modern reality.
Toronto-based web and graphic designer Ryan McArthur gave inspiring quotes by some of the most brilliant minds of our time a second life with his minimalistic poster designs. Humorous, inspiring and strikingly insightful, these quotes take some twisted turns into our minds with McArthur’s playful illustrations.
Having the ability to turn the mundane, or ordinary into a noteworthy site is hard to do in any medium. But Tomek Płonka has a style of illustration that makes something as basic as Mickey Mouse something to gaze at for hours. Check the method.
Superman was born in 1933. Batman was hatched in 1939. Captain America got his shield in 1941. These guys are old, that’s where we’re going with this. And that’s also where Cairo, Egypt-based designer A Morshedi has gone with these eye-grabbing minimalist illustrations. Super Old Men showcases three of the oldest tight-wearing tough guys the world has ever seen, complete with salt-and-pepper hair, beards, and mustaches.
When it comes to photo-realistic painting, life-like works of art, or pieces that suspend disbelief, Andreas Englund’s “The Life Of A Superhero” collection stands in a class of its own. It’s almost needless to say that his talent with a paintbrush is incredible given his style of art, but his ability to tell the story of an entire life with his works is even better. Check the method below.
Gina Kiel is an illustrator/artist based in Wellington New Zealand and she has the ability to wield both traditional and digital media in order to create impressive artwork across a seemingly impossible range of styles.
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