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© Jonathan Atkinson, 2013 gutenberg Copyright Hand Crafted in the U.S.A.
1st of January

Ralph McQuarrie



Ralph McQuarrie’s art must look familiar to generations of movie goers, his work featured in Star Wars, Battlestar Gallactica and a slew of sci-fi flicks. He was a conceptual artist, and past away this year in March at the age of 83. He left behind a legacy of fantastic moonscapes, robots, and epic futuristic space stations.

McQuarrie started off drawing teeth and aeroplane parts for a dentistry firm and Boeing respectively, and created posters for the Apollo Space Program. His technical illustration ended up catching the eye of George Lucas, who commissioned him to create conceptual art work for his new film, Starwars.

“McQuarrie designed many of the film’s characters, including Darth Vader, Chewbacca, R2-D2 and C-3PO and drew many concepts for the film’s sets. It was McQuarrie who suggested that Vader wear breathing apparatus. McQuarrie’s concept paintings, including such scenes as R2-D2 and C-3PO arriving on Tatooine, helped convince 20th Century Fox to fund Star Wars, which became a huge success upon release in 1977.Neil Kendricks of The San Diego Union-Tribune stated McQuarrie “holds a unique position when it comes to defining much of the look of the “Star Wars” universe.”McQuarrie noted, “I thought I had the best job that an artist ever had on a film, and I had never worked on a feature film before. [...] I still get fan mail — people wondering if I worked on Episode I or just wanting to have my autograph.” source

His work carved out a particular style within the sci-fi-fantasy genre, creating landscapes and worlds that one could really imagine inhabiting, vast alien vistas receding into the distance, populated with characters that, brought into our lives through cinema, feel like old friends.

“Ralph McQuarrie’s life can be clearly divided into two distinct sections: before Star Wars, he was an industrious, skilled, virtually unknown technical illustrator; after Star Wars, he became the most sought after Production Illustrator ever to work in films.
A primary reason for this change, of course, has to do with the film’s unprecedented success. But, in a very real sense, Star Wars wouldn’t have been the film it was without McQuarrie. His eyes and hands were the first lenses through which Star Wars was focused and captured for Lucas’ inspection and refinement.” source

You can find out more, and see more of his art on his website.

27th of November

Yohan Sacré



An illustrator based in Belgium, drawing for graphic comics, the doodles of this artist capture the imagination don’t they? Soft and sharp, shadows play, and creatures abound. This is the work of Yohan Sacré. Have a peek into the pencil world and see what you can discover! A tentacled monster sneaking through a doorway or small acorn beings living large in a chocolate chip infested landscape. The uncomplicated medium of paper and pencil just emphasise the detailed ideas, and makes me want to get out my moleskine and draw!

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10th of December

Andreas Englund and the disenchanted hero


Where the real rational scientific world takes away the everlasting & impenetrable fantasy of our hero. I think Andreas has captured a really strong personality in his artwork. Enjoy.

Andreas Englund - Flying

Andreas Englund - Flying

 

7th of May

MFA Illustration April 29 – May 14, 2011


Always lovely to receive a collection of great illustrations from SVA. The exhibition brings together animations, children’s books, graphic novels, figurative paintings, comic books and other narrative works by 21 students graduating from the MFA Illustration as Visual Essay Department at SVA. Curated by faculty member David Sandlin, the exhibition will be on view April 29 – May 14, 2011 at the Visual Arts Gallery, 601 West 26th Street, 15th Floor, New York City.

It’s a very diverse group of illustrators graduating from the MFA Illustrations as a Visual Essay Department at SVA. Some standouts include:
• Chi Birmingham’s The Plainview Dispatch: illustrated observations of a fictional town during the height of the Gold Rush.
• The Romance of Tristan & Iseult by Philip Cheaney: interactive animated eBook for the iPad. Video sample here: http://vimeo.com/22456387
• Pimlada Phuapradit creates a curious world of defective toys.
• Korean illustrator Jungyeon Roh celebration of the vegan diet.

Here is a collection of what will be at the exibition:

 

20th of June

Illustrations by Asaf Hanuka


While I was collecting examples of  Asaf’s work I started to notice that it looked very similar to Tomer’s work. I have subsequently learnt that they are in fact twin brothers. Asaf Hanuka and Tomer Hanuka. I posted Tomer Hanuka’s work fairly recently and I guess this is now in part acting as a follow up post.  Asafs work is equally good and one or two illustrations can be compared to Istvan Banyai in style.

Asaf also does a weekly comic which is a documentation of one family’s search of a home. Definitely worth checking out.

His subject matter is thought provoking and unique. I hope you enjoy his illustrations:

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3rd of February

A tribute to the legendary Norman Rockwell – Happy Birthday


“Norman Rockwell was a 20th-century American illustrator. His works enjoy a broad popular appeal in the United States, where Rockwell is most famous for the cover illustrations of everyday life scenarios he created for The Saturday Evening Post magazine over more than four decades. Among the best-known of Rockwell’s works are the Willie Gillis series, Rosie the Riveter, Saying Grace (1951), and the Four Freedoms series.” – Wiki