Dec 162008
 

This post marks the beginning of a theme of posts on this illustration blog. I love to read novels. All sorts. I often look at the covers and am interested on how the artist has interpreted and expressed the book through the use of illustration, photography, typography and layout. I’ll start out with a poetic and famous book which is hailed to be one of the most widely read books of all time – Gabriel Garcia Marquez: 100 years of solitude.

“It was as if God had decided to put to the test every capacity for surprise and was keeping the inhabitants of Macondo in a permanent alternation between excitement and disappointment, doubt and revelation, to such an extreme that no one knew for certain where the limits of reality lay. It was an intricate stew of truths and mirages that convulsed the ghost of José Arcadio Buendía with impatience and made him wander all through the house even in broad daylight.” Gabriel Garcia Marquez: 100 years of solitude

“It was as if God had decided to put to the test every capacity for surprise and was keeping the inhabitants of Macondo in a permanent alternation between excitement and disappointment, doubt and revelation, to such an extreme that no one knew for certain where the limits of reality lay. It was an intricate stew of truths and mirages that convulsed the ghost of José Arcadio Buendía with impatience and made him wander all through the house even in broad daylight.” Gabriel Garcia Marquez: 100 years of solitude

“Carmelia Montiel, a twenty-year-old virgin, had just bathed in orange-blossom water and was strewing rosemary leaves on Pilar Ternera’s bed when the shot rang out. Aureliano José had been destined to find with her the happiness that Amaranta had denied him, to have seven children, and to die in her arms of old age, but the bullet that entered his back and shattered his chest had been directed by a wrong interpretation of the cards.” Gabriel Garcia Marquez: 100 years of solitude

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Nov 152008
 

Last night I went to visit a friend in Piccadilly Circus. She is one of 4 people living there in this awesome top floor flat which had an incredible view over London. The owner who also lives there used to be an art dealer and his place was littered with antiques. One of the guys staying there happens to be Sam Kaprielov aka Sam Sturis. He was there last night and so I got to know about his work and had a a look at his latest work which was in progress. Really amazing stuff especially his old stuff which is unfortunately not available online. I actually prefer his earlier work as it is a little darker. The work included in this post is his more recent stuff. He uses Charcoal which is not an easay meduim.

SAM KAPRIELOV

“Sam Kaprielov was born in Ventspils on the West Coast of Latvia; he attended art college in St Petersburg before returning to Riga. Many a nineteenth century artist started their career as a painter of theatrical scenery; Sam Kaprielov began his as a billboard painter, as it was the most lucrative form of employment for an emerging artist. He moved to Venice to become a mask-maker in 1992 and arrived in London via a two-year spell in Avignon in 1998.” Sam Kaprielov Website

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Sam Keprielov- Les Rivage Des Syrtes

Sep 242008
 

He has a real command of human anatomy which he then likes to distorts. Chris Scarborough likes to add a lot of detail to hands and feet which draws your attention to them – I wonder if it has some meaning or just for effect. Either way I like the extra detail. He also gives his characters these big eyes (Seems to be quite the popular effect to give more emotion to characters). His characters generally have quite a macabre feeling. Ohh and then the spaceship is great I want one just like that!

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Sep 112008
 

These paintings (Oil on Linen) of monkeys became quite a hit in London. Monkeys generaly imply some sort of social satire and I belive thats why people took to these. I certainly don’t think the work would have been coined as contemporary art if the artiest decided to draw a bunch of elephants in the same way. Personally, I think monkeys are a reflection for humans animalism. A reminder of our own once primordial ancestors which in turn makes our treasured superior animal condition (human) fallible.

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