Sound the trumpets on Christmas Day!

Merry Christmas 2013

Peace on Earth

South American Sketchbook (Part 1: Buenos Aires)

Last week, I returned from a month of travelling in Argentina and Brazil. Half of the time was spent volunteering with an NGO called Voluntario Global, where I helped to teach children and young people English at an after-school academy. The last two weeks saw me visit the legendary Iguazu Falls on the Argentine-Brazilian border before going to Rio de Jainero and the Ilha Grande in Brazil.

As I travelled through Argentina and Brazil, I created some sketchbooks based on the people and places I encountered.

 

Recoleta cemetery

 

 Plaza de Mayo

 Las madres de Plaza de Mayo (excuse my minor Spanish error)

 Polo Match

San Telmo

More to come soon...

Mowgli and Baloo

I've recently been reading Rudyard Kipling's original Mowgli stories, which inspired me to draw this piece.

Deer

More of Wonderland

 Do You Play Croquet?

(pen and ink/digital)

Characters from Wonderland

(pen and ink/watercolour)

Fantastic Mr Fox

Égalité

My own quick digital rendering of the marriage equality symbol.

Cheshire Cat

"Oh, you can't help that," said the Cat. "We're all mad here. I'm mad. You're mad."
"How do you know I'm mad?" said Alice.
"You must be," said the Cat, "or you wouldn't have come here."
-Lewis Carroll, "Alice's Adventures in Wonderland" (1865)

The Swan of Tuolena

The Wind in the Willows - Rat and Mole

 
"Nice? It's the ONLY thing," said the Water Rat solemnly, as he leant forward for his stroke. "Believe me, my young friend, there is NOTHING--absolute nothing--half so much worth doing as simply messing about in boats."
-Kenneth Grahame, "The Wind in the Willows" (1908)

The Girl Who Reads A Lot

Hansel and Gretel

I'd forgotten I'd done this drawing of Hansel and Gretel discovering the witch's cottage until I happened upon it in a sketchbook from last year. Hansel and Gretel ranks among my favourite fairy tales (it'd probably be somewhere in the Top 10), and I think the reason why I like it (and the reason why I think it remains one of the Grimms' best known tales) is because it tells a simple, human story about the need for survival and the triumph of good over evil.

I also think the imagery and settings are particularly enticing, in particular the concept of a gingerbread cottage. I've chosen to go for a slightly more humbling depiction of the edifice as described by the Brothers Grimm themselves, unlike the extreme candy-coated renditions most modern versions show. See if you spot anything particular on the house that may allude to the owner's witchy ways...

Cat and Mouse

Cinderella and the Birds

An illustration to the version of "Cinderella" by the Brothers Grimm (known in German as "Aschenputtel"), in which the eponymous heroine is aided not by a fairy godmother, but by a magic tree and some birds.

Shameless plug

Nothing much, but just to say that I also have a deviantart account now, and will probably be posting stuff over there as well. It should end up being much the same as here, though with some inevitable slight differences, and with some other cool gadgets.

http://jarvworld.deviantart.com/

Enjoy.

Afternoon of a Faun

There's an ink sketch of a faun character somewhere on this blog from last year, but here's a digital piece I created inspired by Debussy's tone poem "Prélude à l'après-midi d'un faune".

Il était une fois...

Just some illustrations of Little Red Riding Hood and The Three Little Pigs, as well as a sketch of Pinocchio. All are digital and were drawn directly into Photoshop.

THE THREE LITTLE PIGS - House of Straw

LITTLE RED RIDING HOOD AND THE WOLF

PINOCCHIO

Dorothy and the Scarecrow

Neverland

Not entirely sure if I'm particularly happy with it, but here is an experiment with a digital tablet and Photoshop.

Bonjourasaurus

Un dinosaure pas comme les autres...

Troll!

Aschenputtel

"Shake and rattle, little tree!
Throw gold and silver over me!"

Probably due to the bicentenary of the publication of Grimms' Fairy Tales, I've been thinking quite a lot about their tales, in particular their version of "Cinderella", known in German as "Aschenputtel". Like all fairy tales, many variants of "Cinderella" exist around the world. In the English-speaking world, the version of "Cinderella" we know is the late 17th century French version by Charles Perrault (this is the version Walt Disney adapted). Yet in many countries, in particular those in the German-speaking world, the Grimms' version of the tale is better known. I can remember being ten and picking up a collection of Grimm tales at school and reading their version of "Cinderella" for the first time. Unaware of the idea that multiple versions of the same narrative existed across different cultures, I was surprised to read such a different version.

"There's blood in the shoe!" warn the birds.

The Perrault version of the tale is much more light-hearted and refined than the more sombre Grimm version. The stepfamily in Grimms' version are truly cruel, demonic creations as opposed to delightfully haughty comic villains. In particular, the stepmother, so hell bent on seeing her family wed into royalty, has her own daughters cut off bits of their feet to make Cinderella's golden slipper fit. The magical helpers in Grimms' version of the tale are also radically different. Whereas Perrault has a fairy godmother appearing mid-point through the story to get Cinderella to the ball, the Grimms have Cinderella plant a hazel tree at her birth mother's grave in the garden, which can grant such wishes as providing a lovely dress and slippers for the royal ball (one can assume that the dead mother's spirit inhabits the tree). Also helpful are the birds that reside in the tree; they help Cinderella with the tedious task handed by her stepmother of sorting out good and bad lentils that have been thrown among the ashes, and they alert the prince of the stepsisters' treachery by getting him to notice the blood in the golden slipper. Yet these birds aren't entirely sweet and innocent as well. In an ending that would delight Hithcock, Cinderella's bird friends peck out the eyes of the stepsisters as punishment for their horrid ways.

The birds help Cinderella with her tedious chores.

Yes, it may sound like an unpleasant tale, especially if you were raised on Disney or Ladybird books. Yet the original Grimms' stories are not exactly stories for children to begin with, hence their bowdlerisation in versions for younger people (in fact, I believe contemporary German versions of the tales for children tone down the violence).  Equally, there is something about the Grimms' "Cinderella" that really is enchanting. So much so, in fact, that I decided to make some sketches based on it. Enjoy!