The Sea is a Good Place to Think of the Future

First of all – thanks so much everyone for the love regarding my new blog design, I'm really pleased you all like it! I thought today I'd share the piece that inspired the theme and palette of my new design.

Time for a Change

I decided earlier in the week that my blog needed a bit of a facelift, so I sat down today and worked on a new design after piecing together a colour scheme yesterday that I thought would work quite nicely.

A little bit of news...

Just before I flew out to Germany I applied for a Christmas temp position at Lush, and while I was away I was offered an interview that I couldn't attend and worried that I'd missed out on a chance altogether. Luckily for me however, I was offered another interview for when I was home and I excitedly attended it last Thursday. 

Her Royal Highness, Buttercup the Sloth

Another painting process post? Yeah, because why the hell not! This time starring the only queen that I'll ever bow down to (well, except for maybe Marina,) – Buttercup the Sloth!

Process: Painting Ziggy

I've had quite a lot of time on my hands since coming to stay with my dad in Germany, so I thought I'd invest a good chunk of it into having a go at painting my little poodle, Ziggy. As I mentioned in my last post, watercolours are a medium that I struggle with, and animal portraits are a subject I struggle with, so once again I attempted to tackle two weaknesses in one piece by painting Ziggy using watercolour alone.

Pinker than Shepherd's Delight

I sat down with my watercolours today and I had a bloody good time. Throughout my course I never really had the time available to sit and pour hours into getting to grips with the medium, and if you happen to have followed me over the last three years you'll have noticed a trend in me pulling out my paints every summer and attempting a portrait. I find it oddly exciting and relaxing to just sit and paint 'properly', so for me it's kind of cathartic to sit down in the summer at the end of a busy academic year and just pour some time into something that yields no reward, but just brings me a little bit of joy.

Saturday Scribbles

Saturday Scribbles

a tea party with alice

here's my most recently completed commission, a sidebar portrait for the lovely alice over at teapartywithalice.com. i've included some snaps of my illustrative process (i mainly post these on my instagram) as it's something i've never really done before, and i must say that i really have had so much fun playing around with gouache and i think it's finally become a staple part of my portrait style. 

i'm still open for commissions, so if you would like one for yourself (or maybe even as a gift to another!), please feel free to drop me an email at robynmakesthings@gmail.com to discuss my working methods and pricing :)

tweet me @xrobynm  |  follow me via bloglovin

dance, magic, dance!

 

just popping by to post another gouache portrait i've completed recently! this time of david bowie as the goblin king from the film labyrinth, which i watched while at uni and felt instantly inspired to one day recreate the characters from it. i do plan to more simply illustrate characters such as ludo (who is just adorable!) and create a whole set of them, but i thought i'd start out here as i'd been meaning to redo a bowie portrait at some point anyway after growing more and more displeased by my original aladdin sane illustration!

i was pretty pleased with this illustration on paper, however i don't feel as though the scan does it any justice *sigh*, such a nightmare when that happens! obviously i've room for a lot of improvement when it comes to portraits, however i do believe i'm slowly getting better at creating depth which is a lot easier to accomplish with gouache paints (my soft spot for them is rapidly growing.) i suppose i've just got to keep practising and practising!

tweet me @xrobynm  |  follow me via bloglovin