Well its been a while since i posted on here!

Turns out three blogs is more than i can remember to update! To see what I've been up to, check out my tumblr and Facebook pages;

www.imaginationistheammunition.tumblr.com

www.facebook.com/pollyrichardsillustration

So in the spirit of new year i aim to update this blog, starting now with my last piece from a project which was based on an excerpt of text about the meanings of different hand gestures. The final idea took much longer than usual to develop, mainly because i had so many thoughts whizzing around, but i'm pretty satisfied with the final piece. It's based on the weird and wonderful art of palmistry, I used the different meanings of each part of the palm to create a theme about love. I really enjoyed using typography as it's not something i had fully immersed myself in before.

work in progress...

Finished piece.

The Mermaid familie's day out to the beach!

We drew some blobs with a paintbrush attached to a stick and this is what it developed into!

The Imposters Rollergirls!

A little while back i did some illustrations for my teams latest recruitment. Matt Smith (visual archive) used his magical Photoshop skills to put it all together to make this awsome flyer that we've been harassing freshers with!

Social Conflict

    Following on from the characters we created during summer, we were asked to include them in an illustration based on the idea of a social conflict.I decided to choose two of the characters that i enjoyed working on the most which was robot man, in the style of Phil Wrigglesworth, and mime girl  in the style of Gary Baseman. This is the finished result...

    The Painting took longer than originally thought, because i had to work out the perspective, which is not one of my skills, i must admit!

I tried to create a visual dialogue between the characters, which i think works quite well with the poses i chose to paint. If i had planned my time a little better i would improve it by neatening up some of the execution of the paint and maybe slightly changed the different tones of the colours to really make the perspective work.

It's been a while Mr Blog....

I'm afraid my absence was due to moving back to university and settling in.I'm nice and comfy now so i will share the rest of my summer project characters. These were inspired by Gary Baseman, Sara Fanelli and Charles Mackintosh. 10 brownie points if you can guess which inspired which!

Wishing tree and other fun stuff in Manchester Art Gallery

Had a great little mooch around Manchester Art Gallery and took some WONDERFUL photos,which i have accidentally deleted. So i guess i'll have to paint a picture with my words.

Good points:

• There was an 'interactive' exhibition where i held some red ice and drew in the dark.
• Great illustrations by Alison Erika Forde of which some were in a cute little shed.
• Added a wish to a wishing tree, someone had wished for Ryan Gosling to be their boyfriend.(That wasn't my wish......honest)
• Took some 'to do' sheets by various artists that i may try.....

Bad points:

• ummmm...I'm not very eloquent at describing what a brilliant art gallery it was.
• The Whitworth gallery,which is just outside the center of the city, was pretty disappointing. 

EDIT:I found the pictures!!

Ralph Steadman

     During my recent visit to London i went to the cartoon museum which was a hidden gem! The main exhibition was a Ralph Steadman retrospective which featured over 100 of his works as well as a really compelling documentary about his way of working. I love Steadman and admittedly,got a bit distracted in the research stage.  Some of my favorite pieces are his illustrations for ' Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas' by Hunter S. Thompson. If you haven't read the book, i implore you to!

'Steadman sees through the glass very darkly' Hunter s. Thompson

    Steadman frequently uses satire to highlight social issues, mainly about politics.Motivated by this i wanted to create a character that mocks the ridiculous ' beauty standard' that our culture has set for modern women. To be socially 'accepted' as 'beautiful' magazines, advertisements, films etc constantly reinforce that we need to be white, young, hairless,wear make-up, and be skinny but with large breasts. What emerged after sketching a few ideas was a barbie doll like figure, which i suppose incorporates all the attributes of a social acceptable woman.

    I really liked the idea of the character having no arms as it makes her look even more passive and vulnerable but i didn't think it would be very practical. So i decided that she would be able to remove her arms at will, which i think is great because now she is simultaneously vulnerable and aggressive.