I started this exercise with a copy of the Gaurdian and cut the illustrations from it and stuck them in my sketchbook.
Notes
1 – Modern Tribes. The political interviewer
This is a representational illustration of a man in glasses. His expression emphasises the tone of the piece which is sarcastic, abrupt and pointed. Or at least that is how it came across to me.
2 – Cherish the age of Bolt
Conceptual illustration of Bolt as the recipient of audience love (represented by the hearts). It more or less summarises the article content which reads as a eulogy to Bolt.
3 – In my humble opinion
This is for an opinion coloumn which, this week, is on the topic of storage of family valuables. The illustration is a narrative, humorous take on an option for storage of valuables most people wouldn’t consider. Done in a comic style in pen and wash.
4 – Corbyn is chiming with the times but no one can predict anything anymore
This is a conceptual illustration of 2 people trying to stay balanced on a swinging pendulum. It represents the 2 main political parties’ relationship with each other and power. It distills the thrust of the article into a simple proposal that is seemingly at odds with the title of the piece. Perhaps things are more predictable than not …?
5 – Grenfell will forever stand as a rebuke to the right
This illustration is narrative and seems to be applicable to both articles on the page which refer to the Grenfell disaster. It shows a ghostly image of Mrs May, cowering in her ivory tower and surrounded by luxury buildings. In the background stands Grenfell; a starkly contrasting black block against the sparkling luxury futuristicly shaped buildings. It is done in pen and wash and has a cartoon style.
6 – If my wife can touch me in bed, she says, the mattress isn’t big enough.
The illustration is narrative in a cartoon style. The piece is an ironic look at ‘first world problems’ related to the purchasing decisions of the man in a heterosexual, middle aged couple. The illustration seems to extend the written piece by showing the couple leaving on a magic flying mattress, possibly a metaphore for ‘flights of fancy’ or ‘the sky’s the limit’. The bemused expression of the man emphasises the lack of control he seems to be experiencing over the spending of their money.
How Green is Your Food?
For this title I found an article ‘How Green is Local Food?’ from which I selected sections relating to factors affecting the emmissions food is responsible for. The article was really expressing the complexity of factors affecting emmissions and in particular that miles travelled was not the most significant factor. The most significant factors were explained as the type of food, i.e. red meat, processed food, and the methods of production, i.e. intensive farming methods, use of pesticide, heavy use of fertiliser. Methane from digestive gasses of red meat and nitrous oxide from fertilizer production were said to have the most impact on the atmosphere. Furthermore red meat production is also attributed with the emmissions generated by the growing of crops as fodder.
I started with some thumbnail sketches of different ideas and chose one to finish. I felt the cow eating corn on a fertilizer bag table showed the complexity of the problem without being a complex image. Although if it was to be for a half page slot a landscape orientation would be better and I would have chosen the more narrative style of the allottment with train in background. I decided the image would be a bit childish for a newspaper like the gaurdian so I created a new rough and coloured with gouache, trying to keep a rough style to the image.
Update Following Feedback
My concept for showing the chain of events by depicting a cow eating corn on a table made of fertilser was not clear so I rethought the illustration. I used my tutor’s guidance to focus more on the chain of processes by showing a plate of food with the negative implications for the environment shown in callouts. I wanted to show some of the complexity behind food’s contribution to greenhouse gasses by showing how the production of meat acrues emmissions at all stages of production.
I have attached the original article here which was entitled ‘How green is local food?‘ and attempts to show how it is not just distance travelled that must be considered.
