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Ethics of Everyone

A successful collaboration between 3rd year illustrators and MSc School of Education students culminated in a presentation at the School of Education Inclusive pedagogy conference.
Over 2 weeks students reflected on the anagram SHANNARRI, which is a measure of well-being used in Scottish Education. They considered their personal educataional experiences and researched the limited teaching tools that explore issues of the ethics of everyone and issues of social justice. The education students wrote stories exploring the subject and the illustrators responded to these making prototypes of teaching boxes filled with educational games, books and artefacts including cushions, comics and workbooks to facilitate workshops.
The work received excellent feedback from the students and teachers attending the conference. With such great learning potential for all involved Holly Linklater (Lecturer in Education) and Harvey Dingwall  (Lecturer in Illustration) plan to develop the themes and content of this project further for both teaching and research contexts.

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Painting workshop with AR Sarah Sheard

Some afternoon painting fun in the studio – as part of a current painting-inspired project, our first years have taken part in an experimental painting exercise led by Artist in Residence Sarah.

Students were paired up and asked to sit back to back. One side was given an image of a painting, which they then have to describe to their partner (without naming the painting or artist if they knew it). The painting partner then painted the description they heard.

The challenge for the describer was to put into words what they saw in the painting and to give as much information about how they believe it would have been created; what kind of brushstrokes were applied, is the style realistic? Are there many layers of colour? Do you think it was made quickly? What’s the mood of the painting?

The painters on the other side had to ask further questions; for example what is meant by ‘a yellow circle’, is it a perfect circle or a bit wobbly? Is the yellow completely flat or can they see some texture? How do they think the texture is made? What sort of yellow? Lemony yellow or orangey yellow?

This workshop was designed to help students really think about what they see and discover different methods of using colour and painterly mark-making. And at the end of it all the group were able to share their experience and have a good laugh – here are the results:

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Simon Grennan at ECA

Today we were delighted to welcome Simon Grennan, comic maker and scholar who came to deliver a comic workshop and talk to our students.

The practical workshop was an amazingly easy and exciting hands-on introduction to visualising and making comics. Students worked through three different techniques to making stories with drawings. All that was needed were coloured pencils – hippos, lions, zebras etc were provided!

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Later in the day Simon gave a an Introduction to Comics Studies to the whole Illustration department raising the question ‘What do we talk about when we talk about comics?’  He provided an accessible, engaging and entertaining introduction to the global conversations about comics, their history, production, readers and thinkers.

Simon Grennan is author of the graphic novel ‘Dispossession’, a Guardian Book of the Year 2015 and Research Fellow in Fine Art at the University of Chester. http://www.simongrennan.com

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Meet our Artists in Residence: Sarah Sheard

Hello! Having graduated from Painting at ECA in 2014, I have come back to haunt the illustration department this year as an artist in residence. Since graduating, I have taken part in several exhibitions as well as developing a range of greetings cards (and also work as a picture framer).

I have a polymathic approach to making, learning and using many different processes from drawing and painting to model making, zines, animation, and printmaking. I usually make work that has a humorous or playful element to it, whether this is conveyed in the subject matter or in the way it is made. I really enjoy work which acknowledges that art can be a very playful and ‘entertaining’ subject, and am hoping to explore how this will meet a design approach within illustration.

During the residency I’m particularly interested in developing my art practice through exhibiting work, and exploring how this will feed in to design projects. I’d really like to create a children’s book and develop my printmaking and animation skills. I’d also like to explore collaborating with illustration students as well as other departments and discover new approaches to making.

I’m looking forward to working with you all so please come and say hello! (I am usually in the studio Wed-Fri)

sarahsheardart.tumblr.com | www.sarahofthenorth.co.uk

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Meet our artists in residence: Pilar Garcia

I am a Spanish artist. I completed my MA in Illustration at Edinburgh College of Art the last course. Before this degree, I had no formal training as an illustrator, having worked in advertising and graphic design. I am now one of the artists in residence at Edinburgh College of Art, with another residency lined up next year, at Arteles in Finland.
My practice normally focuses on women, mindfulness and imperfection. I have always been interested in everything related to human behavior, the relationship we have with the world and especially with ourselves. In addition, I have discovered my interest in interpreting nature and personal well-being in an enlightened way. Imperfection is my alter ego. It is everywhere, in art, human figures, nature, animals and love.
I work in mixed media, combining traditional materials, such as ink, watercolor and ink pen with digital. My aim is to reach a delicate and imperfect art (I always make the right imperfect drawings that make sense to me) through making freely and uniquely drawn illustrations.
I draw everything, from figures, animals, plants, landscapes, objects and buildings. I enjoy illustrating narratives and book covers and also creating lettering, patterns and animation.
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Meet our Artists in Residence – Moira Zahra

Hello! I’m one of the Illustration Artists in Residence for this year at ECA. I’m a full-time freelance illustrator and graphic designer working mostly in children’s books and editorial illustration. Prior to being a freelancer I was a lecturer and programme coordinator in Malta, teaching graphic design, interactive media and game art for seven years.
During my residency here I will be working on client projects as well as working on my own projects. During the first semester I will be working on a children’s book with Merlin publishers (a Maltese publisher). The book is called ‘A Walk in Valletta’ and it’s about two characters touring the Maltese capital. I will be more than happy to discuss my process with any students wishing to know more about children’s book illustration (you can find me in the Illustration studio on Mondays, Wednesdays and Fridays).
Another project I will be working on is a collaboration with a jewellery designer, who is also based in Malta. For this project, I am doing various character and background illustrations that will eventually become jewellery pieces. This is quite a challenging project for me because I’ve never designer products or jewellery pieces, so it should be interesting to observe and learn from the process. I’m also discussing another project with a book maker, where I will be doing illustrated covers for hand-bound books, but this project is still in its initial stages.
My personal project is about the theme of identity, specifically the multilayered/multidimensional layers formed by creative Maltese locals who live abroad. I’ve been working on this theme since moving to Edinburgh a year ago, and would now like to take it a step further. I have several drawings, sketches and ideas for this project, but I’m looking to expand these ideas by  doing thorough research, interview subjects and experts. I’m in the process of pitching my idea to get funding for my research so this will hopefully help support my project and my research.
Eventually I would like to take some of these drawings and illustrations from this project and experiment with 3D printing. Rather than doing sketches specifically designed for 3D printing, I would like to expore ways of how to turn ‘flat’ illustrations to 3D objects, therefore preserving the illustrative qualities of the pieces.
If you’d like to view more of my work, visit www.moirazahra.com or www.instagram.com/moirazahra
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Meet our Artists in Residence – Yasmeen Khan

Hi! I’m one of the new Artists in Residence in the Illustration department.

I’m originally from southeast London, but I’ve been living in Cornwall for the last three years, two of which were spent completing an MA in Illustration: Authorial Practice at Falmouth University. Moving to Edinburgh has proved to be a bit of a change from Cornwall! But it’s definitely a positive move – I’m already finding my new surroundings to be incredibly inspiring. I write and illustrate short stories in the Gothic tradition, and Edinburgh feels like the ideal place to do that – becoming steeped in its atmosphere, history and beauty can only be good for a ghost story writer.

I’m really looking forward to getting involved in ECA’s community and academic activities. I’m excited to be able to use the facilities, especially the print workshop, as my practice involves a lot of printmaking – I love to work in monotype, and any intaglio technique, especially etching, aquatint, and mezzotint. These were the techniques I used to illustrate Vignettes, the book I made for my final MA project.

While I’m here, I hope to produce some new works of illustrated fiction. I also love book design and bookbinding, and my goal is to make my stories into beautiful, and most of all, enjoyable books.

I’m also looking forward to continuing my academic research here at ECA. My research interests are focused on how illustration contributes to and interacts with texts’ emotional resonance, and how this connects with Derrida’s notion of hauntology, with particular reference to Gothic fiction. I’m also very interested in film and television, and especially in how they use and interact with illustration.

Finally, I’m looking forward most of all to becoming part of the Illustration department’s activities, and working with the students! Hopefully, it will be a wonderful and productive year.

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Illustration students at the Edinburgh Book Festival

Earlier in the year our 3rd year Illustrators paid a visit to 4 different primary schools in Cumbernauld, as part of Edinburgh International Book Festival’s outreach programme booked! that delivers creative workshops to communities across Scotland.

The project saw the students working alongside the pupils, collaboratively illustrating stories that they wrote with the support of author Mike Nicholson, resulting in an exciting mixture of everyone’s drawings. As a follow up form this project students Terri Po and Madeleine Pinkerton were selected to do a live drawing event with Mike on stage at this year’s Book Festival.

The team worked in front of 350 primary school children with the aim to show how easy it is to develop a story about just anything. Mike, Terri and Madeleine responded to the children’s ideas with on the spot storytelling and illustrating.

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At the end the pupils got to pick their favourite drawings and ask the artists questions about how they developed their drawing skills. The students explained that they were still learning and always would be, and that learning was an ongoing process. The audience was full of aspiring illustrators and storytellers, and we look forward to perhaps seeing some of them in our college studios in a few years time!

Pattern workshop with Joanna Srokol

Our MA students have just completed a pattern-making project led by Artist in Residence Joanna Sokol, who we introduced in an earlier blog post. Spread across 2 weeks students  received an introduction to surface pattern design and were then asked to create a moodboard based on particular fashion or interior theme, which they had previously pulled from a hat. During tutorials with Joanna the group was shown how to create a repeat surface pattern using Photoshop and through individual crits were given the opportunity to tackle any difficulties.

The photos below were taken at the final presentation this morning against our fantastic castle backdrop.

 

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Alumni news – Sarah Bissell

Over the last few months Sarah Bissell, an ECA alumni and one of last years artists in residence has been working with Edinburgh Collage Collective on an international submission of collaged based work themed around the subject of envelopes. Setup in 2016 by collage artist Rhed Fawell, the collective has been working on exhibitions and events over the last year and currently is showcasing their latest exhibition, G.L.U.E. in our very own Tent Gallery.

The collective (comprising of seven members including Sarah Bissell and another of our previous artists in residence Megan Elizabeth Taylor) believes that it is important to reach out and link to other like minded artists globally particularly in this turbulent political climate. Through their most recent project they have connected with over 70 other artists and gathered over 140 artworks for display in the gallery and the feedback has been incredibly positive with plans to travel the exhibition and future open submissions on the horizon. To get involved check out the instagram page and keep and eye out for future eventshttps://www.instagram.com/edinburghcollagecollective/

Sarahs work is part risograph and part collage as she runs risograph printers The Gutter Press https://www.instagram.com/thegutterpress/ . Collage has always been a focus of her work but since starting her business late last year she has also been making risograph prints created from her original collages. Her work for this exhibition was looking at the excitement and intrigue you have when receiving post and she wanted to celebrate this and inject an element of fun to her subject.

The exhibition is open until the 28th so pop by if you’re in the area. If you have an interest in risograph have a look at The Gutter Press website and contact Sarah with any printing projects you want to get produced. Also watch out for the Edinburgh Collage Collectives future open submissions, they would love more people to get involved and to connect with more lovely collage loving people.

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http://thegutterpress.org/

http://www.edinburghcollagecollective.com/