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We’ve just arrived back from another lovely trip to Oban with a mix of second, fourth year and Master’s students. Now in its sixth year, this trip provides students with an opportunity to not only bond with their peers but to also leave the studio and focus on drawing and research carried out on location.
In a place like Oban you have to come prepared for any weather as it changes all the time. Being outside and experiencing a new place in a very physical way through the cold, sun, wind and rain can be challenging and often has an impact on the students’ drawings which in return are full of personal emotion ranging from joy to frustration and display lots of evocative atmosphere. Narratives of people interacting with the town and landscape fill sketchbooks and allow students to discover new stories and build a rich source of material to further develop.
This year our second year student Hannah Riordan reflects on her trip:
On the first main day in Oban we selected a point at random on a map and had to go and draw in that location. I was given an area surrounded by road works and fly tipping: Quite different from the boats and coastline I had envisaged filling my sketchbook with! I ended up drawing some cones that surrounded the road works site. This proved to be more exciting then I had first anticipated. It was interesting to observe the patterns the cones had been arranged in. I then climbed over a wall to be a closer look at some rubbish that had been left there. A rusty washing machine sat there surrounded by plants and flowers. I found the juxtaposition between these two things surprisingly intriguing! It then started to rain so we went to the Oban chocolate shop, which for me has to be the highlight of the whole four days.
We also spent a day exploring the islands. We chose Lismore and left it until the afternoon to visit. When we got there we realized that everything we wanted to visit was too far away for us to get back from in time for the final ferry. So we sketched in the middle of a muddy field surrounded by aggressive cows and an excitable beagle and thought to ourselves “at least its not raining.” I started on a watercolour landscape when the heavens opened. We decided to return to the ferry port waiting room to shelter from the rain. Our group had a sing along whist drawing each others tired and slightly damp faces.
All in all Oban was a great experience. I really felt like a got to know my course mates better. It was also refreshing being able to just draw and not worry about the outcome or deadlines.
And finally, a few more images of crits, drawings and fun at the hostel.
This month three of last year’s Illustration graduates, Drew Starling, Felix Miall and Hari Connor, took part in the Stojkow Arts Residency Programme in rural Poland where they were able to do lots of drawing and gather inspiration for upcoming projects. In this week’s blog post Hari shares her experience and some of her lovely work created during her week-long residency.
The residency is on this beautiful farm in the rural south of Poland, surrounded by meadows, rivers and forests. I love going out of the city to work on drawings at a slower pace, and I’m always inspired by nature and by making work together with other creatives. I’m really interested in observational drawing as an exercise, how the process of drawing changes how you interact with a place, making you slow down and appreciate tiny details, and how the final artwork can reflect one’s experience of the space. It’s also really interesting travelling and working with other illustrators, and seeing how different artists’ interpretations of the same landscape or object can completely vary.
I’m currently putting together a new book called ‘The Way I See It’ that collects my observational drawings from the last few years chronologically, finishing up with the work from this trip. The book will be small, and include notes and prose that I wrote at the time – I wanted to recreate the feeling of handling something personal and intimate that you get when looking through someone’s sketchbook.
The book has gone to print, and should be arriving next week in time for launch at Glasgow Comic Con – I’ll be selling it online and bringing it to Thought Bubble after that. I’m doing a new, experimental comic that includes a huge amount of natural scenery and plants, but I’ve only sold short zines of my observational drawings before, so I’m really interested to see what people think of it in comics circles!
Stojkow Arts Residency Programme was set up by Jessica Kettle who graduated from ECA Illustration in 2014. For more information email jessicakettle10@gmail.com.
For the past 5 years the Illustration department has organised a 4 day field trip for its students to Oban, ‘Gateway to the Highlands’.
Our annual field trip to Oban has become an opportunity to focus on collecting and recording within one’s immediate surroundings, often with a lasting impact on the way our students approach drawing and research.
This year the travel group consisted of a mix of 45 second and fourth year students as well as 3 members of staff.
During the 4 days students carried out various activities to help them gain an in-depth understanding of the place. Activities included the random choosing of a location on the map while blind-folded, and then spending a certain amount of time researching this spot. Being directed to residential areas allowed some students to meet locals while others found themselves in the middle of a forrest. In a series of group crits in the hostel students got to present their findings and experience of the day to the rest of the group.
After returning to their ECA studios students were asked to continue developing their chosen line of inquiry as part of a set brief. The outcomes were risograph printed zines for second years and song lyric related work for fourth years, all of which were exhibited at ‘Shaping the View’.
We asked a number of students from both year groups to reflect on their experience of travelling to Oban:
Craig Ewan, 2nd year Illustration
“I had heard a lot of great things about Oban before going there and hoped it would be as exciting a place as I’d imagined. Luckily it was much better than that, I really loved my time Oban. The whole town has such a warm, festive feeling about it that just made me want to draw everything.
The spot I ended up picking at random on the map couldn’t have been better for me. I love nature and peaceful areas so to realise that I had to travel to the top of the hills in the middle of the forest was just perfect. There was so much to capture there and I would recommend this spot to anyone looking for inspiration. I love creating stories and being in the right environment gives me all the tools I need to do this. The forest had some beautiful scenery, wonderful views and incredibly dark areas that I can see being of great influence not only in this project but for future projects as well. I plan to showcase one of the stories that unfolded around me and to perhaps go over this in greater detail when the time is right.
Katrine Lyck, 2nd year Illustration
“The bus ride to Oban already gives you a hint of what awaits you upon your arrival. Golden autumn hills, or ordinary mountains seen through a pair of Danish eyes, with little streams, waterfalls and an old train bridge of stone taken right out of a scene from Harry Potter. Reaching Oban at the shore makes you realise this is not the end of a journey, but a place from which to take several boats to the islands in the distance.
Oban is a friendly little town and I got to chat to a few of the locals. An old widow living in the beautiful former church manse gave me a tour around her overgrown and wild garden, let me draw from her brick-a-brack and gave me flowers to press and feathers from her two regular visiting seagulls.
To explore the islands is a must if in Oban so I left one morning at 6:30am and saw the sunrise from a boat to Staffa. Fingal’s cave which forms part of the island is like a hall of black pillars and its square shapes make perfect seats to draw from. On the boat back we watched the sunset and were quite happy with it all.
Following my research from Oban I’m beginning to form a narrative in my head about the woman I met and her home and how I could combine this with the concept of living in a cave with all of one’s belongings.”
Sarah Parker, 2nd year Illustration
“I’ve never really been one for observational drawing. To me, making art has always been an exercise in escapism, thriving off the flotsam and jetsam that washes up into my mind’s eye from a simple snatch of daydreaming or in the moments just before falling asleep. I’ve never found comfort in taking down what’s in front of me in such an involved way, or even in just sitting and stopping too long. I’m a restless person; I fidget and need to be walking. The drive to move has helped motivate me into becoming an avid runner, but as far as my emotional health goes it does not let me relax.
Holidays are primarily a shift in landscape and routine, but they are also a shift in perspective. They let us discover familiarity in something new, and help us rediscover what excites us about familiarity: people become both entirely themselves and entirely fresh when seen in a different context. Friendship is strengthened when you watch someone brush their teeth and then pick up a book before bed. A beach is beautiful to walk on alone, but combing it with other people, talking and learning about each other, forming memories, is an entirely different experience. Something is heightened.
Observation becomes a communal experience, something to be shared. I’m no longer disillusioned with drawing what I see, because I understand now that it’s a journalistic process, and a companionable one. You don’t have to draw only from your own perspective, you can learn to record someone else’s, and that is often more valuable.”
Elle McKee
“Despite what our non art school peers might think, an illustration degree is not all drawing. We spend a lot of time coming up with ideas, storyboarding, researching and making careful considerations about audience and client. For me Oban was opportunity to leave all that in the studio and get down to some good old fashioned sketching!
Swapping the same static desk and four walls for the outdoors, where there is constant movement and constant unpredictability, gave a much needed looseness to my drawings. You had to be quick to capture the mood of the sea at a particular time or to sketch a ferry, tootling back and forth. If you were looking the wrong way you might miss a lone goat exploring the beach, or a pensioner riding down the seafront on a bmx (both happened.) On top of this there is the constant risk of a downpour of rain that could put an abrupt end to your drawing at any moment. Far more exciting than working from a photograph!
The town of Oban with its bustling harbour, terrible signage and charming museum, is nestled amongst layers of remote islands that fade back into the horizon. It is known for its Oban whisky (tried and approved) as well its brief moment of viral fame when it’s 30 minute firework display turned into a one minute extravaganza when they were accidentally all set off at once. It’s classic Scottish landscape, wild and exciting and an absolute perfect reminder of how lucky we are to be living in Scotland.”
Scott Davies
“Oban is a place worth visiting for those who keep a sketchbook/ journal and for those who want/ need a reason to switch off and just draw, paint, photograph and reflect. Staying in the quaint and unusual seaside town of Oban was a calming escape experience and has inspired me to journey into the highlands more often – photos definitely underestimate the beauty the highlands have, and it’s all so easy to access when staying in Edinburgh/ Glasgow and other northern cities. Being in Oban allowed easy travel to the surrounding islands, right out into the Outer Hebrides and all it’s natural phenomena and points of historical interest. Oban has frequent ferries from it’s terminal to the unusual Isle of Mull with many points places worth a visit within and beyond. Close surrounding islands and castles are easily accessed via small boats and rafts. If you’re lucky and it’s the right time of year there’s a chance to see basking sharks, whales, puffins and seals. I decided to take a trip out to Staffa – to witness and make work in response to the basalt cave (Fingal’s Cave), the experience of travel was great fun, the tours that are arranged weren’t standard tourist traps at all. The drawing trip being in Oban was an opportunity to do all this with fellow students over a short space of time, would urge anyone to go visit Oban.”
Our 4th year Illustration students Ann Mcleod and India Pierce are taking over the blog this week to report about their summer travel/illustration experience:
Ann and I went to Malaysia for three weeks and travelled across the north of Borneo (Sarawak and Sabah). We mixed it up by staying sometimes with my relatives and sometimes in hostels, but we experienced pretty much everything from the busy cities to the remote tribal villages.
The highlights for us were probably staying in Gunung Mulu National Park where we went caving and trekking, and also diving on the coast of Sabah. We both sketched loads along the way, and learnt a lot about the local art too, which has definitely influenced our work for going in to fourth year!
As a fan of cooking and physical labour I’m surprised it’s taken me this long to discover the joy of printmaking. Rollers, spatulas and squeegees are my new favourite toys.
Over the past months, a couple of drawing trips have provided me with some valuable relief from ‘illustrator’s block’ and I have enjoyed playing around with sketchbook work in the print studios.
In November, we took a group of students to Oban. Despite grand plans to ‘capture the essence of Oban’ in my sketchbook, the majority of my drawings from the trip seemed to be dedicated to old couples in cafes and charming houses on hills (with the odd shell painting for balance). Resigning myself to the fact that I find people more interesting than landscapes, I enjoyed lifting characters from my Oban sketchbook into experiments with monoprinting and screenprinting (see pictures).
December’s drawing trip was to the ever glamorous Gala bingo in Meadowbank. A wild night was had by all as I’m sure this luridly coloured screenprint shows.
My children’s book work continues to simmer along gently and I have found myself considering serious philosophical questions such as ‘how much cleavage can you give a hippo?’ and ‘can a sausage dog and a hedgehog fall in love?’.
And finally, as a Christmas bonus, here is print of a bird. Birds don’t need an explanation.
Hello there! Now that Christmas is over I am back to the studio and back to reality. I’ve been reflecting about my work and practice almost too much recently, constantly questioning who I am, what I am creating and why. I am still at the answer: “I’m not quite sure!” What I do know is that I am inspired by what I am creating, and am excited by where it takes me.
Sketchbooks and journals are a huge element of my practice- I like to keep all my ideas and thoughts in the one place to refer to when I am in a bit of a dizzy (which is a lot of the time!). Recently, my work has been exploring themes of Obscure and Observe, where my drawings look to challenge two dimensional and three dimensional space working together as one entity. Absurd? Yes I think so too!
Here are some examples from my current sketchbook. This work tends to begin with a site: this can be from real life, a place within a film or magazine, or completely imagined. I investigate these spaces through observation, drawing, photography and collage; architectural patterns appear repeated and elongated, where perspectives and vanishing points are emphasised.
by Jessica Kettle (Illustration Artist in Residence)
So, the weather is getting cold, the days are getting shorter and that can only mean one thing, it was time for another drawing trip to Oban.
For the third year running, this November saw a set of enthusiastic ECA students from Illustration, Graphic Design and Animation don their best waterproof clothing and hit the small Scottish town of Oban for 4 days of intensive drawing time.
After a rocky start of cancelled trains and torrential rain to greet our arrival, we finally arrived at the youth hostel late Thursday evening, soaked to the skin but, luckily, with spirits not too dampened!
The students were given a few small briefs to get them started and inspired. A map of Oban with a small red dot on was their challenge for the next morning, to find the place the dot represented and explore it. Each student was also given a collection of clear plastic bags for collecting interesting bits and bobs they encountered on their adventures. These bags returned in the evenings with anything from old books to dead crabs in them and once the sun went down, the tables of the youth hostel’s kitchen were monopolized by students, drawing, painting and chatting about their day’s discoveries.
No trip to Oban would be complete without a trip to the pub so on Friday night we hit our local watering hole, armed with sketchbooks and drawing implements. Needless to say, we stood out like a sore thumb, taking over about three tables, nursing 5 drinks between us and playing rounds of ‘exquisite corpse’, but luckily the locals tolerated us with good grace and we even won a bottle of wine from the pub quiz (could have been the whole quiz we won if it hadn’t been for that damn geography round)!
Saturday, we took a ferry to the Isle of Mull. Commuting didn’t stop us from continuing to fill our sketchbooks (although trying to take a photo did land Astrid with a slap on the arse for getting in the way of an angry woman’s sea view!
Overall the trip was a great success. Students from different disciplines were able to meet, share ideas and techniques and most importantly, step outside the confines of their studio routine to refresh their practise, taking some of that fresh sea air back with them!
