Artist Analysis: Tim Burton

Timothy Walter "Tim" Burton (born August 25, 1958), an American film director, film producer, writer, poet, and stop motion artist, is known for his dark, macabre, quirky horror and fantasy films. He has directed and produced films such as Edward Scissorhands, The Nightmare Before Christmas, Corpse Bride, Sweeney Todd: The Demon Barber of Fleet Street and Frankenweenie.

This illustration is from one of Burton’s most famous films, The Nightmare Before Christmas, which is an American stop motion musical fantasy film. The Nightmare Before Christmas originated in a poem written by Tim Burton in 1982 but wasn't released as a film until 1993. This is one of my favourite films and I find his work fascinating and curious because his characters are quite unique.

The illustration is of his main character in the film, Jack Skellington, holding a jack-o-lantern. There is a large, bright yellow moon behind Jack’s head, which makes him stand out and become the focal point of the illustration. There is a tall gate to the right, with a strange, purple-black swirly hill behind it. Jack is standing within that area, surrounded by grass and jack-o-lanterns around his feet.

The formal elements used within this illustration are line, tone/form, texture, pattern/shape and colour. There is a range of line being used from smooth to sharp. The lines made to create Jack’s body and suit are very sharp and noticeable, whereas the lines to create grass are more transparent and have very little opacity, which makes the colour and texture of the grass stand out more.

Shape is being used quite a lot in this illustration along with repetition, especially circles; there is the moon, Jack’s head and all of the jack-o-lanterns. The swirly hill is quite an irregular shape which is what makes it more interesting as a piece of artwork. Repetition is being demonstrated with the jack-o-lanterns and the gate/fences.

The colours in this illustration are mostly natural; grass, jack-o-lanterns, skeleton, gate/fences, suit; and the moon is yellow, which is sometimes how the moon may look. Although, there are two parts of the illustration where the colours are quite strange – the swirly hill in purple and most of the sky is black but towards the bottom there is some purple/red/orange.

What I like about this illustration is the composition and especially the character, Jack. I like how he has been dressed in a very formal suit, although he is a skeleton. The build of his body is very long and skinny and his hands are very detailed in bone structure.

For my work, I will use the way that Burton has built his characters body – long, skinny and dead-like.

Artist Analysis: Edward Gorey

Edward Gorey (February 22, 1925 – April 15, 2000) was an American writer and artist. He was most known for his illustrated books such as The Doubtful Guest (1957) and The Gashlycrumb Tinies (1963). His drawings often showed unsettling narrative scenes in Victorian and Edwardian settings.

This piece of work is an illustration from The Gashlycrumb Tinies. Published in 1963, The Gashlycrumb Tinies is an abecedarian book. The book tells a tale of the deaths of 26 children, who each represent a letter of the alphabet. He tells their deaths in rhyming dactylic couplets. It has been described as a "sarcastic rebellion against a view of childhood that is sunny, idyllic, and instructive". This book really is so peculiar. I have never come across anything like it before.

The illustration that I have chosen to analyse is the last illustration in the book. I thought that this illustration was the most haunting as the text reads ‘’Z is for Zillah who drank too much gin’’. We wouldn’t associate children with alcohol as they are far too young to consume it, let alone dying from drinking too much of it.

The illustration shows two girls sitting at a table. On the table there is a big bottle, which, evidently must be a bottle of gin. The girl on the right is sitting upright, with a glass in her hand staring at the girl opposite her. The young girl on the left, which I presume is Zillah, has sunk into her chair and her body is a skeleton.

I am highly fond of the way the artist has used the formal elements. The whole illustration has been created by using line which has added tone, texture and pattern to the illustration. The tone is darker in some areas which create shadow and the line creates an excellent wooden texture on the walls, floor, table and chairs. There is pattern being used towards the top of the wall in the background; there is a strip of wallpaper with a swirly pattern on it stretching from the left to the right. The walls and floor are also using pattern and repetition with the use of wood.

As the stories are quite dark and dramatic, I think that the black and white colours used are very strong and have great contrast. The book is very humorous, although may be quite worrying for parents. Nevertheless it is a unique take on the usual children’s alphabet books and it includes some very distinguished illustrations.

Gorey’s use of pen and ink drawings, formal elements and dark theme will inspire me to create a successful response to his work.

Artist Analysis: Ernest Howard Shepard

Ernest Howard Shepard (1879 – 1976) was an English artist and book illustrator. He was mostly known for his human-like animals in illustrations for The Wind in the Willows by Kenneth Grahame and Winnie-the-Pooh by A. A. Milne. I have a particular interest in his illustrations for The Wind in the Willows. I chose this illustration, The Valiant Friends, to analyse because I felt that it was a good example of his human-like animals and I think that I will enjoy responding to it.

Shepard created this illustration sometime in 1933. During the year 1933, in England, there were quite a few big events that happened which may or may not have inspired Shepard’s work. For example, on 28th March 1933, the Imperial Airways Armstrong Whitworth Argosy biplane airliner catches fire in the air over Belgium and crashes. This resulted in killing the crew of three and all 12 passengers. This incident is said to be the deadliest accident in the history of British civil aviation up to this date. Many people say that the fire on-board may have been started deliberately.

However, this illustration that I have chosen to illustrator doesn’t look as if it was inspired by the biplane incident. In this illustration, there are four animals dressed in human clothing, holding weapons in their hands and around their waist. The main weapons that I can see are swords and pistols. The two animals on the right hand side look as though they are in a conversation, which shows another human feature that Shepard is incorporating to his human-like animals.

It looks as though they’re in quite a confined area with not a lot of space, like a cave. There is a light in the middle of the photo which adds a lot of tone, although, the light doesn’t look that big but it seems to light up the entire area that they’re in which means that this area must be small.

Shepard’s use of line is exquisite. It adds so much texture to the animals, their clothing and the surroundings. It makes the animals look very realistic, as does the natural colours that he has used. There is also some pattern being used on the two animals clothing to the right.

I am looking forward to responding to Shepard’s work as it really interests me. I will use Shepard’s lines and texture technique to create a successful illustration in response to this piece of work. To do this, I am going to take primary images of animals such as dogs, cats and humans. I will then use the images to create my own character by using processes such as water-colour painting and the computer program Illustrator.

Etching Workshop with UEL Students

On Thursday 24th October my A2 Graphics class took part in an etching workshop led by students from the University of East London. The workshop was to introduce us to a new technique, etching, that we could then use in our own work after the workshop. The etching process is quite long and you have to be patient. Below is a step to step guide on how I made my print.

Process:

1) Using a pointed etching needle, scratch your design onto a metal plate (unfortunately, we did not have metal plates so we used silver mirror board card instead). Make sure that the lines are deep enough so that the print is dark enough.

2) Once you have finished scratching your design onto the metal plate, you must push ink into the etched grooves.

3) When your design on the metal plate is covered in ink, you need to wipe the surface clean leaving only the etched areas retaining ink. If you want some places to be darker than others, you should leave some ink in that particular surface. If there are areas which you are afraid of wiping the ink completely, use a cotton bud in that area.

4) The actual impression is made with a copper plate press (similar to an old washing mangle with a large plank between the rollers). The plate is placed on the plank, covered with dampened paper and backed with three or four felt blankets. These are then passed through the press under high pressure so your design can be transferred onto the dampened paper to create your print.

5) Peel the paper off to reveal your etched drawing.

6) Repeat the inking procedure for each print.

Below are the images from my design during this workshop.

My etched drawing didn't come out as well as I'd hoped, but I am still happy with the outcome. I would like to continue experimenting with this technique to improve my prints. The lines that I scratched weren't as deep as I'd like them to be, the ink is quite light; I think that this print would be more successful if the lines were darker.

I think that this workshop was useful for my A2 Graphics class as it introduced us to a new technique that we can use in our coursework. Although my design that I did using this technique was a response to Ernest Howard Shepard, the black and white nature of the etching fits with the work of Edward Gorey as Gorey's work is black and white lines using pen and ink drawings, which would look amazing in a technique like etching or mono-printing. 

A process like etching and/or mono-printing would help me to develop my ideas as it links to dark themes and it looks quite gritty and adds to the dark theme that I want to illustrate. 

Artist Response: Alberto Cerriteno

Continuing from my analysis of Alberto Cerriteno's 'Bear Illustration', I responded to his piece of work by using aspects of his illustration to create my own character.

Alberto Cerriteno used a lot of the formal elements in his piece of work, such as colour, line, pattern and texture; I have tried to include each of these things in my response.

I think that this response is successful as I have taken certain aspects from the artists work to incorporate them into my piece of work using my own style. I have used a limited colour scheme of three colours (yellow, blue and orange); line to create texture (the characters body); pattern (the clue circles in the orange outline around the character's body); shapes (the features of the characters face).

Below is a close up of the lines and texture.





To refine my idea further, I could experiment with doing my character using the screen-printing technique as the colour scheme is perfect for that particular process.

My character could be improved by adding lines to create texture to the legs; experimenting with different colour schemes; using different shapes.