Mother Earth

You can see a larger version here.

I recently created an illustration for a charity event being held by (no name) Art Group here in Philly.  It is in honor of earth day and the proceeds will be going to charity:water which is a non profit that provides clean drinking water to people in developing countries.  The event will be held on April 20 at B Square Gallery in Philly.  All artwork has been printed and will be available for inserts into a reusable water bottle.  Great fun for a great cause.

For my piece I wanted to focus on Mother Nature as a figure who is nurturing with an element of attitude.  I decided to incorporate a side kick of sorts and placed an otter on her shoulder.  I wanted him to hold something significant for Earth Day and thought of a wind turbine.  But it wasn't working so I decided to transform the turbine into a 3 spoke pinwheel.  Below are some of the stages that I went through and the final product that Sherry posted on the (no name) website.

Thumbnails to hash out some basic ideas.  This batch was just for me so it's more rough than what I would show an AD.

When deciding where to put the spokes of the pinwheel I found it helpful to paint all the lines that have been created from positioning.  This allowed me to see that the lines were converging on the otter and I wanted more direction heading towards the Mother's face.  The spokes of the pinwheel helped with that.  In addition I found that at the end the otter was getting lost in comparison to Mother's face.  Enter the rose colored monocle!  I always compare creating an illustration to dancing.  A constant back and forth until it creates a consistent harmony.

After I sent off my jpg and dropped my print off to Sherry at (no name) I was tickled to see that she chose my piece to represent the event!  Learned lesson.....when in doubt add a monocle!