ILLUSTRATOR #8, ANDY WARHOL

   

       Andy Warhol was born in Pittsburgh and spent his childhood there. He moved to Manhattan after graduating from the Carnegie Institute in Pittsburgh as a graduate in Pictorial Design and actively pursued work as a fashion illlustrator. His very first job in fashion industry was drawing shoes for the fashion pages for Glamour magazine and famously illustrating an article called Success is a Job in New York.Then, he was regularly commissioned by Esquire and Harper’s Bazaar. 

He created drawings for I. Miller advertisements and art work for the windows of Bonwit Teller. He even was commissioned by Columbia Records and Tiffany & Co. The ‘a’ at the end of Warhola was dropped as part of this gradual self promotion and self invention and he quickly became one of the most sought-after illustrators in America. He set up Andy Warhol Enterprises Inc. to handle his business.
In the 1960s, Warhol developed into the world’s foremost Pop Artist. Warhol's art encompassed many forms of media, including hand drawing, painting, printmaking, photography, silk screening, sculpture, film, and music.
The body of work Warhol created in this period is now considered to be amongst the most important and influential in the post war era. 

His witty drawings with colorful colors as his signature style. The inspirations came from his daily day and also his ability to elevate something ordinary to extraordinary. Sprinkled with Warhol's perceptively funny observations.Warhol died whilst in recovery from a routine gall bladder surgery in 1987. Plans to house The Andy Warhol Museum in his native city, Pittsburgh were announced in 1989, two years after the establishment of the Andy Warhol Foundation for the Visual Arts in New York. It holds an extensive permanent collection of art and archives. It is noted as the largest museum in the United States dedicated to a single artist.

 
 

ILLUSTRATOR #7, René Gruau

René Gruau embarked on his career as a fashion illustrator in 1924 in Paris and died at the age of 95 year-old. During 1940‘s and 50‘s, he became a favorite of the haute couture world, collaborated with Femina, Marie-Claire, L'Officiel, L'Album Du Figaro and other “high-style” magazines. Some of Gruau’s best work can be seen in the dramatic visual statements he rendered for Christian Dior, Balenciaga, Elsa Schiaparelli, and Hubert de Givenchy. It is where the New Look was born. Nevertheless, His most memorable partnership was with Christian Dior, whom he worked with for almost 40 years. Gruau has created over forty original illustrations for Christian Dior Parfums, sketches, magazines and poster adverts.

In 1948, he was asked to illustrate for Harper’s Bazaar and Vogue before becoming the exclusive artist for FLAIR. He also produced stunningly beautiful advertisements for the LIDO, MOULIN ROUGE and BEMBERG. Gruau continued to work for the greatest names in Haute Couture such as Balmain, Fath, Schiaparelli, Balenciaga, Givenchy, Rochas whilst also producing fashion drawings for ELLE, Vogue, France, Madame Figaro and L'Officiel de la Couture. Moreover, Gruau’s works are collected and exhibited by the finest art institutions including the Louvre in Paris. Rene Gruau’s artistic passion, intensity and technical brilliance have left a high-water mark on art history.  

A classic beauty, grace and sensual elegance and also the use of minimal line of strokes as his signature style.  The quality of the visual appeal of his glamorous and radiant  “beautiful people” is at once bold and languid. Gruau’s artwork is celebrated internationally noted as its exceptional and masterful line, and its timeless, enduring style. What I love about his painting is, he creates so much with so little, so simple yet so effective and his amazing uses of colours and technique. 

 

ILLUSTRATOR #6, KELLY SMITH

Kelly Smith, an Australian-based fashion illustrator, specialising in potraiture and beauty. She was graduated from The Tasmanian School of Art in 2006 with a Bachelor of Fine Arts degree, and has worked for a number of local and international clients including: Valentino, Armani, Jenny Packham, H&M, and Samantha Wills, Mambo Goddess,  and General Pants Co. Her illustrations also have been published in Vogue, InStyle UK, ELLE Girl Japan, The Hub, Russh, Union, Shop 'Til You Drop, Flare, NET-A-PORTER magazine, The Sunday Times' STYLE and many others.

The majority of the ideas for her artworks come from her own imagination which she takes inspiration from fashion, film, nature and fairytales. Some of her ideas also was taken from a photographic reference which  she have collage up her reference images. They are generally a combination of what she have collected or photographed herself. From there she will start sketch it onto white card using LYRA graphite pencils and scan in the final drawing. She have also just started playing with watercolour pencils and she feel like they might be something she will explore more in her every day work. She always wanting to experiment with different tools but unfortunately at the end of the day, she just do not get as much time as she would like to play with it due to her lots of works.

 She creates her illustrations by using of mixing various techniques like pencil sketches, painting and digital printing. While blending all this together, she achieves the mind-bending results like amazing pieces of art that feature the beautiful fragile girls which I love.

The special sense of her signature style that interpenetrates each detail of the image which have catch people’s attention. Her work is so precise and delicate. The gracefulness and the beauty are two main motifs of the wonderful artworks.

She also has posted her artworks through social media such as blogspot, instagram, facebook and others.

Blogspot: http://kjsdesign.blogspot.sg