Veronika Antlova

I decided to illustrate a story about a former family dog that was once adopted from a shelter as a Christmas present and now abandoned and left to his own fate. By choosing this theme and illustrating this story, I wanted to raise awareness of irresponsible dog adoptions, dog abandonment and animal cruelty.

 Shakira Yunus

From researching elephants I began to develop the theme around circuses and how they exploit these gigantic mammals. I started with drawing the elephant form and experimented with different materials to expose textures. Looking at footage captured both undercover and by the audience, I mapped out the stunts they are expected to successfully complete under the torturing conditions. Below is my final which is on a series focused on stunts performed during circus performances. Charcoal allows me a lot of expressive freedom and control where necessary as I want to evoke emotions from the viewer. This combination is what I explore throughout my sketchbook as I planned to capture the disturbing circus life through tactical imagery and shading.

Elise Costain

I chose to look at a more broad idea of animals in sequential imagery, I decided to look at people who have rare species for pets. Especially with the cultural boom of the docuseries Tiger King, I have a heightened awareness about people with extraordinary and endangered animals as pets. Also the idea of the modern social media influencer advancing to a stage where the new ‘in’ thing is to have a crazy pet seemed like a fun idea to me.

Laura Louise McDonagh


My project researches into the history of the London zoo, in particular focusing on a tale of a ghost bear seen at the Tower of London. In my final piece I wanted to illustrate this story in a tarot card style print, combing ideas of three dimensional space and aiming to make it seem like the prints are moving to bring the story to life.

Ollie Keefe-Magan

I looked at the practice of Chinese medicine which has traditionally involved using various body parts of tigers to be crafted into different medicinal and pharmaceutical items. I have researched the different body parts that have been used within these medicines and why they are used. I wanted my final piece to showcase a tiger drawn in a Chinese folk style to gradually melt throughout the page to represent the use of tiger bodies in a grotesque craft.

Kirsten Randall

I chose to look into the domestication of bunnies, and how they went from the common wild breed to the many domestic breeds through selective breeding. I also looked at the sequence within a rabbit's binky, a jumping instinct in common with all the breeds. For my final piece I illustrated the timeline of rabbit domestication in the form of a binky as an animated gif.

Lions - Louise Tagg

For my Research Methodology project, I chose to look at lions as I wanted to research an animal that I was interested in. I was inspired in this piece by mandala artwork such as Ben Kwok's work, which includes a lot of fine and repetitive detail, something I admire and love to work in myself, I wanted to put in my own interpretation and create an interesting and mesmerizing piece in fine liners.

As my project went on, I looked in depth into the well being of animals and the ways in which their lives can be influenced, especially by humans. This is a topic that I feel very passionate about for all animals, and the safety of lions became a very important and interesting subject matter for me. I used this passion to essentially create a campaign that advertised the lives of lions and inspire people to think about what humans do to lions and can do to help. I was inspired hugely by my research and wanted to show a clear and precise message as simply as possible. These two images along with one other, ultimately became my final pieces to demonstrate this topic.

Throughout the project, I also experimented with different media to find what worked for me and this topic, and to demonstrate the art of the lion in as many different ways as possible. This is a piece I completed, inspired by my own previous work that I had completed in the same media of black and white acrylic paint. This is a medium I am used to and love to use because of the layers I work in, making the piece enjoyable and my own.

Bears - Elizabeth Moore

For the Research Methodology Unit I decided to look at a bears as they have always been an animal that I have found appealing and intriguing. I wanted to explore the more playful side to the bear as opposed to their wild nature, so I looked into children's stories and media that featured them. I looked at different Disney films including Brother Bear and Brave, but ended up focusing a lot on Winnie the Pooh. What interested me the most about Winnie the Pooh was how the whole story was based upon A.A.Milne's son's childhood toys; so I started to collect images from friend's and family's own childhood toys to create my own characters.

To do this I firstly did some character designs and developed them a little before drawing them up for my final piece. To make my images I used watercolour as a base and drew on top in fine liner, and then using a scalpel I cut out the bear shapes. I did this in several layers as experimentation but ended up liking the effect enough to use the bears as my final image. Lastly I scanned them in together to photoshop to adjust the colours a little and to edit the background; I ended up using several plain pastel coloured backgrounds as a small series for my final piece to complement the child-like theme I was going for.

Aye - Aye.

I chose to base the project around the Aye Aye because I found it to visually be very interesting, it has so many different adaptions and features which make it look cute at one angle and like a deformed gremlin in others.



Here I have captured the Aye Aye's beauty with the medium, scratch board I tried to show how complex it's facial structure is just by visualizing the hairs.



I chose to draw the Aye Aye's eyes as I felt they were very complex and interesting to capture. I was also studying all the strange things about the Aye Aye.

I did most of it with fineliners, Then added charcoal to add more depth and realistic qualities, fineliner is great for detail like hairs and most shading, but if I this case I found that just drawing the hairs and very dark areas with fineliners and then subtle and dark areas with the charcoal really works together to create images with lots of details but also with lots of depth.

Then finally I scanned it in and added the eyes colour using photoshop.



This is a promarker and fineliner illustration of a baby Aye Aye, it's eyes are black because it's a newborn and they haven't adjusted yet.


I chose this image finally because it's the image I used for my front cover which was part of my final piece.

I drew it using finliners and charcoal, trying to pay attention to every single hair to communicate how weird and scary this thing is!.

I then scanned it in to add the hand and eye colours in Photoshop.

Rat - Jakub Marjanski

I decided to follow the Rat for the project, the reason I took the rat is because the idea of an animal that represents pestilence fascinated me. I instantly jumped to looking at the disgusting side of rats and found that the animal is actually quite clean. I had to look quite hard to find pictures of sewer rats and diseased ones on the streets of New York city. Eventually I collected a range of images that I sketched out.

With that I went on to look up the pestilence part of this project. I looked at depictions of gods and concepts such as the 4 riders of the apocalypse. In my search I found the black death and that it came in 3 different versions that plagued different parts of the world. I decided to make that my main theme.

With that discovery I decided that I should depict the disease moving from one place to the other like it did. In a tutorial I was informed of concertina books, their long length were perfect for the subject.

Final Piece

The final piece was made with 3 cellulose thinner prints of works I have done in my book, each representing the location where black death happened. The in-between parts are transitions made with a Graphite pencil (I also went over the prints with it to make them darker and feel like an old painting). The band around the book was made with a map to add to the travel aspect and the actual book is made with Fabriano paper. It's missing text that was meant to accompany the images but I didn't have enough time to add them to the piece.

The first image represents the Byzantine empire, second Europe and last China.

Jaguar - Lucy Ward

Research Methodology on the Jaguar

Continuous Line

For Research Mythology I chose the Jaguar as I wanted to focus on the fur and their tendency to eat the Yage vine which causes them to hallucinate, I combined the two main focuses for my final outcome by making a psychedelic felt piece representing how the jaguar sees itself and its surroundings.

Llama - Emma West

Creating my own Peruvian style patterns

My chosen animal for Research Methodology was the llama! I chose it because of its characteristically quirky and humorous nature and appearance. I was also given the nickname 'llama' a few years ago by my friends (to this day I still don't know why!) - so I figured it would be fun to work with an animal that I had some association with. My initial thoughts on how to approach this project would be gaining more information about them and the environment that they live in, which led me on to researching about Peru and its culture. This also prompted some historical research in the 'Incas' - in which I learnt about the multicolour llama deity 'Urcuchillay' and the importance of textiles in their culture and traditions. From here I experimented with creating my own Peruvian style patterns, and incorporated a lot of vibrant colours into llama drawings - inspired by both Peruvian culture, Andy Warhol's pop art work and the Fauvist movement. 

Through my experiments and cultural research influence I decided to take a textile based route, thinking about how I could use sewing, knitting and other wool based crafts. The five words I chose allowed me to have some real fun with experimentation and idea development, from the beginning of the project I knew that I wanted to create something fun and colourful. The five words I chose were Quirky, Goofy, Proud, Rugged and Colourful, all of which relate to their appearance and characters, as well as cultural roots. 

Embroidery experiments

Using textiles was a really good choice, it allowed me to re-familiarise myself with machine sewing and I got to revisit experimenting with embroidery which I enjoy doing in my spare time. The final pieces turned out exactly how I wanted them to! Together they encompass the five words and summarise the colourful, quirky nature of llamas. The two embroideries feature colourful patterns inspired by Peruvian textiles, displayed within the llamas coats to reflect on their home country and the culture of it. The weave is a physical representation of the llamas rugged coats combined with Peruvian inspired colours, Tulunpi ear decorations and pom poms they are adorned with during festivals. The three googly eye prints are a response to Andy Warhol's 'Marilyn Monroe' print, duplicating and varying colour palettes to create individual characters whilst adding some extra fun and humour to the llamas. 

Final pieces on the wall together!

Dog - Kalem Richardson

This is a poster I made to give awareness about violent dogs by using black to connote fear and the unknown using the Rorschache ink test method to create a dog image.

I was using black ink because the colour connotation of black is fear, the unknown and others but those 2 things would help me make a good poster with a sense of enigma to make the audience question my work.

This page is on the recreation of a dogs' eye using pencil sharpenings and glue.

On this page is the recreation of a dog paw using water colours for one and pencil for the other trying to get the shape and colours similar.

This page in my book is based on the fact that the word dog can be used to label humans just as much as dogs. I used my hands to make dog puppets as a metaphor for human dog.

In this image I used brighter colours like yellow because the connotations are happy and positive, and using more fluent lines while drawing making it seem like a gentle dog.

In this image I used sharp lines and blacks to connote danger and fear and by using no features apart from mouths/teeth which is highlighting the things that we mostly fear about dogs.

Charlotte Topcott

For my project based upon animals within Shakespeare's plays I chose a stag. To describe this animal I chose words such as; wild, proud, leader, mysterious and delicate. As i developed further understanding of the animal I wanted to portray it through the use of materials to suggest these traits. I chose to use natural products such as woods and glass to reflect the wild aspect of the creatures personality. I also chose to reflect the animals delicacy through the use of glass painting and developed this design so that one piece was intact and another was smashed. This reflected the vulnerability of the animal and although proud can be broken.

Wood cut using laser photographed to show how the animal can blend within its surroundings and make itself unseen

Wood cut laser development to compare how different types of laser could affect the outcome of the design. This design could be used to represent the idea of hierarchy and how the more dominant or darker cut design would be more of a leader. 

Painted glass to suggest that the animal is fragile and needs to be handled delicately, also suggests that the animal is used as a mere decoration and it is us who are the ones who put these animals at risk. 

Candy Smith- Fox.

'I was as lazy as a hog, sneaky as a fox, as greedy as a wolf, as mad as a dog and as ruthless as a lion.' King Lear, Act 3, Scene 4.

I chose a fox as the animal for my research methodology unit. I was particularly interested in the effect of Fox hunting on the fox population and to raise awareness of keeping the ban intact. I wanted to reverse the roles of the fox and the hound, instead the fox would be hunting the hounds. I first decided to look at the fox itself and different aspects that make it distinctive as a species.

Fine Liner Study. 

I then decided to look more into fox hunting and reversing the roles by placing the fox himself in the traditional British fox hunting uniform.

Watercolour and Fine liner Study. 

Finally for my final piece I wanted to show my chosen words; Agile, Handsome, Elegant, Regal and Cunning. For this I created a watercolour piece as well as additions of fine liner and coloured pencil as well as a salt and watercolour wash background.

This project allowed me to look at the anatomy of the animal and look at more social issues concerning the species as well as looking at more cultural references. I found this uni very helpful in allowing me to divide my time between research and visual working. 

Tegan Meredith - Research Methodology - The Hedgehog

For my Research Methodology project I wanted to research hedgehogs. I found them quite gentle creatures that feature often in children's stories as well as being one of the most recognisable woodland creatures in our British wildlife.

                                         

('The Fox and the Hedgehog' stop motion animation I created with Helena Sepehr)

Through thorough research I discovered that the hedgehog is declining quickly in population due to many environmental factors, including fatal attacks from predators.

                                                 

(Created using Charcoal and Adobe Photoshop)

Hedgehogs are vulnerable animals that are only armored by their spines. I wanted to look into how hedgehogs are protected as well as how they are seen in children's story books . This lead me to look into fairy tales and how the Enchanted forest is a place where the vulnerable, innocent character gets lost and found again. 

(Pastel drawing of my interpretation of the Brother's Grimm fairy tale, Hans My Hedgehog)

(Etching of a hedgehog and his Uncanny shadow)

I was inspired by the work of Tim Burton and Dave Mckean to create illustrations that narrate the Uncanny and fear that the hedgehog faces in a world where they are weak, and may perhaps be seen as an unusual creature alone in a frightening habitat.

(Final Piece created from acrylic paint print, clay sculpture, photography and Adobe Photoshop)

Tegan Meredith - My Dog Sighs Level 4 Workshop - Hedgehog

For this workshop we had visiting artist, My Dog Sighs, showing us how we can create a piece of artwork by up-cycling rubbish found around Pompey. We were shown examples of My Dog Sighs own work to give us inspiration to go out to find our own objects to transform into a personified piece of Free Art.  

I found a piece of wood with nails sticking out from it, which I thought would be perfect for creating a hedgehog to put towards my Research Methodology project.

After painting my hedgehog, I had to return it to the staircase I found it under in the city centre - this was difficult as I was quite attached to Mr Hedgey!