Hello again!
I’m afraid this month’s post is going to have to be a short-ish one, as I’m a busy little bee! I’ve started a couple of new projects in the last few weeks, including entering images for a couple of exhibitions in Bristol, (click on ‘Shows and Exhibitions’ for pictures!) working with a couple of lovely writer friends on a dinosaur-based children’s story and volunteering at a festival celebrating sustainable ideas for a weekend (which was a blast- if any of you readers are in the Bristol area next September, please try and go along to the “Small is…” festival, there’s workshops, music, food and really really lovely people, it’s definitely worth a ticket!) Despite trying to adapt into freelance life, I’m also still hunting for part-time work in every spare moment I get.
But the main thing I want to share with you this month is a little something I want to keep rolling as much as possible over the coming year, and I feel that by writing about it I won’t fall behind or forget about it!
I still have a huge dream to illustrate for some of the big children’s publishing houses one day, and from the advice I’ve been given, it’s a long and arduous slog to get there. But I’m looking to, in around a year’s time, attend a couple of children’s book fairs having got in contact with some of the organisations who’ll also be attending, to talk to them about my work and possible pitches for children’s stories. Avid readers of this blog will remember Erik the Viking, and he is the first one of these. But as I’ve also been working hard at trying to work out exactly what I can offer as a consistent style to these houses in a pitch, it’s got me thinking about how to offer different stories which still exist under some kind of uniting umbrella….
And I think I’m a step closer to figuring that out. Something that ties all my artistic thoughts together is nature, and its relationship with ancient society. This clicked when I stumbled across a breed of cat that the Vikings used to keep as pets on account of their excellent mousing capabilites, huge, fluffy creatures which feature in a lot of Norse mythology (they were meant to have pulled the Norse goddess of love, Freyja, along in her cart.) The Norwegian word for this breed of cat, now commonly domesticated, “Skogkatt”, or Forest Cat, sparked off a huge revelation in my head- and I’ve started plans on a whole new story, set in ancient Scandinavia. This is the story that will become the focus of the blog’s update each month, this is the other concept I will try and pitch in around a year’s time.
By sharing it with you lovely readers, I feel like there will always be a deadline, and it will encourage me to keep the story evolving!
Here are some of my initial sketches, bits and bobs which I’ve been working on for this.
The main focus of the story is the Skogkatt itself, and its shroud of mystery and magic- something I’m trying to achieve in the style itself- simplistic, ancient, but still incredibly compelling.
Blending inks of different densities with natural dyes made from berries and grass has been my initial experiment- with a view to making something which draws on the magic of storytelling, how ancient myths were woven in darkened huts and breathed in firesmoke, to deliver to modern children. After all, these times were so long ago they’ve entered the realm of fantasy, which is where most young people live out their childhood.
More updates will come next month- where I’m hoping to include some finalised designs for, let’s call him Skog, and the child he interacts with; as well as a little excerpt of my first draft of the story.
Thankyou for your continued support, watch this space!
-The AutumnHobbit.
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