Illustrated now! Portraits

A book of intriguing celebrity portraits, showcases more then 80 artists work. The editor Julius Wiedemann hand selected artists work that may have had a glimpse of exposer through interview articles, and adverts but artist that are rarely celebrated on their own. The book is bulging with artist which would be deemed as new, because of the lack of attention they’ve received but as you riffle through the pages  you soon realise that these are old timers at creating masterpieces. Artists such as Jorge Arevalo morph Amy Winehouse and Michael Caine into distorted Picasso-esque icons with ease. Also Ben Kirchner uses hyper-real cartoons to create uncanny likenesses of Pete Doherty and Russel Crowe. Throughout the book is aray of different styles used as well as different media’s Jody Hewgill uses a sharp – lined acrylic style to depict Tony Soprano in his customary vest and boxer-shorts, whilst Jason Mecier makes poignant images of celebrities from multiple pills glued on to paper and formed a giant Nicolas Cage from bottles, keys and a VHS copy of Face/Off. The book shows that there’s a rich and intriguing world of pop culture – inspired illustration out there, and this book gives a commended nod towards it.

Dave DeVries

Dave DeVries a former comic book illustrator who worked on Spiderman, and painted monster for universal studios has come up with an interesting project. Dave DeVries has taken children’s drawings and added a dark twist, turning innocently drawn creatures into peculiar monsters. The images are very interesting and creative and can be seen on this link: http://www.themonsterengine.com/

Mr DeVries says ‘As a painter, I made cartoons look three dimensional every day for the likes of Marvel and DC Comics, so why couldn’t I apply those same techniques to a kid’s drawings?That was it – no research, no years of toil, just the curiosity of seeing Jessica’s drawings come to life.’

Here is one of the images: