starshine

A sequence of abstract images based upon the birth, growth and decay of stars.

Maelstrom

The night sky may seem still, constant and unchanging, but in reality the stars, planets and galaxies above perform a never-ending dance choreographed by gravity and the fundamental laws of the universe. An elegant and complex series of orbits, spins, twists and turns in the ballroom of the universe. Everything that exists is a participant in this great, whirling and relentless dance. A maelstrom of movement in an eternal cosmic ballet.

Enceladus

Orbiting Saturn, the frozen terrain of Enceladus is a world of icy canyons and colossal craters. From within the moons core, water bursts forth to the surface, forming gigantic plumes in the sky above. These continuous eruptions surround Enceladus with spectacular ribbons of shimmering water and ice.

Europa Weave

Encased by thousands of interlocking sheets of ice, Europas fractured surface is an intricate web of criss-crossed cracks and converging trenches. A complex and ever shifting pattern woven by the hand of gravity and the violent nature of the moons own geology.

doodledoodle

Music of the spheres

The universe is filled with music. Every planet, every star, every object in the night sky emits its own unique song in the language of radiowaves. Modern technology allows us in to listen to this cosmic choir and decypher its various chirps, crackles and static whisper. A hidden language that reveals to us the secrets of the night sky.

Rubiks

“Mysteries do not lose their poetry when solved. Quite the
contrary; the solution often turns out more beautiful than the
puzzle and, in any case, when you have solved one mystery you
uncover others, perhaps to inspire greater poetry”
-Richard Dawkins

Under the Microscope

"The wonders we see through our telescopes are laboratories where we can test our understanding of the universe" - Brian Cox

facetime

Tree

Moving

An idea I've been working on recently as part of the Parabola Project, which is essentially a fantastic wee book of poems and short stories with accompanying artwork, illustrations and photographs. I was lucky enough to be contacted and asked to produce a piece for the second issue of the project, more specifically to illustrate a great little poem by Molly Naylor. The poem, entitled 'Moving', has some fantastic imagery in it, exploring the experience of moving house and the feelings and memories that can be uncovered during the process of unpacking. There was a lot of visual inspiration to sink my teeth into here which allowed me to experiment with quite a few different concepts, before finally settling on the images above. In the end, I decided to concentrate on, and combine, two visual hooks. One being the idea of the character 'unpacking' forgotten memories as they opened the various boxes, whilst the other being the abstract sculptures, shapes and piles they crafted from the boxes and rediscovered objects themselves.

Apologies if most of the previous paragraph reads like the ramblings of a complete and utter idiot, but it's my best attempt at sounding like a competent artist who actually has the capacity to describe his work without resorting to just using the words 'linear' and 'conceptual' in every single sentence like I usually do, regardless of their relevance.

Shack

Cappadocia

A drawing simply because I couldn't think of anything else to draw.

Emblem

Variations of a design I've been playing around with the last few days. It's all very much a work-in-progress at this stage. As usual, I am completely undecided whether or not to stick with this idea, or move on to an entirely new one. Again. My innate ability to avoid decisions and make cups of coffee instead never ceases to amaze me.

Polyamory Editorial Drawing

Editorial commission for the september issue of The Skinny magazine. The article was about polyamory (being in multiple committed relationships) which can be found here, It was a bit of a challenge trying to come up with an illustration that complemented this months article, but I think it worked out pretty well.

What I wore today

Cheers again Summer, you absolute bastard.

Contact

One of my project pieces from my 4th year Illustration brief. As much as I hated the actual look of the final piece, I was still fairly happy about the original concept for the design. Essentially it consists of a hand-made book and 5 accompanying CD cases/CDs. The premise for the design was to give people a more accessible way to interact with the world of astronomy and allow them to relate to it on a familiar level. In order to do this, I collected a series of sounds recorded by radio telescopes and designed a CD cover for each, illustrated in a way that reflected the nature of the sound and how we could percieve them (For example, the 'clock-like ticking' of a spinning pulsar, or the 'fiery crackle' of saturn storms) By relating these transmissions to noises we are already familiar with, I hoped to bridge the gap between 'the alien/unknown' and 'the everyday/familiar'. The book itself required the user to turn back each page, to 'look beyond' what we can see and hear in our own world, in order to reach the CDs and perculiar recordings housed within (Yes, some sort of painfully executed metaphor). Like I say, the aesthetics of the work itself seem a little terrible now thanks to the horrible curse of hindsight, but the basic concept still seems to hold up some sort of potential. Hopefully I can revisit the idea someday and not beat it repeatedly over the head with an ugly stick.

Outpost

Simple screenprint image capturing our ability to monitor and listen to the night sky through the use of modern technologies.

Telescopic

Three images exploring how advances in modern telescopes and astronomy can offer us a new insight into the universe around us. The first image reflects on the similarities between star formation and the lifecycle of the common butterfly. The second image conveys our ability to interperate and track the movement of celestial bodies. The third image explores how radio telescopes can decypher the various radiowaves and emissions of the night sky and convey them as sounds, crackles and ‘whispers’ that are audible to the human ear.

Caution

For no particular reason at all, a sketchbook drawing. After two weeks of flicking through old drawings and browsing the mess that is my computer folders, my head feels a little bit like a very badly run construction site. Specifically one of those construction sites you walk past everyday for an entire year and yet still have no idea what's actually being built.

Ps. Never call files 'final.jpg', because I guarantee by time you get to the end of the year that is exactly what every single file on your computer will be called. It's like looking for a needle in a haystack, except the needle you are looking for bears an annoyingly uncanny resemblance to a piece of hay.