d'Holbachi-Yoko

d'Holbachi-Yoko paints surreal images of colorful puffy creatures, toys of a nightmare dimension, oddly adorable monsters that bring a smile to one's face and disturbs one's soul. Pretty cool, huh? Check out her site and this interview.

Mark Verhaagen

Mark Verhaagen's digital illustrations are wonderful! Master of form, color, and composition. Go get inspired.

Update: Came across Mark's flickr and saw Mark's illustration in Computer Arts Projects magazine this month.

Golden Gems

Thank you, Barbie Miller, for your wonderful blog, Golden Gems! "A collection of little golden books and other vintage & modern illustrations meant to inspire and delight." That's exactly what it is. Consider me inspired.

Grandma's Graphics

A very nice collection of public domain children's illustrations and more at Grandma's Graphics.

Meg Hunt

Arrrgh! What makes some people so gifted and talented? I feel like I'm a pretty good artist but people like Meg Hunt almost make me despair, she's so wonderful!

Meg has been featured almost everywhere. Meg Hunt's dome work for BeerAdvocate, Fantagraphics Books, K Records, Utne, the Washington Post, and Nickelodeon, among others. Her muted, limited color palette and print style make her work unique and delicious. Enjoy! And keep an eye on her.

•Meg's site
•Meg's blog
•Meg's flickr
•Meg's journal
•Interview at Design Inspiration

A few artists I've noticed...

Javier Gonzalez Burgos - Illustrations Artworks. Surreal and serene illustrations.

Meg Hunt - Ooo-la-la! Delish! Her site, her blog.

Yara Kono - Her flickr, her blog. I love this stuff!

André Gribble - Ya callate André (blog) - Brilliant design and illustration.

Betsy Walton - Her site, her flickr. More fine art than illustration, with a dreamy imagination.

Potpourri

Here's a few things of various topics you may want to check out...

Giant Golden Book of Biology - Illustrations by Charles Harper - a triumph of design and illustration!

Creating the cover of a novel. Irish illustrator PJ Lynch shows a step-by-step of how he goes through the process of creating a book cover.

Bear Tools I and Bear Tools II has Kevin Cornell of Bearskin Rug giving us his tools of illustration - guides on pencils, erasers, and inking implements.

Illustrophile, a blog "for lovers of illustration and commercial art" that started last August. It features mostly artists and designers that are currently working.

By the way - if you enjoyed the illustrations by Charley Harper (above), then check out more of his work here and here.

Alina Chau - Ice Cream Monster

Alina Chau is well known among us congregating illustrators on the web. She contributes to a few illustration groups online and she comments on almost everyone's entries. But what makes her stand out from most of us is her sketchwork - with a few blotches of watercolor and some choice, flowing lines, she captures the essence of beauty of everything she sees or imagines. She's an animator and I'm looking forward to great things from her, but for now I can admire her sensitive and lovely sketches and her beautiful books. Explore her work and be inspired.

•Alina Chau's Blog
•Alina's Portfolio Site
•An Interview with Alina

Flora Chang - Happy Doodle Land

Flora Chang is a graphic designer for work but her illustrations foretell a bright future - a future I look forward to seeing. Her retro-cute block-print style is so delicious and inspirational.

I asked her what her inspirations are and she answered: I admire many artists. To name a few: Mary Blair, Jim Flora, Richard Scarry, J.P. Miller, Tim Biskup. My favorite Japanese artists include: Shinzi Katoh, Piu Sudo, and Sakura Momoko (creator of Japanese cartoon "Chibi Maruko-Chan"). - I can certainly see all of these influences in her art, but her own personal flair shines through.

Flora is from Taipei, Taiwan and now resides in Kansas City. Besides being an amazing artist she is also a wonderful musician!

Enjoy the delightful art of Flora Chang!

•Happy Doodle Land
•Flora's flickr

Allison Sommers

Allison Sommers is a visual artist working and living in Charlottesville, Virginia. And she's spectacular! I love her visions, colors, details. She works mostly in my favorite medium, gouache (an opaque watercolor). She paints most of work while looking through a magnifying glass, commanding exacting detail in her pieces. Her subjects are a blend of nightmare and festive fantasy, a Bosch-like world of meat and turtles. A true inspiration. Enjoy!

•Allison Sommers
•Allison's flickr
•Allison on Drawn!

Never Been

Here's a tasty bit of illustration inspiration... Stuart Kolakovic presents a nice long strip of drawings that you need to click and drag to see all of it. Every bit of this scene is a treat for the eyes and will certainly make you want to do your own!

•Never Been
•Stuart's site
•Never Been, hanging on a wall

Chun Eun Sil

Korean illustrator Chun Eun Sil is amazing! This is my kind of illustration inspiration. The flow, the composition, the colors... there's grace and love in every image she touches. Check her out!

•Her Site (Korean)
•Her Flickr

via Drawn!

Lou Romano

I mentioned this guy before, buried in another post, but I wanted to highlight him here. Lou Romano is a brilliant colorist and has worked as illustrator and designer on various projects including The Powerpuff Girls and The Iron Giant. He soon got a little job at some place called Pixar (Monsters Inc., The Incredibles, Cars). He's also done some voice work there, including the lead character Linguini in Ratatouille.

Anyway, I got a bit of mail from The New Yorker asking that I subscribe (I did) that included a fold-out of covers. There was a beautiful one of a just-married couple in a taxi with a rainy night-time New York backdrop that grabbed me like... like... something that grabs... real hard. I thought, "heh, looks like Lou Romano's stuff, but better!" D'oh! I looked it up and it was indeed a Lou Romano, reminding me of just how much I love this guy's work. He has a mastering of color that kills me! Look, I'm dead!

•Lou Romano's blog
•Lou Romano (official site)
•Lou Romano (IMDb)
•Lou Romano (Wikipedia)
•The Trouble With Lou Oh, really?

Mid-20th Century Matchbox Labels

A lot of incredible matchbox labels from the 50s and 60s, mostly from Eastern Europe, on Flickr courtesy of Mariad (who has some other nice photo sets as well). Enjoy!

•Matchbox Labels

Sam Weber

There's a calm, frozen quality to Sam Weber's art, like a pond of ice, but just underneath that ice is a scene of intriguing terror. Sam finds beauty in blood and vacant stares. His work is a muted wash of monochrome colors with slashes of detailed branches or hair running through like Japanese brush strokes. A bit disturbing but you can't tear your eyes away.

Sam Weber is married to the fabulous artist, Jillian Tamaki.

•Sam Paints - Sam Weber's site
•Sam Weber at Lines and Colors
•Sam Weber at Illustration Mundo
•Sam Weber at Drawn

Joy Ang

Joy Ang is a very young illustrator, still exploring her style, but producing such wonderful work that one can easily predict a great future. Her color, form, and composition are tight, unique, delightful, and just feels right. Keep an eye on her.

•Joy Ang's website
•Joy Ang's prints