The work of Maja Sten

I saw a piece of work my Maja Sten in the Grafik magazine that Zoe and me looked at in PCAD 400. I thought it was quite interesting, so i had a bit more of a look at her stuff on the net. Her work is inspired by Nordic fairy tales, Scandanavian folklore / myths and legends. There is a strong emphasis on pattern and decoration and in most cases she uses lots of bright colours.

I really like the different patterns and swirly block shapes in this illustration. The cloud like pink shapes in the background give the image a  kind of dreamy feel to it. It also has a mermaid - and since one of my face cards is going to be based on a mermaid ( a Jengu - African mermaid ) i thought that this image would be particularly useful.

I like this image too, especially the way the feathery detail on the birds is drawn in lots of different lines. The way Maja Sten uses pattern to imitate certain details is really interesting - i am considering using a similar technique when illustrating my Jormungandr and Quetzalcoatl for Ben.

When i was looking at the work of Sten, i found this webite - which features her and other illustrator/ graphic designers... its pretty good. Here's a link.

http://www.pocko.com/pockopeople/illustration

I was really caught be this image. It made me think of a jack-in-a-box-toy. This led me on to consider illustrating the creatures i have been given by Ben (and will use for my two jokers) as jack-in-a-box toys....