Spotlight On: Expressive Art & Design

Today we hear from Jake (S5) who is a young artist keen on the intricacies of character and landscape art - a subject he hopes to continue in his studies next year:

“I've been drawing since I was very young, however, when I was around 8 years old, I started drawing more consistently and ever since then, I’ve been trying to improve my skills - something I plan to keep pursuing indefinitely.

I’ve been inspired by a lot of different styles, and most of my time has been spent drawing characters, inspired often by artists like Jamie Hewlett, Noriyoshi Ohrai, and a Korean artist called Zangano. Recently I’ve been more interested in landscape art, particularly Ivan Shishkin’s work, Caspar David Friedrich’s winter scenes and some concept art by Ralph McQuarry.

My expressive portfolio was mainly inspired by Friedrich and depicts a farm near where I live on a frosty morning. There’s a lot of thin lines and branches going about which were really difficult to capture; I tried a lot of different mediums but eventually settled on acrylic and pencil for my final outcome.

My design folio is a book cover for Irvine Welsh’s ‘Trainspotting’. Initially, I didn’t really have anything in mind for the final outcome of the folio so I just drew loads of stuff and manipulated it all in photoshop beyond recognition until I found something I liked. This approach was pretty fun and in the end I was quite proud of the final product.

Thinking ahead to S6 next year, I’m studying Advanced Higher English and Art (the portfolio course). It’s an ambition of mine to get into Art School and perhaps pursue a career in Art but we’ll see!”

Join us on Friday 19 April for our 2024 Senior Art Exhibition from 5pm-7pm. Please note, parents are to purchase free tickets via the Parents Digest.