Guest Blogger: Barb Hranilovich
When I offered to do illustration for the ADDY materials, I had no idea what theme the committee had in mind. At our first meeting I found out it was “The End of the World” based on the Mayan prediction that it’s all over in 2012. The team wanted the image to be a dark, but somehow beautiful. This is a comfort zone for me and I don’t often get to go very dark with illustration projects, so I was excited right away.
We discussed what end-of-the-world might mean and cockroaches came up, of course, along with all sorts of post nuclear holocaust mutantesque types of things. But, this is the end-of-Mayan-calendar sort of doom. An asteroid has been predicted as the cause of our ultimate demise. It was time to do research. I found that there’s not all that much original Mayan imagery to see (it was a long time ago and nobody took any pictures to post on Facebook). There is one very cool god sculpture, and I included for consideration one sketch of this entity with the small world in its big hands. In the stone-carved Mayan calendars there are fun and somewhat creepy animal heads throughout. They started to come to life for me, like little demigods who could dance in revelry when the world as we know it has ended. Of course the rats and cockroaches get to stay, too.
So, in essence I wanted the piece to be somewhat dark, a bit crude, intriguing, vital, and fun in its own little way. I chose a mixed-media approach which I’ve only done a few times. I wanted to feel on the edge a bit while doing the art, to allow that energy to come into the piece. I had fun and hope the image works well to set the tone for this year’s materials.
I appreciate the creative freedom the committee allowed me in this project! May 2012 be dramatic, memorable and wildly creative. Let’s dance!
For more information about the 2012 ADDY Awards click here!
Barb is an illustrator and fine artist who has created images for clients nation wide in editorial, business, publishing and toys. She’s currently the Creative Specialist at ZimmerFish in East Lansing.