Author: Sebastian Chapman

How does the theme you chose to illustrate reflect the type of work you want to do in the future?

I chose themes that were very native and unique to New York. These is not a topic that I draw from often, but I am looking at it though my style-lens and using my imagination to create whimsical options, but I also like to add a more graphic option and a “straight-forward” option as well. This reflects my future work as an Art Director and Illustrator because I am able to conceive many ideas with different styles in mind. I like for my thumbnails to always be very different from one another because it’s like casting a broader net, so there is a higher success rate for the best idea to come through.

“How Drag Queens Got Dragged into Politics” (CBS News – online)

The article I chose is called “How Drag Queens Got Dragged into Politics” and it is from CBS News online. It is about the recent laws that are being passed that discriminate against drag performers and the LGBTQ+ community. I chose this article because I am a huge fan of self expression, drag queens and basic human rights. I have done work inspired by the community before and I would like to shine light onto this issue next. My illustration is intended to reach a wide market since the outlet is a news website, so there is a slightly more serious tone than some of my usual political commentary illustration.

For the illustrations I was thinking of images that may stop the reader as this would be delivered online or mobile so I wanted shocking or meaningful images that had powerful emotions behind them. I wanted to make the viewer take a closer look and to convey the urgency of what is discussed in the article. My thumbnails happened in parts, I am sometimes able to work better if I can walk away from the project. Although there were some concepts that were killed by the portrait nature of the brief, I was able to come up with a lot of different iterations of the feeling that I wanted to convey. I am sometimes too detailed with my thumbnails but I like to really visualize what I want to develop more later. It also gives me a chance to figure out if I am even able to draw what I would like that well yet or not at all.