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I collected a mix of photographs and illustrations. Some from the artists I'm interested in studying further and others are just similar pieces I found on Pinterest that I liked the look of and carried a somber and fairytale like feels to them. I compiled them all into a mood board to keep myself inspired as I came up with my story and started my artistic experimentation.

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Gothic Architecture: What I learned in London and what I researched online. Pt.1

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Gothic Architecture: What I learned in London and what I researched online. Pt.1

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Obviously, a lot of the story I wrote came from the research I did specifically for this project. But I knew I was also taking inspiration from stories and media I can consumed on my own time. I compiled what I think were my main influences and highlighted the aspects of them that made their way into my story.

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This first piece depicts Sarah at the beginning of the story and is based one of my developmental pieces. As I mentioned in my annotations of said developmental piece, I used purely browns and greys in this piece to convey a melancholy and dull tone. I drew Sarah looking down and away from the light of the window, whilst pressing herself into the corner of the room. This is meant to represent her internal conflict, as she feels trapped in her unfulfilling life with the urge to somehow escape it, yet still remains composed, as she has always been taught to do. I wanted to make my crosshatching more harsh and obvious around Sarah as a means to emphasize her sorrowful demeanor.

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This story follows the tale of Sarah, a very beautiful young woman from a financially well off family in 1905. She has a silent distaste for the way she has been raised only to marry, and how she has very little knowledge of the world outside of the home. She has recently returned to her family home, after several years spent away at finishing school and is left awaiting her hand to be given away in marriage, arranged outside of her control.

In her time spent back home, she recalls the stories she was told of a very grand house located in their small country town, lost in a tragic fire 40 years ago. The house was ominously distant from anyone else in the area, no one was ever able to firmly grasp the name of the one man known to be in residence there and who lost his life in the fire. Sarah had never seen the ruined manor up close as no one ever went there, but in her quiet frustration and yearning for some kind of control, she, for the first time in her life, did something she wasn't supposed to and set off to visit the manor on her own.

When she arrives at the ruined manor, she wants to explore further and steps inside. The crumbling brickwork opens up into a large garden within the walls of the building and at the center is stood a statue of an angel. The angel is holding out a single white rose. Sarah is drawn towards the angel and reaches out to the rose.

Upon touching it, she suddenly notices how the very garden she is stood in and the building around her has changed. It all looks as it must have 40 years ago, before it caught fire. Sarah looks back to the angel to see that the flower she felt moments ago is now gone without a trace.

She looks around attempting to take in the beautiful structure around her only to stop when she locks eyes with a young man stood in very archway she walked in through. Sarah knows in her heart that this must be the man who lived here 40 years ago, but how was he stood there before her? He does not seem offput by Sarah's presence in his home and introduces himself as Brander. He tells her that she may stay a while, because once she leaves, she will not be able to find her way back. However, he also warns that she shouldn't stay for too long. She doesn't fully understand what he means by this, but in her curiosity, and the desire to escape her dull life, she stays.

Sarah looses count of the days she spends there. She spends time reading from his extensive collection of books, things about the world she would have been forbidden from reading previously, and revels in the things she learns. She starts to frequently take the books outside and ecstatically read aloud to Brander as he tends to the lavish garden. The two of them grow very fond of each other. Sarah is so enamored with the life she has in the manor, that she forgets the strange circumstances that brought her there, the warning she was given and the grim fate of the manor all together.

Eventually, the manor succumbs to said fate and one evening, catches fire via a misplaced unextinguished candle. The manor is quickly engulfed in flames and suddenly Sarah makes sense of Brander's warning and it becomes clear that once she leaves he cannot follow her, she will never be able to return to him and this place between life and death. Ultimately, she stays, choosing to give up life and remain in this place with Brander forever. The two of them embrace and just as Brander's was, Sarah's life is claimed by the fire.

Back in the outside world, the angel statue still holds out a white rose and a second blooms next to it in her palm. The two souls now forever lost together in the ruins of the manor and under her guardianship.

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What I took away from the places I visited (ft. observational drawing of St Dunstan's church)

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What I took away from the places I visited (ft. observational drawing of St Dunstan's church)

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What made the Victorian era gothic? study

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What made the Victorian era gothic? study

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Author study: Lewis Carroll (Alice in Wonderland)

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Author study: Lewis Carroll (Alice in Wonderland)

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I learned from visiting Highgate Cemetery that statues of angels are placed on graves to watch over and protect the departed soul. In my story the angel statue stands at the centre of the manor, acting as a guardian to the soul still trapped there. I places a single white flower in the hand of the angel as a representation of Brander's soul, the soul she is watching over.

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Statues of urns were also commonly displayed on graves, obviously as a symbol of death and mourning. The significance of the cloth draped over it symbolised the barrier between life and death. This symbolism felt appropriate in my story, as Sarah stays at the manor she is quite literally in a place between life and death.

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I drew up this concept for a Victorian manor, because its where my story will take place. I took into account some of the gothic features I've seen in examples of gothic architecture: the arched windows and doorways, the spiked roof finials, detailed stone railings and the large, circular stained glass window. I wanted the manor house to have a pretty and enticing appearance, to be a contrast to how it appeared ruined and desolate when Sarah first walked in. However, I included the ominous detail of the two urn statues on outside railing, such as the ones that would be seen on graves. Foreshadowing how this building will be the grave for my two main characters.

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I wanted to create quick pencil sketches of the characters my story will follow and key objects and places in the story just to familiarize myself with what they will look like in my pieces to come. This art style is what I'd naturally draw in and doesn't take inspiration from any one particular artist.

This is a sketch of Sarah at the beginning of the story, set in 1905. I obviously took reference from the images I compiled above to come up with an outfit and hairstyle that would fit appropriately into the time. I leaned in favor of a simple, very modest and muted outfit as apposed to a more bright, patterned and lacey outfit, both which could have been appropriate for the time period. I felt that the dull and constricting nature of her clothes would reflect the bland life she feels trapped in at the beginning of her story.

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This is a sketch of Sarah as she lives in the manor. Since the time period of the manor is 40 years prior to Sarah's life at the start, her clothes had to be different. I wanted to design Sarah's clothes to fit that time period and also reflect the new happier life she's found herself in. So I compiled more reference images (as seen above). The women's clothes of the 1860s already lend themselves to a more lively silhouette, given the large skirts and the lavish ruffles and sewn details, particularly if you were of a higher class, such as Sarah. Colourful and patterned fabrics also became popular around this era, due to the recent invention of synthetic dyes. This works as a great contrast to the dark, muted colours I designed for her at the start of the story, mirroring the change from her old tiresome life and her new bright life.

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I sketched out a second version of Sarah in 1860s attire. As she does spend days on end at the manor, she will be shown in more than one outfit. I drew this mostly just to visualize a part of my story, as she settles into life at the manor and enjoys the pleasures that come with it.

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My first pieces of "experimental work" took inspiration from John Tenniel's work. I used only black fine liner pens to depict the moment Sarah reaches out to the white rose in the angel's hand. I honestly don't have much to say about this illustration. I think that it is technically a good drawing, for instance, I think I did a good job with Tenniel's crosshatching method. However, it doesn't have a lot going for it in terms of atmosphere or portraying any sort of feeling towards the story.

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I wanted to try again to replicate John Tenniel's style. This time I drew the moment Sarah arrives at the ruined manner. I thought that his style of drawing would allow me to capture the details of the house, adorned with all its cracks and shrubbery. Since my first piece utilising his style didn't have much of any atmosphere I chalked it up to it having no background and thought that if I filled up the whole page this time I could combat that issue.

I do like this piece more than the first one as it's a lot more interesting to look at however I ultimately ran into the same issue. The piece, although technically well done, doesn't portray much emotion. Since the important aspect of my project is to portray a strong and tragic story, these two pieces just aren't right for it.

I shied away from going too heavy with any dark crosshatching because these are supposed to be a more light-hearted part of the story, and I think that's where I went wrong. If I were to try again in in this black and white crosshatched style I would have created a greater contrast between dark and light.

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This piece depicts the moment Sarah meets Brander. This time around I wanted to try using watercolour and black pencil to capture the style of Henry Patrick Raleigh. I have mixed feeling about this piece. Again, I shied away from going too dark because this is supposed to be a more light hearted part of the story and I kept the colours and black pencil in the background details light so as to not draw attention away from Sarah, but what that left me with is a piece that doesn't have much visual impact. I spent quite a bit of time on this piece focused on pencil details when I should have been throwing caution to the wind more and treating this like experimentation.

I do have a perfectionist nature when it comes to illustration. So, for my upcoming pieces of experimentation I'm going to negate that and focus more on the interesting effects I can achieve with the physical art materials I am using. I also want to see how I can effect the emotional atmosphere of the pieces through materials, composition, colour and tone, etc.

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I only needed one sketch of Brander to have a concrete idea of his image. I imagined him to be classically handsome, as a good match to Sarah and came up with his clothes from the compiled reference images above. This didn't take much thought because men's clothes were are much simpler and more consistent compared to women's, even across different periods of time.

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Even though I became interested in Henry Raleigh for his many amazing illustrations, I found myself very interested in the life he lived, the way her rose to extreme heights in the world only to have it all crumble down again, ultimately resulting in him taking his own life. His life makes up a beautifully tragic story all on its own. I think that not only did the lows of his young life come from the poverty he was born into, but also by the early work he took on as a very young artist. Visiting morgues, drawing and reporting on fatal accidents and suicides, then to go on and attend lavish events of the very wealthy and famous. He undoubtedly saw the highs and lows of all walks of life. I can't help but wonder how some of those stories might have affected or desensitised him, possibly taking a part in the end of his own life.

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Artist study: Henry Patrick Raleigh pt.2

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Artist study: Henry Patrick Raleigh pt.2

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As written in my sketchbook, Tenniel's illustration of 'The haunted lady' is what caught my eye. His use of heavy crosshatching around the main subject of the piece (the young woman in the dress) gives off an eerie and definitely haunting atmosphere surrounding her, especially when you notice the faint form of the deceased seamstress in the also heavily crosshatched mirror. It's the sharp contrast between the woman's detailed white dress and the scratchy dark shadows around her that make this an interesting piece that definately conveys that uneasy feeling to the viewer.

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I again used watercolour paint and black pencil, this time to illustrate Sarah within the manor, looking out of the tall windows featured in my concept art. I worked in only black and white to create sharp contrast throughout the piece because its something my previous pieces of experimentation lacked. I think that this worked in creating a moody atmosphere. I also took inspiration from Casper Friedrich's work 'Wander above the sea fog' by drawing Sarah turned away from the viewer. Like it did in his work, it conveys the idea of her being alone and isolated, being the only truly living person in this unnatural place, trapped between life and death. I also think that the walls and her being cast in shadow gives a sense of impending doom.

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I purposefully made this piece somewhat similar to the previous one. Both depict Sarah next to the light of a window whilst still being cast in shadow by the darkness of the room around her. This one is meant to be her in her home at the start, before running off to the ruined manor. I still wanted this piece to have an air of sadness around it but not the same as the darkness from the previous piece. So this time i used watercolour in a more warm brown tone and shaded in black pencil to bring in more darkness. I essentially wanted this piece to be a parallel to the previous one.

In this piece Sarah is sat down in a corner with her head turned down and away from the light of the small window. In this moment she knows that she is that she is unhappy and that she feels trapped in the current direction of her life, and I think that the layout of this piece conveys that feeling well. In contrast with the other piece, where she is stood in the center of a large window looking out of it, yet she is surrounded by and cast in black shadow. This suggests how she now feels more fulfilled and free, oblivious to precarious space between life and death she is in.

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Given that many of Henry Raleigh's piece are purely black and white, I wanted to try it for myself, creating a piece with high contrast. I like that it definitely leans into the gothic theme and I'm now interested in at least one of my final pieces being in fully black and white. I purposely placed brander in the darker half of the piece and I think i were push the darks of this piece further, it could further sell the image that he is cast almost fully in shadow, whilst Sarah is stood in the light from the window. This would work well in portraying Brander as a deceased soul wandering alongside Sarah.

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Looking at his work now, I can say that I don't have much interest in the realism of Friedrick's work but I am interested in their composition. I mentioned in my sketchbook how the people having their back turned to the viewer conveys a lonely feeling, with it just being them against this vast landscape. I also think that having a person's face hidden from view adds mystique to the piece, giving the person no emotional expression or identity. You could also view this a means for the viewer to project themselves and their feeling onto the person in the painting, giving the environment a more immersive quality.

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I thought that Munch's idea behind his series of paintings, 'Freize of life', fit quite closely to what I am aiming to create in my project. A sequence of illustrations depicting an romantic story that ultimately ends in loss and gives off a bittersweet tone

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'The Kiss' is meant to explore the physical act of love, how it connects the body and mind of two people. The two figures are merged into one in this piece, suggesting how love has fully united them.

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The two figures looking directly at each other portrays a romantic scene however other aspects of the piece bring an apposing atmosphere to the scene. The thing that stood out to me was the difference in rendering between the man and woman, suggesting some form of barrier between their love. As does the tree in the background, splitting the piece into two halves, him on one side, her on the other. These aspects bring a bitter tone to the piece and make the viewer ponder what could be keeping them apart. It's also been pointed out to me through online research that both figures lack mouths, so their connection is shown purely though their eyes.

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Claude Monet's 'Camille on her deathbed'

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Claude Monet's 'Camille on her deathbed'

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This piece depicts when Sarah makes her way into the manor's inner garden and stands before the angel statue. I wanted the angel to be large and take up a large amount of space in the piece to make it seem as though it is looming over Sarah and even the viewer, to convey a slightly eery feeling.

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I took heavy inspiration from Claude Monet's 'Camille on her deathbed' piece for this experimentation. I used oil pastels in mostly cool tones and in a haphazard manner to convey a sense of raw sadness and longing. I purposefully used warmer toned colours on Sarah in the foreground (peach in her skin and warm brown in her hair) to convey the life still in her, whilst Brander, being more faded into the colours of the background is already dead. My favourite aspect of this piece is definitely my use of colours. I think that the contrast of light against mostly dark really conveys a dramatic and melancholy atmosphere.

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This was my second go at using oil pastels. Since I was able to capture a dramatic scene in my first attempt at using this medium I thought I'd use them to try and create the pinnacle moment in my story, when the manor is ablaze and takes Sarah's life. I used a warm colour palette for this piece, obviously to convey the image of flames but still trying to keep the feeling of the piece somewhat dark and sombre. I do like this piece, i think, again, that the contrast in light and dark colour gives it a lot of visual impact but i still prefer my first piece in oil pastel over this one. Maybe the composition of the piece could have been closer up on Sarah and Brander, creating a more intimate and emotional atmosphere. I'll keep this in mind when recreating this moment in another piece.

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'Camille on her deathbed' by Claude Monet

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'Camille on her deathbed' by Claude Monet

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It's clear that there is a lot of real tender love in this piece along with a great sense of loss. This isn't just evident from the context of the piece's creation. It's also shown in the haphazard manner of Monet's mark making, the use of cold and muted colours, and the faint, gentle expression on Camille's face. I also think the small amount of light cast on her from the side conveys the feeling of their love in such a dark time.

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I went back into using watercolour and black pencil to recreate the climax of the story. Like I said I would after my previous piece, this time I drew in closer on the two figures. I thought that I could create more emotional impact if the viewer could more clearly see Sarah's (the main subject's) face while Brander is cast more in shadow. I thought this could lighting be suggestive of her being drawn into his darkness as she follows him into her demise.

Looking back on the composition of the oil pastel version of this piece, I actually do like how Sarah's back is turned to the viewer as she takes Brander's hand and walks towards him. It portrays how she is leaving life behind and willingly walking away into the grasp of death.

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As shown, I have experimented with a few different traditional mediums as I've looked at and taken inspiration from different artists. I think I had the most success with oil pastels and watercolours. They both give off very different final results but I've been able to use both to create an emotionally impactful atmosphere. Ultimately, I've decided to use watercolour and pencil to create my final pieces. I personally enjoy using watercolours and I've had more experience with them than oil pastels so I feel more comfortable using them. There has always been a dreamy quality to watercolour pieces that fits in very well to my romantic and tragic fairy tale. I'm also now a huge fan of the work of Henry Patrick Raleigh (who used pencil and watercolour in his illustrations) and I'm keen to keep exploring his style while visually telling my story.

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I planned out each piece digitally on 'Procreate' before beginning to sketch them out onto my A3 watercolour paper. I took the time to do this because watercolour paints are very transparent and any mistakes made on the paper are going to be hard to correct. This also allowed me to freely mess around with the colours and clearly visualize where the darkest paint stokes can be made and where to take more care with lighter, more transparent shades.

(I did this with every final piece but I'm showing 4 out of the 6 (you get the idea)).

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I tried my best not to be too controlling of the watercolour. From my experimenting I learned that I like how it looks best when you let the different tones pool together on their own. I think this most evident in my piece of the angel statue with all the dark green shrubbery surrounding the subjects of the piece. That soft watercolour effect gives it the dark fairytale feel I was aiming for.

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This was the final step in my final pieces, so I used my black pencil to add details and crosshatching to further darken the shadows until I was satisfied with the finished piece.

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This is another piece that is heavily based on one of my developmental pieces and shows the scene where Sarah arrives at the manor and is drawn towards the angel statue. I wanted the angel to be the heavy focus of the piece, even with Sarah stood in the foreground. So, i drew it with large wings that almost take up the whole width of the page, to make it appear as though they are curling out and around to Sarah, portraying her being drawn in. I intentionally made the angel slightly unproportionately large to give it a looming and eerie feeling. After all, despite being a guardian angel it is the thing leading Sarah toward her tragic end. I also made an effort to mix in black watercolors with the green to keep it in my gothic theme. I also framed the shrubbery around the piece in a slightly cemeterial format to draw emphasize this pinnacle moment in the story.

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In my experimental phase I wrote about how I wanted to create a piece in fully black and white and when creating this piece I was looking at specific pieces by Henry Patrick Raleigh for inspiration. I have two printed examples of his work in my sketchbook of a woman stood in the light of a window alongside a man almost fully cast in shadow and this is obviously what I have illustrated as well. I think that Sarah stood in the foreground and in full light of the window, whilst Brander is stood behind and in darkness really portrays an uneasy and haunting feeling to the viewer that Sarah is clearly oblivious to.

It was also whilst digitally sketching this piece that I thought it would be a good idea to keep Brander faceless throughout this whole series of drawings. I thought about how when looking at Casper David Friedrich's work, that the faceless subjects of his paintings carried a mysterious and lonely feel with them. It aids in the eerie factor of my story as his contrast to Sarah is made more visually clear. Her being alive and him being deceased.

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This is my least favourite out of my final series of illustrations and I think its down to the fact that I didn't do any experimentation with these colours in my developmental stage. I again, looked to Henry Raleigh's work for inspiration with the colours and found a couple of examples of his work set on the balconies of what appear to be lavish parties. These pieces are heavily royal blue, depicting the night, with warm light cast on the figures from inside the windows. I used blue and yellow watercolours to render this piece but of course was hesitant to let the two colours touch and blend together, making green. In the end, the colours came out rather flat and I had to add more depth to the piece in the black pencil and crosshatching phase. I think if I were to add a few warmer tones to areas of cast light such as pale oranges and pinks, it could have added more visual interest to the illustration. That's not to say that I don't like this piece at all. I came up with this piece specifically to feature the statue of the cloth draped over the urn that I learned the meaning of in my research phase and drew in my concept art. Having it ominously slightly lit up on the balcony edge behind Sarah foreshadows her grim fate, even as she remains distracted and oblivious to it.

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This is another piece that I think could be improved upon if I were to try making it again. Since this shows to climax of my story, when the manor is ablaze, i wanted all the watercolours to be more pigmented and to be painted in a more haphazard manner. I got his idea from looking at Claude Monet and Edward Munch's work, seeing how their spiritic mark making enhanced the emotional impact conveyed to the viewer. I though that in the case of my piece, it could add to the sense of urgency and fear in this moment of the story. I wanted both Sarah and Brander to be illuminated at the edges by the light of the fire surrounding them as they face each other. I think in I should have been bolder in my variations of colour on the figures so they feel less disconnected from all the colour surrounding them. I was able to go back in with my black pencil to bring more depth to the two figures, but I still think (particularly on Brander, who is almost fully darkened out in shadow) that I should have used black watercolours to help the shadows mesh with the watercolours in the background of the piece.

I do like the composition of this piece though. I like to urgency in Sarah's expression and how Brander's big dark figure takes up a lot of the foreground, as he reaches out to Sarah. Innocently beckoning her towards her demise.

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This is my favourite out of the series of six illustrations and I think it's because I was able to learn from the mistakes I made in the previous piece, that depicts the moment right before this one. I didn't use any brown watercolours in this piece and instead used much more black to create the shadows. I tried again to be haphazard with my mark making, both with the watercolour paints and the black pencil and I really like how it came out. I think it does well to portray the dramatic and sorrowful scene I'm trying to convey. The composition of this piece is heavily based on the blue oil pastel piece I made during my developmental phase. I really liked that piece, so it felt right to recreate it as a part of my final pieces, only with a more fiery colour scheme. I think that the use of said fiery colours works very well in this piece, as it can portray both the violent and cruel nature of the surrounding fire, but also the warmth that Sarah finally feels in Brander's embrace as she joins him in death.