Fiona French - Adult Illustrator class

Every once in a while I have adult classes in the evenings. I love them! In this class we studied the same book, "Paradise", by Fiona French. We did the same technique as the kids. We used black glue and watercolor to create some pretty 

amazing art work!!

Some students used alcohol with their watercolors

It was fun to work out color plans with just the right amount of contrast.

Fiona French 2 - Illustrator inspired art

We continued to study Fiona French and her illustrations by looking at the book "Paradise". The colors are amazing and the images have a stained glass quality to them. 

For our illustrator inspired work we created images using black glue and watercolor.

Students sketched out their ideas first and then made a final drawing on watercolor paper in pencil. Next we took white Elmer's glue that had been tinted black with acrylic paint and "drew" over our lines with it. This creates the leaded look of stained glass.

Finally we added lots and lots of color by adding watercolor paints in all of the compartments we created with our black glue.

Fiona French - Illustrator inspired art

In our Illustrator class we studied the art work of Fiona French. She has so many amazing styles it is great inspiration! In this class we looked specifically at her book "Anancy and Mr. Dry-Bone".

Our illustrator inspired artwork was to create a background in watercolor washes and then create a drawing in black permanent ink on top of our beautiful papers. 

Students created a sketch of their story page first in pencil on copy paper.

Then we took time to create our colorful backgrounds with watercolors like the ones in Fiona French's work.

We talked about art vocabulary like line, pattern, and texture.

Some students were inspired by French's use of borders!

We shared our work with each other and told the story being depicted in our work.

I am in love with this one!