Pleasant News and Pattern Sneak Peeks

Good afternoon, evening, or morning!

Alright, so today I want to start off by sharing some delightful news I have received on the weekend. (Sorry if you already know and are reading about this for the 3rd or 4th time)
What happened was that I had been accepted into our 52nd  Illustration West Competition held by the Society of Illustrators Los Angeles. Seems that my elite and endangered hummingbirds charmed the judges into deciding to include them in the upcoming web exhibition on the Illustration West website on SI-LA.org.
Congratulations to all the other entrants who got accepted, and thank you to everyone who's supported my work. I hope this small victory will be the stepping stone to many great things to come. :)

The Endangered Elite

In other news, a few days ago I created a Facebook page - Mariya Olshevska Illustration - for my illustration work/news. Please follow it for more frequent updates. Thank you in advance!

And now back to sneak peeks of that secretive project I keep mentioning. Being a huge lover of patterns, I couldn't help but create some of my own patterns which I could imagine the characters from the story wearing. I used the patterns found in Japanese wood block prints as my inspirations but I also tried to give them a little bit of a personal flair.

 ©Mariya Olshevska

If you haven't seen too many Japanese prints, I strongly encourage you to get acquainted. They're fantastic! Here's one of my latest favorites:

Utagawa Toyokuni I (1769-1825) Double portrait of the actors Nakayama Tomisaburo and Ichikawa Ichizo, c.1800. Oban

If you're in Vancouver, Canada - I recommend to check out the Ukiyoe Spectacular Japanese Woodblock Prints from the 1800s. It's a two part exhibition on from Jan 10th to March 23rd. Follow {this link} for all the details.

That's it for now!

Sneak Peeks at White and Black Vignettes

Hi again!

As promised in the previous post, I'm continuing to share glimpses of work I've been doing from September till now. (Still working!)
Today, I have close ups of black and white chapter heading type images. These were actually done before the paintings I previewed last week. Before diving into full-colour illustrations I decided to pick a few subtle moments from the story and portray them in little vignettes. This gave me a chance to explore design elements I was considering for the bigger pieces.

More sneak peeks again next Tuesday!
Previous blogpost - Sneak Peeks at Snowy Scenes

Something new I'm working on. Tracing some of my own patterns on to this lady's outfit. I'm old-school :)

Have a lovely week!