Themes

After being at loss at what to do for a bit, I thought about some of my favourite artists and things they have done. I know that I like to draw both people and animals, and landscapes too, so it would be good if I could find a way of combining these elements in different ways.

My favourite artist Mucha has done lots of different series and themes of illustrations, which could give me a few ideas for my own work.

Mucha's Themes:

• Flowers (rose, lily, crysanthemum, orchid)
• Semi-precious Gems (ruby, quartz, emerald and amethyst)
• Horoscopes
• Seasons (there were three seperate versions of this)
• Times of Day (morning, day, evening and night)
• The Arts (painting, poetry, dance and music)
• Moon and Stars (moon, morning star, evening star, pole star)
• Other Decorative Pairs (blonde and brunette, feather and cowslip, etc)

'Four Seasons'

De Goya also painted a couple of themes, like the 'Black Paintings' and his series 'Disasters of War'.

'Saturn Devouring his Son' from the Black Paintings

print 39 from the Disasters of War series

print 05 from the Disasters of War series

 I like working within themes because it gives me a way of containing my ideas in measurable 'portions', so they don't just all try to come out at once, effectively giving me artblock.
As you can see in Mucha's themes, the seperate images are all very different but when put together the series is clear, and it's all very much in the style he is commercially famous for which is another element that pulls them all together.


Themes I might enjoy:

•  Elements (air, fire, water, earth, darkness etc)
• The Seven Deadly Sins (Sloth, Greed, Gluttony, Pride, Envy, Lust, Wrath)
• Horoscopes (Aries, Taurus, Capricorn, Gemini, Cancer, Leo, Virgo, Libra, Scorpio, Pisces, Saggitarius and Aquarius)
• Creatures (sea creatures, land creatures, etc)
• Mental illnesses/ disorders (depression, anxiety etc)

At the moment these kinds of things are what I'm thinking of because I actually quite like to do darker, more macabre images rather than really happy, shiny things. I could think of lots of different things to do for some of these themes.