"Signs of Life"

This mixed media illustration was really so enjoyable to create. It had started as a submission to the City of Charlottetown for their fall Lightbox project. It wasn’t selected to move forward, but I still feel it was well worth doing because it was something different, and its now hanging in my own home. 

“Signs of Life” is very much representative of the parts of Atlantic Canada’s nature and wildlife, that all springs to life each year. Beach waves, sand dunes, rolling waves make up some of the shapes. There are numerous birds - A blue heron, piping plover, hummingbird, starling, goldfinch and ground sparrow. Some of my favourite flowers are in the design - tulips, lady’s slipper, apple blossoms, lupins, lavender, bleeding hearts, crocuses and more. Blue butterflies and blue florals, Boston ferns and a maple seedling - There’s a ton going on in here.

My favourite part, and the final thing I added, is the little bumble bee butts. I didn’t initially plan anything in this space, but it felt a little empty as I put things together. I started making purple flowers and then thought about these little bee butts - I was cracking myself up adding them in. 

Here you can see how it looked laid out with the gaps - It absolutely needed some flowers and bees!

There’s a broad spectrum of techniques used here - The geometric pattern was planned out digitally, and then I made a game plan for the colour scheme and where I might place everything. Then I moved to a pencil outline of the geometric design, broken out by colour and placement. I did a rough sketch and outline of my subjects, and then started in with watercolours. After it all dried, I used archival inks to fill it all the details and then a bic pen to add shading. 

I have a long format video of the inking part of this process, which you can watch below. When I finish a piece like this, I can have anywhere from 30 minutes to 5 hours of footage - Reels and other videos these are really best under 1 minute and it’s tough to crop it all down. I was happy to put this together for anyone who is interested in seeing the longer format.

All in all, I really love this piece and it was a new experience putting something together like this. It’s almost like a very intentional collage and I’m happy to hang it in my home. The space was empty for a long time, waiting for the right thing.

I have made a limited number of prints of this piece, and have listed them on Etsy. They’re 11” x 14”, so smaller than the original but this is the only size I’ll be offering this in.

If this print is still in stock, it can be found here: