The Prince of the illustrated magazines

Now that Spring finally seems to kick in I'd like to lure you with a Christmas edition of this beautiful magazine. The photos are fantastic and the advertisments are really great! I just love the last one, which is on the back cover.

Henk Cornelissen

Henk Cornelissen was my graphic design teacher for 4 years at Art-college in Breda (st. Joost). He had a big influence on me during my study and when I see his work I can still see why. His work is based upon the idea of coincidence. He makes coincidental patterns and textures. He creates his work on 50x65 cm size paper within strict boundaries.

I love patterns and textures and I admire artists or designers who's work is based upon a certain sense of persistency. When I come to think of it, that might have started when I was in Art-college...

Found in the trash part two

I found this old magazine lying on the street right next to this book. Lucky find!

Animal lotto once again

You just gotta love these kind of children's games! I bought this one a while ago in my favorite second hand store. But I've got another game just like it which I've posted before, you can see it here. Those illustrations are a bit softer.

Old Dutch lotto

Looking at the box you'd almost think the Lotto-game is typically Dutch! I love the game for its graphic design; the cards are always so beautiful.

Love is all at the Butterfly ball

Some of you might know this book, but I had never seen it before. Beautiful, narrative illustrations full of fantasy. While googling I discovered this artiocle on Wikipedia:

The Butterfly's Ball, and the Grasshopper's Feast is the title of a poem by William Roscoe, written in 1802, and telling the story of a party for insects and other small animals.
Two anonymous sequels were The Peacock 'At Home' and The Lion's Masquerade and the Elephant's Champetre, both credited to "A Lady", and describing similar parties for birds and large mammals.
The Butterfly Ball and the Grasshopper's Feast is also the title of a 1973 picture book, loosely based on the poem, by Alan Aldridge and William Plomer. This greatly expanded and altered the original work, focusing more on the animals' preparations for the Ball. Aldridge went on to create two more books based on the sequels; The Peacock Party and The Lion's Cavalcade.
An animated short based on Aldridge's illustrations, but once more focusing on the Ball itself, was made in 1974, with Roger Glover writing the accompanying song Love is All, based on the song Love's All You Need mentioned in the book (which may, in turn, have been a reference to The Beatles' All You Need Is Love). This was supposed to lead to a full length animated film, which did not get made. However, Glover had written a full soundtrack, which was released as an album (See Butterfly Ball.)

I didn't know that the video for 'Love is all' was based on this book, it's one of my most favorite videos ever! What a coincidence.
So, without further ado! Roger Glover' Love is all:

wooden learning material

And a bit more learning material. The boxes are stackable, so have no lids.

Somewhat red and somewhat brown

The first year in Art-college is a year of playing around with materials, colours, textures, ideas and concepts. Lots of drawing, painting, but also 3-dimensional work. Most of the time it was a lot of hard work!
This small book is a colourstudy. I think I might scan is sometime to use the textures as a background for illustrations or something else. I'll definately find a destination for them!

Here! Sit! Down! Good boy...

I love dogs and that's why a colleague gave me this agenda. It's a design made for 'Papier Hier!' (Paper here!), a day where a Dutch Paper Supplier shows its new collection. The designer approached this title as a way to 'talk' to a dog. So Dutch Illustrator Bart van Leeuwen was asked to develop a dog character called Paper.

Childhood games

I photographed these games over at my parents' house. My mother used to play these games with us. Some of them still look quite new, but they are definately from the sixties or early seventies. Vintage, I'd say! I remember playing Electro. I was never any good at it, so the pictures are imprinted in my visual memory...

Cooking in vintage style

Always lovely, old cooking books. Especially with illustrations.

Doodling in a new Moleskine

I always fear the white pages of a new notebook, especially if it's a Moleskine... I don't want to blemish it. The result is that I have a lot of empty notebooks on the bookshelf. But this time I went ahead and started scribbling and doodling. Great, 'cause these textures are the result of that effort.