Chromophilia

In Autumn 2021 I took part in two exhibitions in collaboration with artist Sibel Kantola. Chromophilia was the first one, with prints made of our paintings for outdoors hanging on the beautiful street Luostarin välikatu in central Turku. Artist Paul Krispijn also took part with a light installation that was visible in the autumn evening. In December Sibel and I also made a Christmas/winter themed exhibition in the same frames. The frames were built in June 2021 by Hasan Al-Rubaye, with funding from Stiftelsen för Åbo Akademi. They were made for the photography exhibition Love Crossing Boundaries, organized by Nana Blomqvist. Nana gave me free hands to create art for the frames, and I invited Sibel Kantola to join me.

This collaboration was intense but very joyous. And we did not put any breaks on our love for colors (hence the title). Below you can see my half of the artworks from Chromophilia and secondly from the December exhibition.

Sibel and I are working on a webpage together, where we will further exhibit our collaborations and see where we can take it! But those are the plans for 2022.

I want to take the opportunity to wish you a Happy Yule and Happy New Year 2022. 2021 was intense and extremely productive for me. So much so, it has been hard to keep this webpage updated. If you use Tiktok, please go check out @kiiwyn, since I post there quite frequently, and I’m enjoying the simple video format very much.

Illustrated history

In April I finished one of the most extensive illustration jobs I’ve done so far, the book Piga, klockare, inhysing, lots, by the author Carina Wolff-Brandt (book in Swedish, published by Vingpennan). It finally arrived from the printers’ in the beginning of July and is now for sale!

The book is part historical fiction, part fact, about the life of people in the archipelago of Southern Finland during the years 1669-1809.

I begun work on the illustrations in August 2017, and by the end of April the amount of images landed at around 70. They are all graphite drawings, and then digitally assembled and colored. The original drawings are for sale, so if you happen to read the book and wonder about some of the drawings you can ask me about them by sending an e-mail (jennykwiik@gmail.com) or sending a DM on one of my social media accounts (Instagram @kiiwyn for example). Some of them are already sold, so act fast if you’re interested!

I feel very proud to have been part of the team making this book. The text is fantastic, a very engaging mix of fiction and fact, that paints a vivid image of the people of the archipelago. My task was to imagine places, people and object that are in some cases not pictured anywhere. For example a coast line in the 17th century will look very different. This was a very cool challenge, and I’ve been waiting for an opportunity to work with historical illustration. I really hope I will have the chance to do it again!

In the book there are also animals and plants, and this has also been a dream of mine, to have the chance to work with images of flora and fauna. A fantasy I have is to get the opportunity to illustrate a book on botany or similar.

The graphic design is also stunning! Made by Tuire Aho (Anno Design Oy).

Anyway. Cheers to our new book! I’ve received tons of wonderful feedback, and all I want is that as many people as possible see and read this beautiful book.

“Piga, klockare, inhysing, lots”, Förlaget Vingpennan 2018.

“Piga, klockare, inhysing, lots”, Förlaget Vingpennan 2018.

Fairy tale girls

In my last blog post I said I have more good news. And I sure do!

I got a grant from The Finnish Association for Illustrators, that I’ve been a member of for eight years already. I haven’t applied for their working grants before, and in April I got the idea that my Goldilocks illustration could use some company. I already had a contact to a publisher who publishes easy to read books for all ages, and so I pitched them a story book with my illustrations. The fairy tales I’ve picked out will all have a girl protagonists. However, another author who knows more about easy to read texts will do the writing.

So in September and onwards I’ll be focusing on fairy tales! I’m so excited about this, it’s a dream come true. Ever since I was young I’ve adored classical fairy tale illustration, especially artists from the Nordic countries: John Bauer, Hans Arnold, Theodor Kittelsen, Rudolf Koivu, Kay Nielsen, Björn Landström and Tove Jansson of course. Now I will have a chance to make my own mark among these giants.

But the summer is all pixel art and games (I’ll update you on progress soon! Some awesome characters are forming as we speak). Goldilocks will have to wait a few months more…

Goldilocks is already available as a print: Check my Society6-shop!

Autumnal activities (portrait series and exhibition)

Time for an update! Besides being with the cutest baby ever, I’ve started editing my book manuscript and working on an art project when I have the time (which of course is almost never, but I can find a few minutes of time for art every now and then).

The new project is actually not that new, I’ve had it on my mind for a long time, but in the form of a diffuse inspired feeling. I’ve taken a lot of photos of my oldest daughter when she plays with clothes and scarves, and felt like painting or drawing her.

During summer I made this pencil drawing on paper:

Then I got the idea to try acrylics (that I’m not so used to using, source of inspiration: Maija Hurme) and paint a year old Instagram photo that I’m especially fond of:

And now I’m trying Kyle’s brushes (Happy HB) on Photoshop for a very fine pencil line:

I’d also like to paint some very large scale acrylic paintings of these same poses, and really explore them. What feelings do the different techniques and sizes create? This is a playful project of exploration! We’ll see where it goes. I’m hoping to create a body of work around this theme that could be used for an exhibition.

And speaking of exhibitions: right now I have a ten minute film of my digital fantasy illustrations rolling in the public library. I’ll post the film here in October when the library exhibition is over! Here’s the flyer (in Swedish):