Position Statement

At this point in time I am an illustration student, come June I will be an Illustrator and Tattoo Apprentice. Upon leaving the course I will aim to maintain a constant practice, not only in the area of tattooing, but in illustration as well. My work up until this year hasn’t been vocational, nor focused on a field that I could see myself working in. This is no longer the case. In my apprenticeship I have found a context for my work to exist and grow within. I am fortunate in the security I have gained through making contacts in this industry and finding opportunities for my progression in this area. Much of this is down to the progression and maturing of my work throughout university.

This module in particular has helped me professionalise my practice and broadened my horizons. It has helped me begin to organise these opportunities and responsibilities around my own artistic vision. I’m able to adapt the lessons from this module to my future work and career development. Completing tasks within this module has helped me organise my current work within my chosen field of tattooing. I don’t believe I would have gotten as far as I have without fully taking on board the things required for this module.

I feel now that I have a set path to go down, which has made me less anxious about my plans after this degree. I don’t believe that I have backed myself into a corner with this choice. On the contrary I believe that these choices will give me the security to evolve and experiment with my future illustration work. I fully intend to utilise what the course as a whole has taught me throughout these three years

End of Module Evaluation

Throughout my time at university this module has been my favourite, it provided me with space to evaluate my work and the practitioners I admire. It’s also pushed me to be more professional.

I also think it’s been my favourite module because regardless of grades I have always felt it has been my most successful. I found that my strengths lie in branding, networking and opportunities and although I am not the most prolific worker, my strength is utilising the work I create and placing it within a professional context.

The branding I created for myself this year is something that I see myself using for a considerable amount of time, which is important in a brand. By using a pseudonym of ‘Wren’ I have felt more confident as a professional by separating my persona’s, as an individual I am anxious and unorganised, professionally as ‘Wren’ I am able to talk to more people, create a brand that is separate from myself but coexists at the same time. I think it makes me more confident to have a translucent screen in place.

My presentation this year was organised and completed over a week before the Thursday I was presenting, which for me was incredibly organised, this allowed me time to refine what I was going to say and I think this organisation made it run a lot smoother than in past years. I think through creating a consistent layout throughout made it more professional but it was simple enough not to distract from the work I was showing. In hindsight I wish I spoke clearer about my progression after university, as my apprenticeship is something that I’m incredibly passionate about and I feel I’ve found my place a little more within the creative sector.

Due to my direction after university I haven’t found it relevant to my practice to contact illustration agencies and studios, I feel like I would have been wasting my time and theirs. I have contacted professionals, and focused on those that, like me, are illustrators as well as tattooists, I had some success with this as most replied. I felt after the first five I was repeating myself and doing it for the sake of it. I recognise that more effort should have been put into this part of the module on my part, that it would help get out of my bubble, but since starting my new job I have gained 6 professional and recognised tattooists that are there to advise me.

I believe one of my strengths to be my organisation, I plan my week every Monday morning and stick to this as much as possible, I found through list-making I knew exactly what I needed to do and by when. This works to help me stick to deadlines for various exhibitions and commissions and also helps to keep my anxiety at bay.  I also feel that although not the fastest worker, the work I produce is utilised and placed across branding, my online presence and my Etsy. I think I am good at stretching work I complete that I am happy with to get the most out of it.

My biggest weakness is motivation, although my time is always organised to a high standard, the will to complete certain tasks is outweighed by being demotivated, I think this is partly due to my mental health but after three years I am disappointed in myself that I haven’t managed it better. Another weakness is contacting professionals as stated previously, I find the things I enjoyed most about this module are the things I completed to a high standard, such as branding and contextual research, but the things I enjoyed less or felt I was just ticking boxes for are areas that became lacking. I think that whilst knowing exactly what I’m doing after university and what I want to achieve has been a blessing, it has also dulled that panic and fire that would drive me to contact people and push myself into internships whilst trying to figure things out.

Final Presentation

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This is my final presentation, which i'm pretty happy with! I think it links to my branding well and covers all the bases of my practice, putting it all into slides made me realise that i've done a lot of stuff outside of uni this year that I should celebrate more.
Now to present it and hope it goes okay...

Presentation Boards

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These are my final presentation boards for the submission, they explain and depict my personal branding and how it's shown across multimedia applications.

Portfolio Pages

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This is my portfolio as it stands, I aim to update it with more third year work as I make it but so far i've not made work that i'm happy with.
I think it flows quite well, it's mainly for my personal use as I won't need it when I finish uni.
I aim to instead complete a tattoo flash portfolio for my Big Kahuna, as this is more relevant to my practice.

Ordered a stamp

I went with my gut when sending off for a rubber stamp making, I wanted it to be more about me than about the shop I work in, so I sent off my moth motif and my D.O.B which I think has a little more impact and is more personal, though maybe people will see i'm real young and not take me seriously, but if that happens then they're silly and I don't wanna talk to them anyway.

I'm terrified it won't work out, which is why i've put off ordering one for so long, but I guess I just have to be brave sometimes. 

Final Stamp sent to print

Stamp Making

I need to get a stamp made for my brand, it's something that will be stamped on my prints and flash work and i'm struggling a little with how to approach it. Do I include OTC? (Oddfellows Tattoo Collective) or will this dilute the brand that i've created on my personal work, or will this just be the same once I leave university?
Am I just Wren or Salut Wren, is that too cutesy for a tattooist to put on their sheets?
Does square or rectangular work better?
I'm very stuck. This is what I have at this point in time, I want it to be simple but powerful, which I think the font I use across my branding (Bebas) does effectively, though it looks a lot harsher in black than the yellow I generally use.

Contacting Professionals and Tutorial w/ John

After my tutorial with John I felt better about this submission and my presentation.
We spoke about how i'd contacted 5 professionals, but felt that any more wouldn't be relevant.
I was meant to contact 10 but as it isn't the field i'm going into, contacting art directors and agencies would be wasting time.
I have however contacted Illustrators, Illustrators turned tattooists and fellow apprentice's to find out answers to questions I have revolving around my chosen area, I couldn't think of anyone else that I wanted to talk to at this point in time, and contacting them with stock questions would be wasting my time and theirs.

I don't think it's integral to my practice.
I also think that working in a shop with 6 professional tattooists with over 30 years joint experience, I have enough people to talk to and contact.
Through my job I have also made links with Awesome Merchandise (the head printer, James), The owners of Red Temple Prayer and UK Custom Plugs.
I also have opportunities to work Brighton, Leeds and Edinburgh tattoo conventions over the next few years, which is full of professionals, machine makers and valuable industry contacts.

So I think i'll be fine.

Business Cards

I took some better photos of how my business cards fold out. I really like them though the bright pink needs to be brighter, again this is probably my printer but the one in the studio came out a lot better, it could be the inkjet ink in my printer soaking into the stock too much? I should try some different stock.

Badges + Badge Backs

I made some badges that i've been meaning to put on my Etsy for a while now, though I think they could be neater so i'm going to remake them, for the purpose of presenting my work I created these badge backs as part of my branding and 'promo' pack that i'm working on.

Unfortunately my printer was running out of ink so it's very desaturated, more so than normal, so i'm going to reprint EVERYTHING when my ink arrives, the toppers for the packets of mini prints were too pale to use at all. 

 

Promo Pack and more struggles

I've been struggling with what to do for this submission.
I feel a little like i'm forcing all this STUFF like worrying about promo packs and portfolios and everything else and i've decided that I need to tailor it to me.
So instead of promo packs to send to agencies and stuff (which I'm not even planning on doing) I'm instead going to focus on my branding and what I send out with Etsy orders, which is:

- Business Card
- Stickers
- Thank You Postcard
- General test prints and freebies (which I send with every order)
- Pack toppers and badge boards which will be branded and printed, I don't know the proper names for these but that sounds pretty descriptive.

As for my portfolio, for the PPP submission it will exist as my website, and possibly 5 printed boards of my best work. I don't like anything that i've done and it won't be seen by anyone after this course regardless, it's more relevant for me to focus on my tattoo portfolio that i'm developing for my big 603 brief.

I have 6 weeks left, and I need to use my time effectively, rather than forcing things that don't help my practice.

This makes me feel happier.

Remade Invoice

I remade my invoice with my new branding, though every time I export it the logo at the top becomes pixelated, and I don't know how to fix it.
I'm going to work on it over the next few days to get it looking swish, but here they are in comparison.

I remade the new one on InDesign (which is probably why i'm having trouble, I can't use it very efficiently) instead of word, and I think aesthetically it looks a lot smoother and simpler.

Victoria Gray

I emailed Victoria Gray as I realised i'd only contacted tattooists, Victoria Gray's work is super super detailed, and focuses on the themes of nature. I think she has similar themes to tattooists and her work could easily be translated onto skin.
I emailed her for her advice on selling her work, as her photographs and Etsy are super professional, and though I think her work is expensive, it seems to sell very well.

Her packaging and branding is something that also really stands out to me, her work translates really well onto promotional items such as swing tags (I assume for thank you's to buyers). It's all really consistent. 

I made some business cards that I don't hate.
They've changed a lot as I work things out, I didn't like the placement, I used grids on photoshop but that went out the window when I printed and folded them.
I tried blue on different stock too, but the one above turned out best, I like the brightness on the grey stock but think when I use my printer at home they will come out even brighter, which is even better.

I think that this business card/hot dog book provides all the information I want people to know whilst been a bit different to a regular business card.

Birthday Painting

This is Floyd.

I did a super quick painting of my bosses Argus Monitor lizard for his birthday, it's similar in style to my Whale painting print that I sell, and I think it was a good experiment into painting new animals, I'd normally stick to birds and sweet things, not a 4 and a half foot reptile, so it pushed me out of my comfort zone. 

I used Quink on Khadi handmade paper which made it look really swish, I think when selling original paintings in the future i'll stick to this paper to give a nice, higher quality aesthetic.

Sister Said: Oh, Natural! at the Wakefield Beer Exchange

As part of Studio Brief 6: Nature Prints I helped curate and contributed to a Sister Said exhibition held at the Wakefield Beer Exchange, the exhibition will run for 2 months and showcased the work of mine and Bobbi's fellow practitioners, some even from my course and alumni such as:
- Harrison Park (Graphic Design Graduate)
- Louisa Foley (Printed Textiles Graduate)
- Becky Carlton

- Orlaith Conlon

- Rosie Wood

- Emily Jackon

and of course mine and Bobbi's work, which together we will be expanding into another exhibition in Harrogate in late April.

(Mine are the 3 prints on the left)

(Clockwise: Me, Orlaith, Bobbi, Harrison)

This was such a lovely experience and it really pushed me to work to a print deadline, the people from WeAre Projects that asked us to do it hung all the work for us, and we needed to ensure it was printed and ready to hand over by the morning of the 24th of March. 

I really enjoyed getting everyone's work together and to see what work we created when given a theme.

All Cats Are Grey (and great!)

I emailed french tattooist Vincent (All Cats Are Grey) who hasn't got his surname anywhere as part of his online presence.
His work is very stylised, in a similar way a lot of tattooists coming out of France are at the minute with solid clean lines and large areas of black, little shading.

Liz Clements: Illustrator turned Tattooist

I recently emailed Liz Clements about her journey into tattooing from being an illustrator, she's someone i've followed for years and the way she illustrates women is lovely.

She recently began tattooing as the apprentice at Occult, which is something which i'll be doing come June here in Leeds. (I obviously don't have the years of freelance experience she has though)

Her Illustration work.

I showed my mentor her flash work and tattoos, he told me that great illustrations sometimes don't translate well onto skin, that rather than composing on an A4 piece of paper or on screen is so completely different to placing and composing on skin, as you need to follow the lines of the body. 

Meg Langdale replied!

"Hello lovely

I'm so sorry for the delay, I've been terrible at keeping on top of my emails recently and wanted to be able to sit and reply properly to you... Firstly, I'm very flattered you'd even think to ask me! There's so many wonderful apprentices around at the moment, so thank you for thinking of me and I'll do my best to be of some help :)

I had no grand plans to get into tattooing when I was younger, but I came from a heavily arts based background throughout school and then studied fashion and illustration at university. When I graduated I wasn't really sure what I was doing and ended up working a dead end 9-5, which allowed for me to carry on with my illustration work in the evenings and weekends. I was selling prints and doing commissioned work mainly, which led to having my work in a few exhibitions and displayed at a few tattoo conventions. And often getting asked to design tattoos. My partner is a tattoo artist also, and when he opened up his own studio around 2 and a half years ago I spent a lot of time at the studio drawing etc, which eventually led into starting my apprenticeship (18 months ago). And I started tattooing a year ago this month.

Initially I found the transition from illustration into tattooing quite difficult. The work I did as part of my illustration work was always very intricate, delicate and detailed. And of course when I first started tattooing I was being told to keep things simple. Everything in me wanted to over complicate designs, but that then made them too tricky to tattoo. But I have an ultimate fear of keeping things simple, traditional work was so far from my comfort zone. So I guess it was just about finding a happy medium. I look back at some of my first designs and hate them, but it was part of learning, and building my confidence. Now I'm finding I can do pieces that are more illustrative and headed toward where I want them to be. But still such a long way to go.

I think because I had built up a small customer base during my time as an illustrator, I had quite a lot of people that were willing to have custom work in my own style from the very beginning. In that way my apprenticeship has been quite different, I know I've been very lucky, I've not really had to do walk in stuff, as I've always been quite busy with bookings from the beginning. In a way I think it's not the best way to do it as its really important to learn all different styles. You'll get told that a lot aha. But at the same time, I'm of the opinion that although being a rounded artist is important, it's natural to have a preferred style. If someone's insanely good at painting landscapes for example, it doesn't mean they can do portraits, pencil realism, or abstract? Same goes for tattooing. In my opinion anyway. For me, my confidence was a massive factor also. I needed to build my confidence doing stuff I felt more comfortable doing. And now I have a little more confidence, I'm able to push myself to do more tradional black work and I'm starting to do some colour pieces, and I love it now because it's exciting and new. 

I was fortunate enough to be able to borrow equipment from the studio initially. I borrowed machines and supplies for the first month or so. I quite quickly bought myself one machine that I used for everything, not ideal but I managed, after another few months I got a rotary works. And it's not until this year I've built up a nice set of machines to cover everything I need. Again with supplies, initially I used the studios stuff, but started buying my own once I was earning a decent amount of money and could afford to get every thing I needed myself. The other stuff, foot pedal, power pack, clip cord, bed, armrest etc, I got over time. I still need some bits now, but it's pretty gradual, there's a lot of stuff to get so hopefully the studio you're working at can understand that and will be willing to help you out as you build up your own set up. I left my full time job to start my apprenticeship, and was fortunate to have help from my partner until I was earning money myself. It was hard at the beginning. I wasn't making a lot, but i managed. And my customer base built quite quickly so I've been pretty busy from fairly early on. It gets easier i promise. Selling prints on the side for a bit of extra cash helped me loads too! 

Hope that this helps a little, I'm sorry if it's not useful at all! I know it's such a different journey for everyone, and I feel like I've been very fortunate with how things have worked out. But there's been times where I wanted to give it up. I hope you manage to make it work! And if you ever need anyone to talk to/ask more questions, I'd be happy to help. I know how tricky it can be..

Best of luck lovely 

M x "

This is a big chunk of help.

It makes me feel a lot better about the profession i'm heading into, I think we have similar positions and thoughts about tattooing, and a similar mindset to that of my boss and mentor, Neil Dransfield, which helps a lot. 

My biggest worry was money, but after talking to Meg it's reassured me that I will be able to manage. 

Branding update

I've been working to update my Etsy in time for leaving the course, so it will hopefully generate a bit of revenue. (I've made £30 in my first month) and realised that my branding for my Etsy needed to be the same as my website.
I've also realised that I am ashamed to give out my website because it's so outdated, so I really need to work hard on this.
I began by making them look the same.

I had some trouble with the colours of this, but realised that I had been saving everything as CMYK as most of the work I make is for print, it's not even something that crosses my mind. It looks kind of cool this bright, but it's not the tone of voice I want to put across, maybe if I was a little braver or used these colours a lot in my work.

Painting at Fred Aldous

I teamed up once again with Bobbi to do some Live Painting in the Fred Aldous Leeds store. 

I did an interview for their website which you can read here, I was a bit scared about that as I feel self-concious and felt I sounded like a bit of a tit, but apparently I came off as real professional so that's good. 

It was tons of fun to create this canvas but we had a bit of difficulty and confusion about payment, we knew we weren't getting paid in cash but were promised a goodie bag to say thank you, the night before we went to paint we got an email from the shop manager saying she didn't have the authority to give away free stuff, and I assumed she'd been a bit over-zealous with trying to get people to come paint in store, a bit peeved I wanted to do it anyway as part of a studio brief for 603 and also just to test myself making larger scale work.

It turned out we were getting goodie bags, a few weeks later, which consisted of Fred Aldous branded stuff and free samples, so overall it cost them pretty much nothing for our 5 hours of work for them.

I realise that we knew what we were getting into, and free stuff is still free stuff, but I assumed as an art supplies shop they would give us a bit more as a goodwill gesture rather than things they get for free. 

In the end it was good exposure, I did my first interview as an illustrator and I've been getting people messaging me or sending me photos of my canvas that they've seen as they pop in store, so exposure is good, right? It'll look great in my portfolio :)

Portfolio struggles.

I'm struggling with my portfolio, as in, it doesn't exist yet and I don't like the vast majority of my work anymore.
It's at a point where I forget I have to have one, remember and panic, then forget about it for a bit longer.
I think this is telling to where my head is at the minute. Whilst I love drawing and making work, I don't see myself as an illustrator, I can see myself as a professional creative but not one with concept and strong portfolio talk-pieces, and I'm okay with that, in fact I am where I want to be. I am making work, I have lined up my career in tattooing once I graduate and I am enjoying painting and making mistakes in preparation for that, and getting better.
The one thing that is pulling me back is how this all fits into the Learning Outcomes of these two final modules.

This is probably the nicest piece of work i've done in a while, it combines my love of tattoo flash and getting better at it, and making finished work to take to print. 

The only problem is it has NO context, because a lot of tattoo flash doesn't, it's more about making it aesthetically pleasing and having straighter than straight lines because if you can't paint one, how can you tattoo one? 

Basically, I'm struggling to link all my shit together, in a tutorial with Ben he told me to go with it, make everything now about tattooing but then I know I'll get pulled up for lack of context and content. 

I don't know what to do, and what I need to do to not fail this course. 

Another gushy email to Meg Langdale

I emailed Meg Langdale, an apprentice and illustrator from Leicester. I find her work really delicate and beautiful, and was surprised that she was only the apprentice. I wanted to find out more about her experience as an apprentice and how she developed her work. I think it's good to get more female views on this too, as where I work is a definite 'lads club' and the industry as a whole is very male oriented.

Kyler Martz replied!

"Hi Wren,

Thanks so much for the kind words. I started illustrating before tattooing but always found inspiration in old american folk art and tattooing. After illustrating for several years, I was getting more requests for tattoo commissions which eventually evolved into me tattooing. Because the art that I had always been inspired by was rooted in folk art, flash, and etching, I was lucky that my illustration style sort of naturally translated into tattooing. I am still definitely learning all the time and trying to find a balance between the two but overall feel lucky to be able to bounce back and forth between illustration and tattooing. Hopefully this helps! Also, I will definitely let you know if I am coming through Europe soon and need a place to guest spot.

Take care,

Kyler "

I wasn't expecting a reply so quickly, I admire his work a lot so it's nice to hear that he still tries to find balance between both practices, this is something I hope to be able to do, but hopefully with the time spent on this course I will be able to do this, even if this means just having an Etsy or something to make prints for, i'd be happy with that. I googled 'American Folk Art' to see a little of what inspires him, and found illustrator Stacey Rozich whose work is really beautiful, I really like her tone of voice and how she uses blocks of colour, which is something that could be translated into my work.

Etsy Update

I have things in my Etsy now! From the Leeds 4 Syria event I have just uploaded all of my leftover stock.
This is proving to be something I am excited about, I get to make work that other people like and make a bit of cash back from it to save for my apprenticeship. I worked out that one pack of paper (50 sheets) is worth 1 A4 print, and to fill my printer full of ink its 4 A4 prints, so i can quickly see profit from this.

I nerded out and emailed Kyler Martz

I was trying to think who I would like to contact, and who would be able to answer the questions I have as both an Illustrator and aspiring tattoo artist, I found Kyler Martz' work and I think his work is perfect for what I am aiming for, to have a sustainable practice as both illustrator and tattooist, and how those can overlap.