Polar Music Prize and Beyond

Hello there!

Well I have indeed been neglecting you!!  Apologies.  I have been drawing alternately in alternative drawing approaches. I have been performer, workshop host, illustrator, archivist, designer, storyteller, photographer, resident artist and documentor.

Went for a walk on my birthday at Roineabhal and made
this photo collage for them from the flowers and bugs I found.
Amazing sunny day, accompanied by MacDuff the family hound.

I spent two and a half months in Scotland, and now I have returned to Stockholm, with news that I will indeed be drawing for the 3rd consecutive year as 'official drawer' of the Polar Music Prize.  Last year it was Patti Smith and the Kronos Quartet. The year before it was Björk (Idol!) and Ennio Morricone. An amazing couple of years, and now the prize will be awarded to laureates Yo-Yo Ma and Paul Simon. What a privilege to draw!

Tomorrow night I will be drawing Extra Life at Debaser Slussen, a gig put on by the notoriously experimental batshit ballsy and brilliant promoter 'Mother'.  Some of the most exciting and off the wall gigs I've drawn in Stockholm have been courtesy of 'Mother' and I don't anticipate that the line up of future gigs will diminish in mindbending mastery.

The playwright Lynda Radley will be flying out here late July so we can develop our collective project courtesy of the 360 Narratives initiative and funded by the Playwright Studio and Creative Scotland. Looking very much forward to it. Lips sealed for now. You'll just have to be patient for news.

Drawing Smoked Char up in Matsdal, Lapland

I've also just come back from 3 days in Lapland. Lapland I ask you! A twelve hour drive from Stockholm, through the night, arriving at 4am. But we saw a Moose!!  And a male Capercaillie strutting his stuff in the middle of the road, as well as a plethora of lovely looking females hanging around the sides of the road. Loads of hares and foxes with their diminishing winter coats, cranes, grouse and a big bunch of other equally stunning and beautiful wildlife.  18 inches of snow, lots of daylight and that was just the surrounding nature.  We stayed in Mattias's folk's little wooden cabin in the forest and it really was like a childhood fantasy come true.  Suffice to say I was drawing throughout the few days up there, so they'll appear in some shape or form at some time or another.  Have been maxing out the hardrives so need to clear some space for scanning first.

I also created illustrations for the first Electric String Orchestra in Scotland. They'll be opening the West End Festival in Glasgow on Thursday 31st of May, playing the likes of Radiohead, Lady Gaga, Bowie and more.  You can see the link here. 

Their brief was quite open, but they wanted illustrations that they could use on posters/t-shirts/album covers that could be used over and over again, that had an aspect of 'electric' without being cheesy.   The logo of their name was created by someone else, but everything else is mine. A new foray into Photoshop with hand drawn instruments - Cello, Violin and Violas - drawn in my style, then put into photoshop, coloured and then placed in a circular pattern that mimicked a kind of snowflake/fractal type image. I'm pretty pleased with the final result, although I did do quite a few different examples.

Illustration design for Poster Format

From the ESO themselves on how they found me and their response to the poster -
'We love it thank you so much!  We're picking up posters today for our Oran mor gig.

We heard about you from a born to be wide session I think but you're well known from the general band circuit in Glasgow and I'd seen some of your artwork before'

Until we meet again. Jenny S xx