A.Richard Allen

Vacation (slight return)
Posted by A.Richard Allen at 2:43 am on July 8th

American Lawyer- 'Breaking with Lockstep'

Another extended absence from Drawger and not much to show for it but a collection of illustrations (hey, what more could you want?) and a suntan. I took another vacation the other week, conscientiously taking with me my laptop, wacom tablet, scanner etc. My plans were scuppered by The fates making me forget my mains cable. The tiny Channel Island tax haven of Guernsey didn't have a spare on the whole island (I went door to door asking) but it was probably just as well. I don't much enjoy working away from the comforts of my studio and it gave me a chance to switch off for once.

Guernsey- my family holiday destination for most of my childhood is a bay-oo-tiful place and I'm glad to've had the chance to take my own kids there. My parents came along too for a nice piece of added continuity (and some welcome child-minding). If I had several million to hand, I'd rather like to set up home there amongst the portly tax exiles.

...and these were only one of three lots of roughs...

Portrait of author, Flannery O'Connor

For your favorite and mine, SooJin B at PLANSPONSOR, on someone siphoning off money from a fund and claiming to be investing it in a second hand submarine

Another version of the sub piece

roughs for the PLANSPONSOR ones

Jewish Living- 'Forgiveness 2.0'

Roughs for the JL piece (originally a full page)...

...but downgraded to a half page

A regular spot I've just got for UK Women's Mag, Red. This one's on- what?- slobbish, complacent male partners?

the roughs

'Don't Have Kids, I'm Telling Ya!' or something similar (for Utne Reader)

'Keeping Up With the Joneskis' (London Magazine). How wealthy metropolitan types can adjust to the credit crunch without feeling inferior to their megarich (Russian) neighbors (I know we can all relate to that, right?)

For Pete Hausler at the WSJ. Nicely AD-ed. Amusingly I ended up doing three versions with the rocket at different angles as- during the course of the day- the Dow Jones rallied

For fDI Magazine (UK). It's hackneyed imagery (going against the flow, etc) but I rather enjoyed doing it

And finally, of course you're dying to see some holiday snaps. The obligatory Guernsey cow

A Guernsey landmark. The tiny, kitsch, concrete and broken crockery shrine, The Little Chapel

The descent to the gorgeous Moulin Huet bay

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How to Live to 100
Posted by A.Richard Allen at 5:01 am on June 4th

For Time Out NY on gay life in NY

Some more busy editorial pieces from recent weeks (I will try and dig out some calmer, conceptual images to contrast)

The rough for the above

Spots to accompany the above piece ('Why Wont Drag Die?', 'Why are LGBT films so bad?' and another one I can't quite remember the idea behind)

'New Statesman' Magazine- Young People (unconcerned about) drowning in debt

Guardian Newspaper Section cover about UK rail fares being simplified

Roughs (1) for the above- tried to go for something simple to represent reduced fares (train cutting through banknote/ � sign)...

...but they were adamant they wanted a crowd scene!

CiB Magazine- Access to information

SMT Magazine- Surveillance of employees

Roughs for the above piece

Jewish Chronicle- Secrets of reaching 100 years. AD-ed by the great (and exacting) John Belknap. The formula for longevity, apparently is
1 Exercise
2 Good food
3 A sense of belonging to a group
4 Religion
5 Love
6 An ability to adapt to change

I reckon I've got three out of six. Plus pretty good genes on both sides

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Slow
Posted by A.Richard Allen at 12:33 pm on May 19th

A section cover for the (UK) Guardian newspaper on the subject of Slow Working. The article's author investigates the idea of applying the principles of the Slow Food movement to working habits, introducing a little calm when we're all expected to be throwing ourselves into gainful activity the whole of our waking lives.

Me, I'm an mixture of loafer (idler, not shoe) and workhorse. I guess the stop-start nature of freelance life makes it difficult to relax completely, as I found on a recent week away with my family.

The red outline on my chosen rough is me doing the hard-sell on the anthropomorphic animal solution. Luckily, the AD succumbed to my pleading

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A busy
Posted by A.Richard Allen at 9:46 am on April 30th

Businessweek. The last of my monsters-destroying-cities-illos for a while, I promise. I did propose other ideas to represent an out-of-control Wall Street (raging bull etc) but Kong won out

busy month resulting in plenty of RSI in my arm and wrist. To counter it I'm popping codeine and ibuprofen and curbing much of my superfluous typing; reining in rambling emails, Scrabulous and Drawger posts.

I know that a slideshow of recent stuff, sans commentary/ roughs makes for a dull post but, just to keep my hand in, here are a few from April's illustratothon.

For a pensions mag. Obvious imagery about corporations neglecting environmental impact but I liked the composition

'Ox Populi' For Reader's Digest Germany. An interesting brief about how 'Asking the Audience' for guesses (here, the weight of an ox) often results in a surprisingly accurate average figures

First in a series for 'People Management' Magazine, '1000000 Tiny Plays About Work' a series of tragi-comic observational pieces written as dialogue about the minutiae of life.

More from the '1000000 Plays'

...and another

Ok, so it's kind of got that disaster movie thing going on but it's not a monster destroying a city, right? This one's for a pensions magazine relaunch

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NY
Posted by A.Richard Allen at 1:24 pm on April 7th

For Christopher Benfey's review of 'Dictation, A Quartet' by Cynthia Ozick. Shown here: Henry James dictating to a typist

It's taken me a while to post since getting back from New York; a heavy workload and a heavier cold have kept me away. Traveling light (as anyone who saw me two days running will testify, I barely had a change of clothes) I didn't bring a camera so you'll have to take my word for it that I was ever there.

The best I can do by way of visuals is a couple of recent illos one for Nicholas Blechman at the NY Times Book Review, one for (who else) SooJin Buzelli at Plansponsor.

In contrast to my previous trips to NY where I've always been ensconced in midtown, this time I stayed downtown in Tribeca. My hosts for the four nights were the estimable Roman Milisic, his wife MaryJo and their cute as a button/ sweary as a stevedore daughter, Giovanna. I owe them a bunch for their bounty (I went through two rolls, arf), their good company, their inflatable bed, and their English muffins (note to all those thinking of playing host to an Englander: it's all we will eat). Mind, they did give me this stinking cold too so I think really we're quits.

I filled my days with plenty of traipsing, seeing various ADs (thank you Nicholas Blechman, Dave Bamundo, Chrissy Dunleavy, Max Bode, et al) and trying to get all the items on the Herculean shopping list I'd been issued by my wife.

I didn't manage to notch up anything terribly cultural. Unless you count trips to Clinton Hill to visit the family Wacksman. And I know I do. But I think I'm wont to get hung up on genuflecting at temples of high culture when just hanging out and being somewhere new is experience enough.

Drawger kingpin Dave F organised a meet on the Tursday night and all in attendance were impeccably behaved. It was a real pleasure to meet Robert Hunt, Dave Bamundo, Tim O'B, SKron, Edel, Thomas Fuchs, Yuko, David Goldin, Wax, Ellen Weinstein, Laura Tallardy, Rich Goldberg, Hal Mayforth. Have I missed anyone out or shoehorned-in anyone who wasn't really there?

The SoI awards was the following evening and Steve W was my prom date. A perfect gent he was too. Through a martini haze I recall meeting John Dykes, Felix Sockwell, the amazing Buzellis (I make them sound like a circus act) Randy Enos, Dale Stephanos, Joe Ciardello, Patrick JB Flynn, Man Mountain Brian Stauffer, Scott Bakal, Peter de Seve. Call me a simpering fool but they all seemed like good people.

Chump that I am, I hadn't prepared a speech and so whilst other award recipients spoke with authority and/ or wit, I most likely mumbled charmlessly. Thankfully, drink has helped airbrush the speech and in my recollection of events I was a regular Oscar Wilde, commanding the podium and captivating the room with my warmth and a ready stock of anecdotes.

And before I knew it I was being driven from Manhattan, bundled blindfold into an unmarked plane and disgorged back to England (it's how your State Department rolls these days).

In some ways New York didn't seem quite so exotic to me as it has done in the past (I told Roman that catching sight of the NY skyline on the cab ride in hadn't given me the thrill it had on previous occasions. He sniffily retorted, 'So what does the Bournemouth skyline look like, then?'). But the City also felt more comfortable and familiar, despite not having been there for 9 years. I'm looking forward to having an excuse to visit again.

roughs

Plansponsor piece about a dodgy wedding (or a widow's pension plan that was declared invalid after the marriage was found to be a sham. Or something along those lines)

First round of roughs. The AD, SooJin suggested something that combined the two themes I'd gone for (wedding cakes, skating on thin ice)

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Shared palettes
Posted by A.Richard Allen at 6:01 am on March 5th

Some more editorial pieces. The first is for my favourite AD, SooJin Buzelli at PLANSPONSOR. This one's about going back to basics with selling financial products.

A batch of roughs- the food ones relate to an analogy made in the article about eggs. The books ones are about concealing a copy of 'Fun With Dick & Jane' inside a hollowed out 'War & Peace'

For Radio Times (TV/ radio listings) Magazine

The second one (and I only noticed the identical palette when putting this post together) is for a radio programme about a survey of how kids spend their time in the playground (or schoolyard if you insist). Here's the synopsis I was given:

For nearly forty years, Iona Opie worked with her late husband collecting the material for their books, starting with “The Lore and Language of Schoolchildren” which was published in 1959. From the 1970s onwards, as part of her fieldwork, she visited her local school playground, in Liss, Hampshire, every week. These were the children whom she called “The People in the Playground”. Already, then, there was anxiety that their spontaneity and expressiveness were being extinguished in the face of the mass media and increased consumerism, though the Opies refuted this claim. Can it be refuted any longer?

My approach was slanted towards today's kids being in thrall to electronic devices. Whilst it makes for a provocative image, judging by the raucous din that comes from the primary school nearby every recess I'd say that this pretty wide of the mark.

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Horses
Posted by A.Richard Allen at 6:23 am on February 21st

Some recent editorial ones that I've got a kick out of.

The horses piece was for the New Statesman to go with a piece about how progressives within the (governing) Labour Party need to recognise how much ground they share with the Lib Dem (formerly Liberal Party). The article's here

I'm glad this went down a conceptual route tying the headline ('Lib-Lab rides again) with the colours associated with the two parties. Initially there were ideas of Gordon Brown looking in a mirror and seeing a historical liberal figure (Milton, Gladstone) reflected back...

I think that there's possibly something symbolic missing in the final image. Maybe the intersection between the two horses should form some sort of shape although that might've strained the imagery too much

What's certainly missing is a rather suspect protruding limb from the rough image.

The second one has much in common with my Fashion Cafes image (here) from September. Not quite as satisfying a composition with a more conventional perspective but still a pleasing design.

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Chekhov
Posted by A.Richard Allen at 4:46 am on February 15th

A few recent pics. First up a portrait of my favourite short story writer (and second fave Lieutenant from the USS Enterprise), Chekhov.

Next is an editorial potboiler that I rather liked about poor hygeine in spa pools. Yum

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One year on
Posted by A.Richard Allen at 7:54 am on February 12th

A spot for a Financial Times magazine about- you guessed it- flourishing Post Communist economies

When Leo invited me along to Drawger last February I really didn't have that much of an idea about the place and my knowledge of big name US illustrators was limited so I didn't really know what sort of (stellar) company I was keeping. Then again a willful ignorance/ lack of decent research has been a hallmark of my career to date.

Looking back I marvel and wince at the tantric stamina, the verbal diarrhea I had as a Drawger Pup! 17 posts in that first month!

It really has been a very interesting time for me (I won't ask how it was for you, gentle reader). Drawger's been instrumental in making me take a look at my work and it's given added impetus to the experimenting I was doing when I arrived. It's also made me a bit less blinkered and locked into a particular aesthetic and keen to try new ways of working. I guess it's something like doing another MFA as a correspondence course and this time actually bothering to turn up to crits (as I managed to avoid throughout pretty much the whole of my undergraduate and postgraduate years). The warmth of the welcome I've had from Drawgerites has been touching and I feel as though I've made some genuine, lasting friendships with fellow artists. I'll be over for the SoI show in late March and will be hooking up with E Coast Drawgers when I'm in NYC. Whether they like it or not.

Oh, and here are a few recent offerings since this is an illustration blog.

Thanks again, Leo, The Great and All Powerful Zimm and all in the Drawgerverse.

Does the world need another Hokusai 'Wave' pastiche? Maybe not but I quite liked doing it. It's for a piece about Risk Management

For the WSJ on the subject of Austrian Wines (it seems they've been rehabilitated after the antifreeze scares of the 80s). Not too heavy on the concept but quite pretty anyhow

The wines piece went through the mill at the roughs stage. Most of the neat conceptual bits (restaurant tables as symbolic alps, wine bottle as red-white-red Austrian flag) didn't make the final edit. Then again nor did some of my cheesier devices (Tyrolean hats)

See more: Editorial, finds

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Mail shot
Posted by A.Richard Allen at 12:02 pm on January 23rd

Who can resist when an AD says, 'I was thinking of maybe a giant robot destroying a city'? The subject of the article was the UK newspaper the Daily Mail. For my sins, I've done the odd illo for this right wing, 'upmarket' tabloid in the past. I was young, I was naive. Actually, I worked for them last year so that doesn't wash. All the same, I relished doing my bit to put the boot in. The Mail's politics really are pretty ugly. It's paranoid, bullying and bigoted and its hateful self-righteousness is not so easily laughed off as the bs pedalled by the 'red tops' ( the cartoonish sex/ sport/ celebrity obsessed downmarket tabloids) because it seems to exert a huge influence over politicians of all hues who increasingly tailor their policies to the paper and its semi-mythical constituency- 'Middle England'

A few personal pieces to lighten the mood. Kind of.