UNDER THE BRIDGE

Here is some of my sketchbook work for the 6x6 brief. I had to do two illustrations for the short story "Under the bridge". This story was about a boy living in a poor scruffy neighbourhood who had been kicked out of his house and had to spend the night fending for himself. The story is gloomy and unfriendly and I wanted to get this across in my work. I used a lot of greys and muted colours in my sketchbook to echo the cold and unfeeling world in the story. The 'brid

ge' in the story is the one place where the boy was safe, and the only place he could stay. This became a focal point in my illustration as it was one of the most significant places in the story. I tried out many ways of drawing and representing the bridge, some more successful than others. I tried using the idea of a hand acting as a bridge to show the comfort and safety that it brought to the boy. A hand covering something shows protection and warmth and I used this idea in one of my final illustrations. The drawing with the rainbow is one of my favourite illustrations although I didn't use it for my final piece. I like the way the rainbow above the boy represents the bridge as being something warm and happy in an otherwise dark and unfeeling place. I used the blood on the boys face to give the impression that the story is a bit dark otherwise the mood of the illustration might have been too happy. Even though I did not use this illustration for my final piece, I kept

 the idea of the rainbow which I did use. I wanted to make the main illustration bold and dark and I tried a few ways of showing the mood of the story rather than picking out and drawing images. I used a lot of paint, textures and dull colours to get cross the overall mood of the story.

My two final pieces are below: