stumbling onwards

2011 was a year full of changes and surprises (the good kind, mostly). The year of finishing MiMaster and setting up Studio Armad'illo with my 8 awesome collaborators.  Of turning my life (ok, my career path) around; of deciding to take the leap and to try to make it as a professional illustrator. So far so good. Bring it on, 2012! I'm ready for you.

Happy New Year, everyone!

no.2

in case you missed it - here's my second contribution to the armad'illo advent calendar. happy holidays!

is / was

back from a super-intense (and fun) week in warsaw, and of course i'm ill again. it's becoming a holiday tradition. 

złote pszczoły

woohoo, it's here! the comic anthology I collaborated on in September is finally out! Beautifully designed by Fontarte, with comics drawn by Malwina Konopacka, Agata Nowicka, Olga Wróbel, Joanna Jurczak, Anna Czarnota and myself.
Conceived and written by Monika Powalisz, the anthology is made up of six different stories, and is a great insight into the life of Warsaw Jews in the1920s and 1930s.  

 

The book is a super-limited release, as it won't even be available in bookshops, but i'll post some pages from the comic on my website soon. For any hypothetical Warsaw readers - there's a book release meeting and debate tomorrow, December 16th, at Chłodna 25. 18.30 is the time. Why did I write this last bit in English? This really makes no sense :)

armad'illo advent calendar!

here's my first contribution the the advent calendar studio armad'illo is running throughout december... i hope you like it! (i also hope that all the presents you get this year are great!)

each day, a new image by one of the studio members comes up, so check the page regularly :) 

you can also follow us on facebook! over here.

in other news, it is almost freakishly warm out here this week, i had a nice long walk today and a coffee in the sun... luckily, in a couple of days i'm flying back to warsaw to get my dose of the proper, cold and dark northern winter. phew!

topipittori / studio armad'illo

There's an article about were i work on the Topipittori illustration blog! 

Here's the story: a few months ago, me and 8 other illustrators got together and created a common workspace for illustrators. We all met last year at a postgraduate illustration course (here) and decided to keep working together. We are called Studio Armad'illo (yes, like the animal; it can also stand for Arma d'Illustrazione in Massa, or 'weapon of mass illustration ;). So far it's been great! Here you will find links to the pages of my co-workers: http://www.studioarmadillo.it/

We work in Viale Gorizia, in a vaguely fashion-y area of Milan, so there's a lot of ridiculously good-looking people around.  Here's what waiting for the subway usually looks like for me:

postcards and creatures

well this is some exciting news! you can now send my drawings as postcards through the awesome petite poste site. the site lets you send them out both as online cards and actual physical printed postcards. yay!

apart from that - in october i did some black-and-white illustrations for a little book, to be published soon.. here's a little sneak peek:

catching up

oh no, i'm super behind with posting again.. and i do have quite a bit to share. so, first up - my first Italian magazine cover! it is for a Florence-based literary magazine that focuses on children's literature. this month's topic was death in children's books. i'm still struggling with more conceptual work, but i'm pretty happy with how it came out. (and more than happy to see my work in print! whee!)

panels, panels

the other thing which kept me reaaaally busy throughout september was a comic project (or should i say graphic novel? haha). it was my first try at such a complex story (10 pages long! full colour! constant google search for historical images of warsaw!), and i think it turned out rather nice.
the pace, at times, was insane, but, well, i just learned to draw faster. the story was written by the great monika powalisz.

here's a tiny preview -  i'll post more once the book is out.

workshop with serge bloch

ok, so it's been a while! well, here i am again, after a well deserved summer rest and a busy busy september. one of september highlights was a magazine cover workshop with the ever-inspiring serge bloch. Four super-intense days with a-cover-a-day pace (sometimes more). I had a lot of fun.
First subject was a guide to free eats in Paris, and this is what I came up with:

Next up, a cover for a business magazine, something i've never tried my hand at before. i was real happy with the idea i had for it, too -

until, once the image was finished, i decided to check out Bloch's original cover...

umm, oooops!

website update!

I have updated www.zozozosia.com with a bunch of recent projects, including the story which kept me so busy throughout June - illustrations to Daniil Kharms' short story, Sonnet. Go have a look!

back in a bit

Phew! Now that was a busy two weeks! Taking a few days off, and then it's back to regularly scheduled blogging.   

I hope you're having a nice july!

concerned lady

a tiny bit of my final thesis, on which i'm working 24/7 now; i'm trying to make a 32-page illustrated album in a week.... wish me luck ;)

on the perils of irresponsible illustrating

here's a little comic for a change.. all true, folks! all i can say is, take care of your vertebral columns :)

(click to view larger)

zeffira

 Phone book project continues. Here's a more defined portrait of the neurotic Ms Caffeini:

the phone book project

This is probably my oddest assignment to date:  I am currently illustrating my way through... a Milan phone book. Not all of the names, thankfully; we are allowed to pick twelve. All thanks to a workshop by Chiara Carrer. Here are some early watercolour sketches:

what's out there

so yeah, i'm home alone on a stormy friday night...

i keep expecting for something like this to peek into my living room.

forest

the children

concerned men in suits are becoming a trend

a sonnet

(colour sketches!)

more sketches still

 

promise to post something with colour soon!

some sketches from today

curious hair

away we go

other

working on some headers...

this might actually become a project,

...but for now, it's just a lot of fun (and dirty hands) with my new inks and the watercolours.

inks&fables

1000 years after everyone else, I've discovered INK.

tourism

today i made a little children's book/folder promoting a region in southern poland. here's the cover:

and here's how it looks all printed out and stuff:

in other news, i had an exceptionally crappy morning thanks to a train that was late, a deserted train station with nowhere to hide, and a chilly wind that is taking lombardia apart since yesterday evening. brrr! 

keep warm people, spring can be tricky!

she gasped

working on a re-imagined version of the bluebeard fable. here's a little side-sketch.

                                      

in case you haven't noticed,

 

and so are my allergies. atchooooooo!

back from bologna

...and back to work. here are some pages of my bologna sketchbook - been drawing mostly during talks with illustrators, otherwise it was impossible: too many people, too many kilometers to walk, too many stands to see, too much everything :) still, a really cool experience, definitely looking forward to going back next year.

more people in trees

...for your viewing pleasure.

also: pre-bologna panic mode ON. only two days left!

communication

a quick sketch + some photoshop colour. trying to keep the loose, sketchy feel of my freehand drawings.

i'm in business

Yay! My moo mini-cards arrived in the mail today! They are tiny and adorable, and come in a handsome recycled-paper box. Just in time for the Bologna book fair! 

Please excuse the hazy photo, I just couldn't wait for tomorrow's daylight to photograph them :)

thursdays are for badgers

...so here's one!