Jay Ryan

Because I work all the times that I'm not in college I have really struggled to to make it to any exhibitions or events this year so have been looking through books of illustrators that I like. I bought a book by jay Ryan a couple of years ago that is still a strong influence on my work. he started out screen printing as a way to make posters to advertise his band. After a while more people started asking him to make posters for them and he became well known for his screen printed designs. I like the fact that he carved out his own niche market almost by accident through doing something he enjoyed. He now has work displayed at exhibitions and has published books of his work.

I really like his use of colour that is limited because of the process he uses. His colour palette is obviously carefully considered to highlight important areas of the composition. his use of borders and text is interesting, his text is hand dawn and loose but regimented enough to be clear and appear as a font. His borders are often made up of blocks of colour or elements of the composition and usually only frame part of the piece. By doing this he gives a feeling of a poster layout without the image feeling too generic. 

 

I think I could learn a lot about the use of texture in printing and how i can simplify my designs  From Jay Ryan's work. He works in a format that has a purpose to grab attention but also communicate a set criteria of information and he manages to do this and still make his designs appear charming, crafted and almost innocent.