Professional Practice: Study Task 3: What is Illustration? Part 1

During our last PPP session, we explored in groups and as a class "What is Illustration?" as a whole, what qualities do we look for in illustration as well as what makes a "good" or "successful" piece of illustration?

It was quite hard to pin down the exact qualities we would all look for but after discussing as a class we managed to come up with the following key qualities:

MESSAGE
CONCEPT
EMOTIONAL RESPONSE
PERSONAL CONNECITON
NARRATVIE
COMPOSITION/COLOUR/SHAPE
VISUAL QUALITY/ CRAFTSMANSHIP
TEXTURE/MEDIA
STYLE/TONE OF VOICE/DEPICTION
CONTENT

Important notes:
Illustration has to have a purpose.
Illustration "is a job", it is a profession and that is what sets it apart from other practices.
Illustration does a job, wether it be "illuminating' or "bringing to light" information within an editorial piece of text, describing narrative and becoming a visual partner to the story, or conveying an idea etc etc.
An image becomes an illustration when it is put into context and given a job to do. Effectively communicating concepts, ideas, information and messages using visual language. It is a process of visual communication that translates key information to its audience.

* When creating illustration "keep it simple and effective. Don't let cleverness get in the way of communicating the information." *

Keeping these points/statements in mind, our next task was to create a new Pinterest account online and create 5 boards related to our choice of the previous key qualities.

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Here are my boards under the headings I chose and the process in which I made them. These all relate to the qualities I look for in illustration and which inspire me to create new pieces of work. Just creating these boards has left me buzzing with inspiration and I love having all of these exciting illustrations and artwork that I have come across in one place where I can revisit, research and become inspired.