KELLY THOMPSON

Kelly Thompson is a Fashion Illustrator and Photographer who is from Wellington, New Zealand. She finished her studies on Bachelor of Design at Massey University Wellington. She once was head of the textiles program at Goldsmiths, University of London (England) and spent more than a decade as a senior lecturer and program manager at the School of Art, Otago Polytechnic in Dunedin, New Zealand. She is also an Art Director with a creative brilliant knowledge and skills to detail which ensure that not only does the job gets finished, also the way and final output with catch the attention of everyone's eyes.

Some of Kelly's illustrations are based on reference one. "If I make things up I never really feel that it looks as realistic as if I work from reference imagery, I am also not that skilled when it comes to perspective, so I find having a reference helps me to visualise the correct directions of lines, etc." - Kelly Thompson replied one out of her fans' question.

I can just tell that the jackets would be so weighty and thick and the silks perfectly smooth and bliss to wear. The way it combine clean shapes with pretty clashing pattern and texture. Then it is completed with gateway luxury hunting down accessories.

Most of her illustrations are more focused on the face's expressions. For instance like for the pictures above, she has her illustrations done in a make-up way rather than has more focus in the dress. The way she applies make-up onto it illustrate or define the sense we get. Like for the first picture, it gives a femininity and timid sense. As for the other one, it gives more of confidence yet gorgeous sense.

LAURA LAINE

Laura Laine, a talented fashion illustrator who was born in 1983 in Finland, was considered as a great marvellously brilliant young Scandinavian. She studied fashion design at the University of Art and Design Helsinki with an interest mainly on fashion illustrator. After completing her studies, she worked as a freelance illustrator with famous brands now a days which are Zara, Tommy Hilfiger, H&M, Iben Hooej, Daniel Palilo, The New York Times Magazine, Elle Girl, The Guardian, Pap Magazine, Vogue Nippon, GAP, Telegraph, Rad Hourani, Prada, Muse Magazine, and Wunder. She has also displayed in San Francisco and Los Angeles.

She is known as her predominantly black and white illustrations which are hauntingly beautiful and delicate. She has an incredibly fine and detailed line work, which manages the suggest a great variety of textures (furs, silk, wool, leather, etc). Furthermore, there is a certain motion quality to her illustrations which is conveyed by the gracefully twisted body postures and the splendidly flowing long hair of her characters.

Her style is great and not so conscious about. She simply makes working in her illustrations, painting what she feels like at the moment. Most of her illustrations are quiet unique with black and white imagery of long-haired females caught in almost theatrical movements, which exude femininity, sensuality and sophistication. The skinny legs emphasized or more focused to the the details of the dress (patterns, leather, etc). She also played with the styles of long-haired which have the roles of sophistication (on how the hair move along with the outfits' style). As for the femininity and sensuality, they come from all of the elements that go together.

"Fashion is impressive I discover enormously inspiring and like to stay as an aspect of my work, but I have not at all be apologetic of giving up the genuine designing" - Laura

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CARL ERICKSON

American illustrator, Carl Oscar August Erickson was born in Joliet, Illinoise 1892. Carl Erickson would received his formal art education at the Chicago Academy of Fine Arts. Although limited to only two years of schooling, his artistic talent attracted the likes of Marshall Field, Lord & Thomas and other well known advertisement accounts in Chicago. In 1914 Eric would move to New York to continue his advertising illustrations.

In 1916 Eric made his debut in  Vogue magazine and by 1925 he was a regular artist on the magazine. He would go on to dominate the field of fashion illustration for over thirty five years, creating illustrations for French publications and drawing society portraits. Becoming a pillar of the illustrious magazine, Eric worked together with Rene Willaumez Bouet and later Rene Bouche. He was known for his drawings of people in fashionable settings and would stress the importance of detail in his artistry. He continued to work for Vogue until the 1950s.

The Brooklyn Museum held a retrospective of his drawings shortly after his death in 1959.

Most of Eric's illustrators has lots of overlap, diminishing size, surface lines and foreshortening. You can observe on how every line and shape and detail seem to direct your eye right to the centre of interest, the centre of interest being look. They give the impression of having sprung to life without suffering the usual labor pains. But his performance looks too easy; its nonchalance is deceptive. It is not accomplished without a struggle. 

Erickson indeed is a hard-working man, a very serious artist who is usually practicing when not actually performing. In spare moments he is usually drawing from the model and his sketchbook goes with him to the restaurant and the theatre, capturing the elegance around him.

Eric took his sketchpad wherever he went (like what is mentioned above), and drew his models using intensive bright colors and black lines which capture their gestures perfectly. His sketches speak of the elegance and the beauty of the fashion in the 1940’s, and as Reed himself would say, Carl Erickson’s “drawings and paintings are authoritative because he knew his subjects and their world; his taste and beautiful draftsmanship reveal him to be an artist of permanent importance.”