Going for Gold

April 12, 2018

The Commonwealth Games is currently being held on the Gold Coast of Australia and with that, bringing this sunshine filled corner of the world into the limelight. I’m loving seeing not just the sport news from the region every day but visuals of the local landscape, which I drew recently as part of a series of Australian Cityscapes for my licensee down under. I have a very annoying habit of shouting out “I’ve drawn that!” when a panoramic shot of Surfers Paradise or a drone view running along the coast comes on TV.

Collaborating with licensees and retailers around the world to create map like illustrations that capture the character of a place and celebrate its unique culture is a source of pleasure and fascination for me. I love my job! Cities or regions that I know very little about and are far away from me often pose the most challenges as I try to understand the local geography, fauna and flora as well as identify what’s important to the people. My licensees and retailers steer me along the way but sometimes I spot something that catches my eye or steals my heart such as the super-cute parakeets that live in the Currumbin Valley on the Gold Coast.

The ambitious architecture that springs up from the coastline (Surfers Paradise), is a land of glass and steel, connecting sky to sea and is in stark contrast to the exotic and strange land that surrounds it. I love drawing sea … people splashing about in it, boats bobbing along on it and fish and other marine life enjoying their life within it. As such, The Gold Coast design is the backdrop to the wonderful creatures that inhabit the Coral Sea.

Up the coast Brisbane beckons and my Cityscape of this beautiful Australian city captures people continue to enjoy the outdoors, much of which happens around the banks of the Brisbane River. I love the winding river with its many beautiful, modern bridges but I also like to remind people of a city’s heritage too, so have included The Old Windmill built in 1828, marking the oldest surviving building in the whole of Queensland.