Rita Fürstenau (4/5)

Rita Fürstenau from Germany makes beautiful prints and illustrations. As Rita’s always busy with work – she also holds illustration workshops and has her own publishing company with two friends – she has created lovely workspaces for herself, one of which is in a Swedish country house. In her blog, she tells us more about her work and life.

Hi, it’s me again. Today, I’ll tell you a bit about my illustrations.

My favorite materials for drawing are a pencil and uncoated paper. I take a sketch booklet with me everywhere I go and also a small selection of colored pencils.

For my illustrations I mostly start with a pencil drawing. Once a black and white drawing is completed, I scan it and continue to color it digitally.

I like to work with picture elements that stand free on a flat background. This way I can create pictures that are divided into different parts that stand on their own and are connected to each other at the same time.

Besides creating single pictures or smaller series, I love to work with more complex paper formats like booklets or leporellos (printed work that is folded in a concertina fold). Of course, my illustrations are influenced by my work as a pattern designer – I like things to have no end. A while ago, I created an illustrated booklet that can be turned, folded and unfolded in many directions. The drawings create a web of images with no start or end point on the foldable space and with every fold and turn, the scenes and relations between the figures are rearranged.