Analysis
I was looking through her collection of felt toys and characters when I noticed that her pieces, particularly the fairies, bore a striking design resemblance to the children's book character 'Flyaway Katie' by Polly Dunbar whom I had recently researched.
I thought that Penni's pieces whilst not convetional children's book characters were still characters in their own right and an interesting area of illustration and design to explore. She creates these soft toys and characters entirely out of natural felts and fabrics by hand.
Whilst not in a book or television show like most children's characters these fairies and animals Penni creates all have a character that comes to life with every person that imagines it for themself instead of reading or watching it in a book or show.
Penni's pieces could easily lend themself to children's books or stop-motion animation.
In particular her work reminded me of the characters in 'Old Bear and Friends' a television series made of stop-motion animation using soft toys as characters. The characters in the television show came in all forms, soft toys, television characters and illustrated in children's books. I could see the work of Penni Townsend easily doing the same.
The fairies in particular caught my attention as I could see them in a
book or stop-motion animation. They have soft faces and warm smiles.
They look friendly and inviting and their sheer gold skirts with
glittery stars and wings make them look magical and appealing to
children and set off an imagination.
I couldn't help but pick up and have a look at all of her items for sale as I found them so captivating. The set of sleeping mice also caught my attention and inspired me with stories and characters for each of them. In terms of details the fairies are quite refined in their finish, neatly sewn and unexposed stitching. This finish is quite considerate for the character as it reflects the polished, elegant personality of a fairy.
Her pieces are all full of unique character as each one was individually handmade and designed, they're not a mass-produced soft toys but each hand crafted and thought about carefully.
Unalike the fairies the mice have exposed stitching and a very handmade quality to them. This unrefined finish reflects and gives character to the little mice. I think of things like mice building their own nests and piecing things together when I look at them.
The four sleeping mice for example all have different faces and teddy's. They follow the same sewing pattern but each has a unique trait to them and so much potential as a children's story book character. Looking through her pieces set my imagination wild wiht ideas of children's book ideas.
Experiments
The background needed to compliment the character so I chose a dark pastel yellow in a similar tone to the ones found in her skirt. I placed the character slightly off center, framing her entirely in the box didn't look right
As the artwork in these experiments is photographs the cover I felt ought to be quite simple and a tool to enhance the image. A clean background in a complimentary colour and a short, eligible title.
The designs of Penni's work are child friendly and I can evisage them effortlessly working in children's stories. I chose simple titles and backgrounds as the artwork itself is very detailed, being photographs of real objects. Using a photograph of the physical soft toys I think works very well but also her designs and characters lend themselves to being illustrated in a traditional way.
In these experiments I used my own artwork drawn from Penni's designs as the cover art for these children's book covers. Whilst I like the designs of my own illustrations I do believe that Penni's work photographed and collaged onto the book cover works nicely and retains the true nature of her characters.
My drawings are adaptations and in developing on her designs lose their personality and become their own character. I used water colours and pencil as I thought anything else wouldn't capture the soft, delicate nature of Penni's work.
The title and authorship remained simple, eligible. The colour of the title was important as this time it was against a coloured background.
Dark/contrasting colour type didn't work out as a well as shade darker of the background itself or...
White. I think these colours worked best.
As well as experimenting with painted character copies of Penni's pieces I also bravely experimented with creating my own sewn character. I (very poorly) made a rabbit which I scrapped. I then made a reindeer soft toy which due to more consideration and thought on design worked much better and actually looked like what I imagined it would.
Trying different background shapes.
Like before I've put the character into context of traditional children's book illustrations and used a photograph of my soft toy to create a children's book cover. Finding a background to compliment your character is important, the light brown and pastel green worked best for the characters design as they both enhance the details in the toy: it's red nose, rosy cheeks, red heard and stitching. The backgrounds of pink and red these elements of the character don't stand out as much.
As I hadn't used the red in the background I could use the red instead for the details of the cover, such as the title.
The white border frames the artwork and creates composition for the book cover.
Evaluation: Penni's
handcrafted plush toys can be looked at as a different form of
children's illustration. The design of her toys makes them become
characters. Each is unique and has a personality. Whilst different to
the traditional methods of illustration they are in their own way a form
of children's illustration. As a physical thing, a soft toy, they can
also be used in other more conventional forms of illustration such as
television (stop-motion) or photographed and used to illustrate a
children's book.
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Bibliography
Artwork/images
- Dunbar, P. (2004). Flyaway Katie. Candlewick Press.
- Hissey, J. (1986). Old Bear. Random House.
- Hissey, J. (1990). Jolly Tall. Random House.
- Hissey, J. (1993-1997) Old Bear Stories. ITV.
- Townsend, P. (2014). Christmas Fairies.
- Townsend, P. (2014). Door Mice and Bottom Drawers.
- Townsend, P. https://www.facebook.com/pages/Pennittextiles. Pennittextiles. Facebook page.