The Handmaid’s Tale – Illustrations

This weeks kick about over on Red’s Kingdom is the colourful compositions, shapely design and bold typography of Saul Bass. Bass’s graphically designed posters and iconic title sequences are utterly transfixing and I wanted to create illustrations in relation to a series that grasps me just as much. The Handsmaid’s Tale is a dystopian series revolving around the roles of woman in a new male dominated world order. The series is directed by Liz Garbus and is based on the 1985 novel of the same name by Margaret Atwood. The series uses colour and composition in such a visceral way to represent the emotions of the characters, cooling teals and burning reds make up a lot of the series compositions and are splashed alongside more sterile colours, always making for such a striking difference and oozing with ominosity. I made some illustrations revolving around that colour palette and adding some of the phrases frequently used. I think illustrations can be very intriguing when you try take away all the unnecessary stuff and boil the composition down to its core so that it is still completely understandable. Doing illustrations like Saul Bass is tricky as although Bass’s impressive catalogue might look simple, it is hard to know how to get something up to the point so that it looks “right” and although I think my efforts could be better, it was still enjoyable – especially when something clicked and brought it closer to the desired result.••