HANA MENDEL
Photo illustration in print
Concept sketches
Process: This is a visceral, dark, and heavy piece of make-believe, rich with metaphors for mental illness. I illustrated a few stand-out moments in the story for the team, and they decided to move forward on the concept depicting a bird’s eye view of the main character in bed with the spider-like creature emerging from below.
Fortunately, I managed to scout a room with a bed directly beneath a skylight which was accessible via the roof. I paid the renter to lay in bed while I took some shots (dream gig), and the photolater served as the base image for the final piece.
After some online sleuthing, I found a wire spider decortion on an online Halloween toy depot, and deconstructed it to my liking. The black smudging was made from a combo of activated charcoal and good ol’ extra virgin olive oil.