Blow Bubbles Mug

Blow Bubbles.  Original artwork by Julia Griffith.

This artwork began quite by accident.

I was painting my rhino when I discovered a Procreate brush called Old Skin.  As soon as I saw the texture, I thought of the wonderful folds and wrinkles of an elephant’s skin and that was enough to send me off in a completely different direction.

The elephant came first.  Then, somehow, the bubbles appeared.

There was no grand plan behind them.  I simply followed the picture as it developed and the result was this rather lovely, slightly whimsical elephant blowing bubbles.

The words came much later, probably a couple of years after I had first created the artwork, which is often how these things happen for me.  A picture can sit quietly for a long time before I suddenly realise what it has been trying to say.

A Note from the Artist:

I have always loved elephants.  I have touched them in Thailand and I still have my from birth stuffed elephant, Nelly, who has somehow survived all these years.

So perhaps it was inevitable that an elephant would eventually wander into my artwork.

What I love most about this piece is that it was never really planned.  It simply grew, one brush, one thought, one bubble at a time.