Flaroh Illustration

Illustrator of the Ancient Mediterranean 🏺 My Art

[flaroh]

Hiya everyone! I'm Flora, a freelance artist specialising in vibrant illustrations of the ancient Mediterranean world 🏺🏛️🌞

📜 [email protected]  🌿 Portfolio 🌿 Patreon 🌿 Merch

[flaroh]

Happy Carmentalia! 💃⏳✍️ may her life-bringing and omniscient future outlook bless us in this new year✨

On the 11th and 15th of January, ancient Romans celebrated the goddess Carmentis (aka Carmenta), who was the protector of midwives and their clients in childbirth, the observer of the future and the past, and the mythical inventor of the Latin alphabet(!!)!

I’ve drawn her here in a dual form emulating her sisterly attendants, Postvorta and Antevorta, who represented what has been and what shall come to pass, as well as the position of the child in childbirth (being born either head-first or feet-first). She was important enough to have a dedicated flamen (priest) out of the only fifteen in Roman state-sponsored religion. Her base was largely female, and one of the few things we know for certain about her worship is that leather and any “dead” animal products were banned from her temple as to not desecrate it with death.

[flaroh]

Apollo & Hyacinthus 🌞🦢💏

[flaroh]

Fragments by Sappho mock book cover 💘💐🕊️

I’ve been continuing to play with cover concepts, and am very excited to share this one for a prospective collection of Sappho’s poem fragments. 💘

I’d come up with the idea earlier, to reuse my illustration of Flora from Stabiae, but this week I stumbled across this very cool font named Big Caesar that looks just like ancient handwriting. I’ve tweaked it a little bit to fit the composition, but overall kept the original look.

[flaroh]

Athena with Olive Branches 🫒🏛️🌿

Mays illustration is a bit of a throwback to the floral artefacts series I created in 2020, where I paired different artefacts with contemporary plants. This time I’ve taken a Athena Parthenos statue and surrounded it with olive branches (slightly scaled up for visual effect)🫒

Even though May’s subject is very Greek, both the May illustration and the matching sticker are based on artefacts and plants I saw on my trip to Rome last month. The Athena statue I saw at the Palazzo Altemps museum, and The sticker is based on a mosaic from the House of the Severi in Rome (2nd-3rd century CE), which I saw at the Palazzo Massimo Museum. I snapped a quick picture because I feel like I almost never see Capricorns in Roman art!

[wolfythewitch]

Katabasis with mama

[flaroh]

Not sure if this translates well into Tumblr, esp because I’m not very good at staying active here, but let’s do a meet the artist bc I really like how this turned out!🏺🌿

🧡My names Flora and I am a freelance illustrator with a special interest in the Mediterranean world, especially Roman daily life around the empire. I love to create art inspired by archaeology sites, ancient myths, and general visuals that echo times long past. This year I’m also looking at maybe exploring fantasy and gothic vibes as well🦇

🌿I went to uni in Baltimore for a bachelors in Ancient Studies, and then returned to the UK for a masters in Museum Studies. I now live in Newcastle which is at the east end of Hadrian’s Wall, and I am constantly inspired by the Romano-British archaeology around me🏺🌿

🏛️for fun I like to hike around the beautiful Northumberland countryside, grab drinks with my friends, read books for my bookclubs, learn Italian, spend all my money travelling to Italy, and occasionally have a Sims or BoTW marathon. I absolutely HATE heights, cooked spinach, not seeing the sun all winter, and all this mass produced AI art nonsense clogging up my feeds 😡

You can see more of my work in my Portfolio, buy prints and merch on my redbubble, and even support me further on my Patreon 🧡

[flaroh]

Nike of Samothrace with Linden branches💖🏛️🌿

created in 2021 for a private client

[flaroh]

‘Hymn to Artemis’ by Callimachus mock book cover 🏹💐🦌🏺

Prints [X]

I’m working on beefing up my portfolio with speculative commercial work, especially book covers. For this cover I had the idea of a female archer leaping through a stylised meadow like something from my 1970s children’s books.

Which version is your favourite??💐

[flaroh]

Livia, Empress of Rome 👸🏻🏛️🌿🍇

Happy Natale di Roma everyone (albeit one day late)!! Aprils illustration is of the empress Livia Drusilla, who ascended to the throne in 27 BCE with her husband Emperor Augustus. This portrait shows her infront of part of the garden fresco found in her villa. She holds a totally not tampered with fig in her hand and looks at the viewer with an imperious gaze 👸🏻

The April sticker is of The Boxer at Rest, a Roman bronze statue of a Hellenistic original. I hope to visit both this guy and Livia’s frescos this week at the museo palazzo since I’m heading off on a cheeky Rome trip tomorrow!!🏛️🌿

I also managed to fit in a quick British museum visit before my train last week to check my reference image in person which was SO cool to do!😍

[flaroh]

Pink Pegasus Club 💖🪽🧡

Begging Chappell Roan to do an Ancient Greek lewk for the ultimate sapphic vibes😭

These designs are an idea l've had for a few months now but only just put onto paper 📝 Patron members can download the hi-res files and wallpapers, as well as see some of my initial sketches👀

[flaroh]

Love and War 💞❤️‍🔥🕊️

Happy valentines everyone!🥰 Februarys illustration is of Ares and Aphrodite looking very flirty and in love, or at least some form of it.

[zooophagous]

Two Legends.

The story isn't kind to either one of us. It's not fair. It's ok to cry.

Finished it finally. I wanted to see if I could replicate pencil drawings digitally and while I did succeed it's much more fun to do a pencil drawing with real pencils IMO. Next one I do I think will be physical media and not digital.

I will be ordering a print of this for myself, if anyone else has any desire for one let me know and I'll put in a request for more when I order it.

[flaroh]

Pink Pegasus Club 💖🪽🧡

Begging Chappell Roan to do an Ancient Greek lewk for the ultimate sapphic vibes😭

These designs are an idea l've had for a few months now but only just put onto paper 📝 Patron members can download the hi-res files and wallpapers, as well as see some of my initial sketches👀

[alexandriad]

returning after a few months long break from drawing with the usual ancient greek ladies

[flaroh]

The Floralia 🌸🏛️🌿

honouring Flora, the ancient Roman goddess of flowers and blossoming plants. 🌸🌷🌿🌱

[kleioscanvas]

Praise Aphrodite, a goddess so much cooler and more interesting than her pop-culture portrayals would suggest