Katie Whittle Illustration

Liverpool based artist, lover of all things spooky, nature enthusiast.

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The Moon- Common vampire bat

The Moon is a card of mystery, hidden meanings and revelation of the unknown

Upright: uncertainty, mystery, fear and hidden things

Reversed: revelation of mysteries, unhappiness

Been working on The Bad Trip Tarot again, the Moon card is represented by a common vampire bat. Their venom is present in their saliva and an anticoagulant administered through their bite (usually on sleeping livestock). They felt like a perfect for with the moon card, both because it’s an air card but also because their shared mystery.

Vampire bat venom has been explored by the medical community for it’s anticoagulant properties and could now be used to improve blood flow stroke victims.

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That which is above is like to that which is below, and that which is below is like to that which is above.

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The Bride

Bookmark design, just wanted to play with different aesthetics and techniques than I normally do. I would also love to print this with black foiling 🖤

[spitblossoms]

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One for anger Two for mirth Three for a wedding Four for a birth Five for rich Six for poor Seven for a witch …I can tell you no more ✨ Between conventions, packing Kickstarter rewards, etsy deliveries and on top of it having some demonic form of the flu…I’ve managed to relax this evening and work on my book a little :) Beware, my timeline will be very magpie and folklore related soon! #art #illustration #letter #folklore #typography #magpies #birds #bird #instaart #digitalart #rhyme #magpiesofinstagram #zine #birdsofinstagram #illustrator #witchy #witchyvibes #borb #manuscript

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Card spotlight: The Moon

Card spotlight: The Moon

Occult Ornithology Tarot deck now available to pre-order! This week’s card spotlight will be looking at the 18th card of the major arcana, The Moon, represented by a Lyrebird.

My version of the card is represented by a superb lyrebird, a bird renowned for it’s ability to mimic. When thinking about The Moon card, it was important to find a bird that represented the idea of deception and hidden…

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Card Spotlight: The Hanged Man

Card Spotlight: The Hanged Man

Occult Ornithology Deck: Available to pre-order

This weeks card spotlight is the twelfth card in the major arcana, The Hanged man.

My version of The Hanged Man is represented by a ring necked pheasant. When I fist discussed creating this deck with my partner we were suggesting different birds for cards, the first suggestion for the hanged man was a pheasant and since then nothing really…

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Card Spotlight: The Tower

Card Spotlight: The Tower

Occult Ornithology Tarot- now available to pre-order! This week’s card spotlight is the 16th card in the major arcana, The Tower

When it finally came to the time of designing the card for The Tower, I didn’t have a specific bird in mind, I just knew it should be a sea bird or bird that nests in cliff faces, for the life of me i couldn’t think of a more precarious place for a bird to live,…

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Card Spotlight: The Hierophant

Card Spotlight: The Hierophant

Occult Ornithology tarot: Now available to pre-order!

Todays spotlight will focus on the fifth card in the major arcana, The Hierophant, represented by an Onagadori Rooster

Applying the idea of ‘tradition’ to a bird isn’t necessarily an easy concept. Lots of birds have been revered for centuries, could I use tradition in that sense? That context didn’t really sit right with me, it was only…

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Card spotlight: The Wheel of Fortune

Card spotlight: The Wheel of Fortune

Occult Ornithology- Now on Kickstarter! The next card featured in the spotlight is the tenth card in the major arcana, The Wheel of Fortune.

Deciding what should portray the Wheel of Fortune in my deck wasn’t immediately apparent, I knew it needed to have a circular motif and the idea of the nest seemed fairly obvious but tying it to the concept of a change in fate or fortune wasn’t…

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Card spotlight: The Star

Card spotlight: The Star

Occult Ornithology- Now on Kickstarter

At once a voice arose among       The bleak twigs overhead In a full-hearted evensong       Of joy illimited; An aged thrush, frail, gaunt, and small,       In blast-beruffled plume, Had chosen thus to fling his soul       Upon the growing gloom.

The Darkling Thrush, Thomas Hardy

The next card spotlight is for the Seventeenth card in the major arcana, The…

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Card Spotlight: The Hermit

Card Spotlight: The Hermit

Occult Ornithology– Now on Kickstarter! The next card spotlight is for the ninth card in the major arcana, The Hermit, represented by a grey heron.

When deciding who should represent The Hermit card it was quite difficult, I knew I needed a bird that lives a solitary life outside of breeding and who visually could mirror the feelings inspired by the Rider-Waite hermit card. I’ve always had an…

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Card spotlight- Judgement

As some of you know prom my previous post I have been working on a bird tarot deck, Occult Ornithology, which is now on Kickstarter. I have decided to do a spotlight every few days for cards! I will be shuffling a deck and pulling a card from random for each one, this morning I pulled out  card number 20, Judgement.

As a card, Judgement was one of my favourite cards to draw. I knew early on when…

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The Fool- bird tarot deck

I’ve started (for fun) designing a bird inspired tarot deck, I only plan to do the major arcana at the moment and I’m making a heavily inspired by the Raider-Waite tarot deck, with my own interpretations in addition.

The Fool- white stork

The fool is the first card in the major arcana, often unnumbered but I chose to start with ‘0’ and symbolises the beginning of a story. The journey of…

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Cephalopedia

Vampire Squid

As a way to unwind while working on my next major comic project (Maleficarum with Frisson Comics) I’ve been making illustrations of my favourite cephalopod species.

Paper Nautilus

The style has been fun to practice with so far, and may become my 2020 animal zine depending on results!

Any excuse to draw octopus, I have a list of all my favourites I need to work on 😀

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I’ve recently been reading The Paleoartist’s Handbook by Mark Witton, it’s a cracking book talking about the history of paleoart, talking about how to create good paleoart and it gives lots of gorgeous examples in loads of different styles! I’m about halfway though and it’s left me itching to draw my own paleo art.

I decided I wanted to depict a prehistoric ocean, a subject not so shocking to those of you familiar with my love of aquatic life. I wanted ammonites for their iconic shells and tentacles and one of their main predators and my favourite type of Ichthyosaur Opthalmosaurus. In his book, Witton talks a lot about the importance of biological accuracy and intent to portray an accurate depiction of the time you are presenting. I have tried my best to accurately portray the biology of both animals depicted, I originally was going to have a kelp pattern in there as well but research showed me most marine fauna had yet to evolve and the Jurassic sea had mostly reefs.

I’ve always wanted to create a repeat pattern that could be used on fabric or paper and i adore victorian wallpapers so i tried my hand at making the design  a repeat pattern which i’m fairly happy with. It was quite fun to make though so no doubt i’ll be trying my hand at designing more, I might even have a go at doing another paleo inspired one!

For now, i’ve put the design on my Redbubble shop while I decide wether i’d like to do anything else with the design for now, or if i’d like to practice more.

It is really cool seeing the Redbubble mock ups of the image though 🙂

Blog post talking about the process for my latest illustration. I really do recommend the paleoart book i talk about in the post for this of you who love prehistoric life! I've recently been reading The Paleoartist's Handbook by Mark Witton, it's a cracking book talking about the history of paleoart, talking about how to create good paleoart and it gives lots of gorgeous examples in loads of different styles!

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Bookmark design

At the time of writing this post, I have 10 days left on my Kickstarter and am inching closer to my #4th stretch goal which is an exclusive Kickstarter bookmark, here is my design:

The theme of this design is perfection in knowledge. I’m really happy with how it has turned out! The symbol at the top represents platinum, an element in alchemy often representing perfection.

If I reach £1400 on my…

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