Su Blackwell Studio Blog: Farewell to Intelligent Life Magazine as we know it.

Tuesday, 15 December 2015

Farewell to Intelligent Life Magazine as we know it.

I was invited by the art editor at Intelligent Life Magazine to contribute an illustration to accompany a feature by the writer Robert Macfarlane, in which he muses upon the literature that has inspired him. That was back in 2013, and the feature was only scheduled to run for 6 issues. The feature proved to be so popular however, it ran for 18 issues, over almost 3 years.
Every couple of months, I would receive Robert's copy for the upcoming feature, and I would spend weeks researching, sketching, and making a book sculpture from the book that Robert was writing about.
I would send a final sketch to the art editor, who would give me the go ahead when his team were happy.
The resulting sculpture was then handed to the photographer Colin Crisford, who lit them dramatically in his studio, creating the images you see below.
Now that the magazine is set to relaunch in early 2016, the feature is no longer going to be part of it.

The art editor wrote to me to say,
'I'm particularly sad about losing your contributions for Robert's column as it was always a highlight of the magazine for me and it's become a really lovely body of work over time'.

Here are some of my favourites from the feature.