To celebrate the premiere of Penny Dreadful: City of Angels we asked three Society6 artists to create an exclusive collection of illustrations.
Here, learn a bit more about each of those artists, their processes and how the powerful story and aesthetic of Penny Dreadful: City of Angels inspired their work.
Astor Alexander
Graphic Designer / San Diego, CA
Can you give us some insight into how you approached your pieces inspired by Penny Dreadful?
I tried to make a pair of cool posters that would get the mood and themes of the show across. The first poster shows the opening crime scene and the other is a more symbolic depiction of the Devil’s plans for LA.
Tell us a bit about your artistic process—how do you start and how do you know when you’re “done”?
I have a chaotic process. I start with a simple idea for the composition and then figure it out as I go, changing stuff over and over. I’m done when the deadline says I have to be done, which I really appreciate.
If you could travel back in time to any era (and still be an artist!), what would it be and why?
I wouldn’t go back. I’m too used to my modern digital tools and I can’t imagine living without internet. I would rather travel to the future, get augmented and move to Mars. They’ll probably need illustrators over there.
Cassidy Rae Marietta
Illustrator and Painter / Columbus, OH
Can you give us some insight into how you approached your pieces inspired by Penny Dreadful?
I knew right away that I’d want to highlight the Mexican-American folklore that infuses the show as well as Los Angeles, where the story is set. By branching the two, I was able to dissect each topic further, and that opened up more ideas which led to what you see.
In the “LA” piece, I wanted to capture the duality between a sun-drenched cityscape and looming death, crime, et cetera. We are looking at LA before the second World War, but it can also be an observation of things we see today and a small nod to the proverb “history repeats itself,” learning from our past to make more moral decisions for the future. I think currently and globally we’re at the nerve center of some of those decisions. How we perform now will dictate what our future looks like. Hopefully, this all makes us a kinder, gentler society.
“Santa Muerte” employs that same “good vs evil” framework as above. I really wanted to capture the Mexican-folk spirit that encompasses the show, but I also wanted to keep my identity as an artist (which really wasn’t too difficult because I use many of the same elements in my personal work).
I had so much fun with these pieces and I’m super excited to get into a new show!
Tell us a bit about your artistic process—how do you start and how do you know when you’re “done”?
I like to think of my work as a whole. Each individual piece tells a small story that contributes to one boundless narrative, revealing a little with each piece and allowing me to see how the work changes over time.
Being in a really calm space is crucial for my creative process, and these days I’ve had the “Native Flutes” track on repeat with noise-canceling headphones in order to reach that place. (This is telling of the times, I suppose.)
I’m starting to pencil out my ideas more now and execute them slowly, but typically I dive straight into a drawing with Micron-ink permanence and never look back. The work is then scanned and further colored digitally in Photoshop. I can usually come to a stopping point when things look balanced.
If you could travel back in time to any era (and still be an artist!), what would it be and why?
I’ve always been attracted to the styles of the 1920s and the flapper phenomenon. The women of that time were really fearless and open-minded, confronting a conservative society in a powerful way by flaunting their disdain for what was acceptable behavior. And the evolution of it all up to now is pretty remarkable. I guess it’s nice to read about, as we’re all trying to find a place for ourselves in the current age.
Carina Guevara
Illustrator / Austin, TX
Can you give us some insight into how you approached your pieces inspired by Penny Dreadful?
I often start a lot of my artwork by researching the fashion and photography of the time period. For these pieces, it was interesting to make work about a show that hasn’t come out yet, so there was a lot of repeat watchings of the trailers and brainstorming based on what I knew the themes of the show would be. I spent a lot of time looking at the aesthetic of Los Angeles in the 1930s, the fashion at the time and the Latinx presence in photography (or lack thereof). Because the show has Latinx roots, I also tapped into some of my own experience growing up to help inform some of my visual choices like the calaveras and the altar.
Tell us a bit about your artistic process—how do you start and how do you know when you’re “done”?
I work on my iPad Pro, which helps me be a bit more mobile as an artist. I’ll start by collecting images to reference in my drawings, sketch thumbnails and really try to stay loose about my ideas. After I work out a vague version of the illustration, I spend a lot of time building up the form, color and adding linework/details. Selecting color schemes is such a big part of my process, but this time I wanted to pull from the colors I already saw in the show, like the L.A. sunset.
How do I know when I’m done? When I feel like I’m not adding to the drawing anymore and I’ve begun to overwork my pieces. I’ve never liked working on a piece for a long time.
If you could travel back in time to any era (and still be an artist!), what would it be and why?
If I’m honest, there really isn’t a good time period or fun time to be a woman of color (especially an artist) in history. But in an ideal world, I might hope to travel to Paris in the late 1800s, paint alongside famous impressionists and be a contemporary of Cézanne. I have a fine arts background in painting, so Cézanne was always one of my favorite painters and biggest inspirations. It’s part of why I think my work has a very painterly feel to this day.
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