Sunday 28 August 2016

Katarzyna Oleska - Artist Extraordinaire!

One of my favourite blogs is Reading and Art which I have mentioned before during my ramblings.  Recently it brought to my notice a remarkable artist / architect -  Katarzyna Oleska.  Her artistic works include sketches, paintings, and caricatures and she is self-taught.


Cover illustration for "Ksiezniczka" (The Princess) by A. Pilipiuk
This is one of my favourite pictures of all time.  

Katarzyna was born in 1981 in Poland and took a Masters in Architecture and Urban Design at Warsaw Technical University, graduating in 2006, before working as an architectural assistant / junior architect with a Warsaw firm of architects.  Subsequently she moved to the UK and since 2013 has concentrated on illustrating books and magazines for publishers and working for private clients as an illustrator.   She lives in Ramsgate, Kent.

She works in a variety of media having started out making pencil sketches of  people at the age of nine.  She is fascinated by human faces, expressions and anatomy and that fascination comes across in her work.

"Man in India" by Katarzyna Oleska

As well as her sketches and digital work Katarzyna also works in oils and acrylics.  Her caricatures are remarkable and if you visit her website or blog you can see a short video on making caricatures or you can buy a full length video from www.gum.co/caricature.  She also has other tutorial videos available.

Among her recent works are 14 book cover illustrations for the Piper Verlag series of Terry Pratchett's Discworld, published in Germany, Austria and Switzerland.  Great art and Terry Pratchett - what more could I want?


Cover illustration for "The Science of Discworld 2"

Privately she describes herself as a very optimistic person with a good sense of humour.  I am most grateful to Katarzyna for permission to reproduce the three illustrations in this post.

10 comments:

  1. Wow. She now is one of my favorite artists as well. I have to see if she has a website. Is The Science of Discworld in English?

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  2. Katarzyna has a website - there is actually a link on the text above -
    http://www.katarzynaoleska.com/
    The Science of Discworld (and The Science of Discworld 2) are published in English but the ones of which she has illustrated the covers are in German.

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  3. Thanks for the post and link.

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  4. Impressive. The b&w one I would have taken for a photo!

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  5. Amazing! My admiration for artists is almost boundless.

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  6. Her good sense of humour certainly shines through her work!
    Great talent, beautiful paintings/drawings.

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  7. Wonderful pictures. And self taught, too. I think some people must have a natural gift for doing stuff that seems almost photographic. I don't think I could do that in a thousand years! I am glad I know a bit about the person who has done those cool Pratchett covers now, though!

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  8. I have to visit her blog! Amazing works of art! I really admire artists. My Great Grandfather was an artist. His talent seems to have skipped a few generations as many of my Grandkiddos and siblings children have artistic talents. This young lady is truly gifted. Thanks for sharing!

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  9. Well going through Katarzyna's website occupied a good few minutes. I think the clarity of her illustrations is beautiful and I can see why the first one is one of your favourite pictures. There is a theme similar to one you gave me.

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  10. Hi everyone,
    First of all big thank you to John for writing this post - I really appreciate it!
    And thank you all for your kind compliments. I am really happy you like my work!
    Katarzyna

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