Progress and ideas so far.

Limbo.

My first word of inspiration was Limbo.
Limbo means being on the edge or boundary to hell. It's also described as being the underworld/hell/hades.
Another interpretation is when someone is caught in a situation between two choices/stages, and it's unclear what is going to happen next.

This word lead me to the book The Divine Comedy and the story/poem about Dante's journey through hell, called Dante's Inferno.
To get a better idea of the story, I decided to read the book, and for every circle I wrote down notes about what might be interesting to make illustrations of.
Another idea that I am still kind of working on, is creating something loosely based on Dante's Inferno, perhaps some animal symbolism.

Here are some of my notes and images used for inspiration from Dante's Inferno.

I also found a video game and some photographs that I felt really captured the word being in Limbo. I did not do any research of the game itself, but I might do some reading up on it.

This was also a style I was really inspired by, and I wanted to capture some of that style in my own illustrations. Unfortunately there is a lot of others who has had the same idea and I wanted something more original.

Another story that I found was fitting to the word Limbo, was the story of the Apocalypse and the Four Horsemen.
I've done a little research on this, but it's not something I am completely ready to follow through on yet.

The same goes for Norse Mythology, but I have recently acquired a book on it, and plan to read through some of the more interesting stories.

Some research on The Four Horsemen

Book on Norse Mythology

I've also looked into Norwegian Fairy-tails, although there are no books in our library, I've found a lot of the stories online and even in English.There is a lot of opportunities from a fantasy world, and a lot of interesting stories to base illustrations on.

Another topic that I have some interest in, is indigenous people, aka people without a country, it would be fun to create some sort of packaging that might be inspired by their arts or clothing (most focus on northern people). 

I came over several vodka packaging from Eristoff that were dressed up in coats. I thought this was a very fun concept, and I might explore this further as I want to create some packaging and use some fabric, but I have not narrowed it down yet to exactly what I want to make.

Also during my research about indigenous people, Norse Mythology and Fairy tales, I came over stories and legends about animals being tricksters or stealing the sun and the moon. This is something I might want to do even more research on.

Animal symbolism is something that is very important for most people, that is where a lot of stories and legends come from. Even today we have superstition about black cat crossing the road being a bad omen, so I am also exploring that as an aspect that can be used.
As you can see a lot of these topics are connected and some are almost related, but it's all a string of though were one idea leads to another.

There are some areas that I have explored very briefly and probably won't take further at this point.
One of them is Thermal Imaging and another is Decay.
I did find some really interesting images, and even if I am not going forward with these ideas right now I want to save them for a later time and opportunity.

Decay/Rust

Another idea that I am not sure if I want to take further at this stage is based on emotions and colours.
I had this idea initially, but it became more interesting when I came over an article about emotional space, and how negative feelings can seem to fill a room, making people uncomfortable.
The idea was making masks, somewhat inspired by modern masks and Venetian masks.
The inspiration from modern masks was to display feelings and emotions through (geometrical) shapes and colours. But also use fabric that could be associated to certain activities that provokes specific feelings.
The idea is to create a poster campaign for mental illness.

When it comes to the media I want to use, I have considered posters, artist book, packaging, paper art/cut-outs and illustration.
It's to early for me to decide, but as I generate ideas I also regularly give thoughts of what media would express what I want to say the most considering what I am saying.

Very clever chocolate packaging with a cut-out story box.

Chocolate bars with illustrations.

To reach my goals in this project, which is to use illustration as a creative output, I need to practice doing illustrations.
So far I have started doing some, but also borrowed books from the library about how to draw animal anatomy, and a lot of anime books to learn how to draw humans in different activities and actions.

Drawing illustrations I also need to see the different styles of illustrations to expand my imagination of what is possible, to see all the different variations of illustrations and I have also started drawing my own illustrations.

Drawing my own is a way for me to find my style and to improve my skills.
So far I have learned what kind of pen liner works best for shadowing, outlining and details.
I still have a lot to learn and some illustration can take time.
One of the things is also generating ideas that work together in an illustration, and also get a good balance of the objects.
In this image I haven't planned the balance of the illustration that much, but hopefully I can balance it out when it's closer to getting done.
I've started the outlining, but am not completely done with the sketching.

My current work. taken 2-3 days so far.

To be able to achieve these goals I have invested in new pen liners, colouring pencils that will give a water colour effect when used water on (for a different type of illustrations, mostly to give me options), coloured outliners and markers.

I've also acquired fabric samples that will fit not only one, but several of my ideas.

Satin, lace, crushed velvet, faux fur, faux leather, faux suede leather, and patterned velvet.

I have also decided to order this book, as I loved the style and also want to have it permanently in my collection.

What I must do next is not only to continue my illustrations, but also do more research on the Interzonal theme, or more specific one of the themes I currently am considering.
I feel I need to pin down a certain idea to be able to decide what type of packaging or physical object I want to create.

Then I need to start sketching out and planning these objects, most likely packaging, before I can starts making them.
I will also need to research best printing options for my illustrations to achieve the best possible outcome.