Jonathan Arras

My Spirals In Love series depicts fantastic creatures spiraling in and out of love. Figures traditionally associated with children's art (magical beings, monsters, anthropomorphized animals) are often burdened with very human and sometimes adult emotions. Common themes are delirious love, loneliness, and giant desserts.

My paintings are done with a 3-step process. First, I use a soft pencil to rough out vague shapes of figures, sometimes based on thumbnail sketches. Then I select my colors and apply them in stages - depending on the painting I may let each color dry for more separati...

My Spirals In Love series depicts fantastic creatures spiraling in and out of love. Figures traditionally associated with children's art (magical beings, monsters, anthropomorphized animals) are often burdened with very human and sometimes adult emotions. Common themes are delirious love, loneliness, and giant desserts.

My paintings are done with a 3-step process. First, I use a soft pencil to rough out vague shapes of figures, sometimes based on thumbnail sketches. Then I select my colors and apply them in stages - depending on the painting I may let each color dry for more separation or I may blend several layers of color while still wet. One thing that I strive to do with this series is apply painting techniques from other mediums to watercolors. This allows me to get brighter colors and textures not usually seen in traditional watercolor paintings. Finally, I elaborate on the original sketch with colored inks.

I have been making art since I was a child, but the origins of the Spirals In Love style can be traced back to around age 15 when I discovered the joy of adding definition to the usually soft edges of watercolors. The spirals came shortly after that.