Discover some fantastic highlights on the WIA2023 Exploration Longlist in this curated list. From innovative work to portfolio pieces, the exploration category encourages a huge range of illustration designed to explore the medium, techniques and ideas.
The World Illustration Awards 2023 Longlist features 500 projects by New Talent and Professional illustrators from all over the world across ten categories. This year, the awards celebrate great illustration!
Read on to see our Exploration Category Highlights – and if you’d like to learn more, click through to see the full project and contact information!
Professional
This series of paintings is the artist’s ode to New York City. Whether you are a local, a transplant, or simply a passerby, we all share the awe of experiencing one of the most incredible cities in the world. Each of the paintings is a small vignette observed from the artist’s daily commutes and experiences.
Franco Zacha is an Argentinian illustrator raised in Paraguay, Colombia, and the United States. He graduated from the Rhode Island School of Design and is currently based in Brooklyn, NY.
Professional
The artist created these illustrations for the Instagram challenge ‘Powerful Women Week’ which they host annually with a group of female illustrators. “Drawing challenges with a prompt list for inspiration and a specific deadline are a great way to create personal work.”
For this challenge, the artist practiced frame-by-frame animation and composition to show confident women who encourage each other.
Petra Braun is a freelance illustrator based in Austria.
Professional
Brompton Cemetery is an original pen and pencil drawing inspired by the titular site in the Royal Borough of Kensington and Chelsea. The work is both a map of the place and a character study portraying the cemetery as the Grim Reaper, and sets out to subvert the idea of the burial ground – a site that is often associated with permanency and belonging but here has become nomadic.
Agustin Coll is originally from Barcelona, and has lived in London since 2008.
New Talent
The goal of this project was to explore the diverse ways of sharing the images and stories, and real world application into posters. This project allowed the artist to experiment with different materials from paint to drawing, printmaking, and unorthodox materials.
Jungmin Lee is an artist and a student who studies Illustration Design at Art Center College of Design, based on Pasadena, California, USA.
New Talent
This illustration was created during the summer when the artist was undertaking a residency project. “I was immersed in the green, getting rid of the city, healed by the power of nature. It is as if I leave everything in the world behind and return to be a free spirit.”
Xuan Liu is an illustrator based in Brooklyn, NY, focusing on editorial illustration and picture books.
New Talent
This series represents the different meanings found in the concept of home, depending on space, dimension and perspective of each individual. In this exploration, the artist used paper cuts and coloured pencils delimitated by the icon of a house to find its placement in a playful way.
Denisse Beltran is a Mexican Illustrator and Graphic Designer, currently pursuing a MFA in Illustration Practice at Maryland Institute College of Art.
If you enjoyed these highlights, why not check out the full WIA2023 Longlist for the Exploration Category!