VICTORIA HALL

~WRITER AND ILLUSTRATOR~

How to make art that you love

Art from your armchair

Little zombie boy - speed sketch in watercolour

Sketching in Sydney's Royal Botanic Gardens

Demetri

Books... my first love.

Christmas sketches

Dec 20, 2018
1 min

Christmas sketches

Just a quick note to wish everyone a merry Christmas. I'm taking a short break from designing t-shirts to work on some festive sketches. I've mainly been playing around with watercolour paint and pencils. This is a progress shot of an illustration called 'Baby, it's cold outside.' (I'm actually in Australia and it's scorching out there today. Ha, ha!) Here's the final artwork: And this one's called 'Christmas Sleeps': I hope you're all enjoying the break, doing your favourite

Horrible fairies from all over the world

Jun 24, 2018
2 min

Horrible fairies from all over the world

This International Fairy Day, I’m giving you the heads-up on the nastiest sprites from across the globe. Spot them and stop them from ruining your trip! Happy International Fairy Day, fairy fans! No doubt for most of you, the word ‘fairy’ conjures up images of Peter Pan’s playful Tinkerbell, Fern Gully’s forest-saving Crysta or even Sleeping Beauty’s generous fairy godmothers. But, did you know that not all fairies are good? In fact, anywhere you go, there are some downrigh

Inside my little travel sketchbook

Dec 10, 2017
1 min

Inside my little travel sketchbook

For my last Vie-art-nam blog post, I thought I'd open up my little travel sketchbook and share some of my favourite drawings with you. For each sketch, I used a 'line and wash' technique, using an old-fashioned bamboo pen, a soft Asian calligraphy brush and water-soluble Chinese black ink on white cartridge paper. As you can see, I developed the pen and brush work at the same time, but laid some darker washes over the lines. Each sketch took me about 10 minutes. I really love

How to be creative when you don’t have time to be creative

Sep 24, 2017
2 min

How to be creative when you don’t have time to be creative

For time-poor writers and artists, journaling can be a quick and easy way to revive your creativity. Read my five tips on how to get started. Things have been hectic since I last posted on here in June. I’ve moved to a new house, worked around the clock on commissioned writing projects, travelled to Asia with my family and quietly celebrated yet another 30-something birthday. When life gets busy, I find it extremely challenging to carve out time for my more creative projects.

It's in the eyes...

Line and wash character sketches

Jun 14, 2017
1 min

Line and wash character sketches

Here are some line and ink sketches that I recently created. I really enjoy using this medium. I normally try to develop the line and wash together, rather than 'filling in' a line drawing. I like the line to remain crisp, so I dip the pen in a waterproof ink and then use a water-soluble ink for the washes. Here, I've used Winsor and Newton inks and a Speedball pen on smooth hot-pressed paper. I always let ink dry naturally. I never use a hairdryer! x VH #VictoriaHallIllustra

Picasso

Mastering observation

Jun 5, 2017
1 min

Mastering observation

When I’m asked where I find inspiration for writing or illustration, my answer is always the same: life. From a young age, I developed an interest in life as I saw it. I was particularly interested in the people around me—family, friends, foes—and their motivations for doing what they do. Beautiful people. Interesting people. All utterly fascinating. That’s how so many of my characters have been born. Through observation. Every day, I remind myself to open my eyes and my ears

My favourite part of the Sydney Writers' Festival?

May 29, 2017
2 min

My favourite part of the Sydney Writers' Festival?

Folks, the 2017 Sydney Writers’ Festival has wrapped. My favourite part of the program? Family Day! Held in the heart of Walsh Bay on Sunday, 28 May, Family Day encouraged bookworms of all ages to come together for a delightful celebration of creativity and storytelling. Needless to say, the weather and harbour-side location looked picture perfect. With a hot coffee and a fresh croissant, I took a stroll around an exhibition of Roald Dahl’s book covers from across the globe.

Happy holidays

Dec 21, 2016
1 min

Happy holidays

With the festive season upon us, now feels like a good time to wish all of my readers a happy holiday. I hope you have a wonderful break and enjoy some quality time with your nearest and dearest. This Christmas will be a special one for me. My family, who live in the U.K., are visiting Australia for the very first time. Before I go offline for some much-needed family time, I thought I’d share some of my Christmas-themed sketches with you. These will be making an appearance on

The big release

Sep 19, 2016
2 min

The big release

It's been almost two weeks since the release of my third children's book, The Fairy Beasts. I just want to thank my friends, family and followers for their well wishes—and for buying lots of copies of my book! While it's still early days, I'm really pleased with how well The Fairy Beasts is doing. Two years ago, when I launched my first children's book, I naively thought that once it was out, I'd be able to put up my feet and drink tea while the orders flew in. Nope! I now kn

The Fairy Beasts - available now!

Sep 5, 2016
2 min

The Fairy Beasts - available now!

Victoria's third children's book, The Fairy Beasts, is available now in print (AU$14.99) and digital (AU$3.99) formats from Amazon, Apple iBooks, www.victoriahallauthor.com and selected bookstores. In The Fairy Beasts, Victoria Hall explores greed, loneliness, friendship, bravery, perseverance and survival. Gothic, humorous and a little bit gross, The Fairy Beasts is a fantasy story about real fairies. Real fairies are not made of sugar or spice or anything nice. They are dan

Book proof: The Fairy Beasts

Aug 25, 2016
1 min

Book proof: The Fairy Beasts

I'm excited to have received the proof of my new book, The Fairy Beasts, today. Finally, my motivation, commitment and serious hard work has come to fruition! I feel a great sense of achievement holding a hard-copy version of it in my hands. Now, it's time to start the publishing process, which includes arranging sales, distribution and marketing activities. Please stay tuned for more information on how you can get your hands on a copy of The Fairy Beasts! Thanks for reading.

Layout and design

Jul 23, 2016
1 min

Layout and design

Over the next couple of weeks, I'll be completing the layout of my upcoming picture book. Here's a sneak peek at one of the interior illustrations. You can see that I've gone quite gothic with this book, as it's aimed at older readers. Stay tuned for more updates. Thanks for reading. Victoria x #VictoriaHallIllustrator #VictoriaHallAuthor #VictoriaHallBooks #VictoriaHallWriter #VictoriaHallArt