Head Illustrator and Co-Founder of The Nottingham Horror Collective, alongside one half of the witchy music duo Modern Coven, Ruth Skrytek has a knack when it comes to the creatively spooky. After first featuring their illustrations in our October magazine, we knew that there was no one better to design a cover for our magic issue…
Tell us a bit about yourself…
I’m Ruth - I’m an artist, illustrator and design tutor. I trained in architecture and interior design - but have since transitioned to more graphic-design based work.
Tell us about some projects you’ve worked on in the past…
I co-found and now design The Nottingham Horror Collective’s indie zine, a mini illustrative magazine for the morbidly curious. We showcase iconic horror media and Nottingham local creatives who deal with the darkness. Every zine, art print, poster and piece of media we have worked on so far has been a dream come true. We couldn’t do it without Emily (co-founder and editor at TNHC)!
What was the inspiration behind the cover?
I like creating nonsensical, non-euclidean universes - in these drawings I can take hyperbolic geometry to another level.
How does it compare with some other projects you’ve worked on?
The majority of this cover is derived from hand-drawn isometric illustrations, so I was working in one complete raster canvas, which is not something I often do these days - I’m usually swimming in dozens of layers. I haven’t done anything isometric in a while, so it was really fun to work with this again.
What was the biggest challenge that you faced in creating the piece?
Deciding which of the people was going to be assigned as the witch! Maybe your readers can find her?
What have you got planned for the future?
Zine V: The High Priestess came out in March for International Women’s Day - we will be working on more for the release of that one for a while! But our next zine, The Devil, will be coming Halloween 2022.
thenottinghamhorrorcollective.co.uk
@thenottinghamhorrorcollective
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