Here are some black and white editorial illustrations I did, commemorating the anniversary of women getting the vote in Canada.

Two of the major players in the fight for the vote were William Lyon MacKenzie King, whom was Prime Minister of Canada at the time, and Nellie McClung, whom was a part of the Famous Five women who fought for the vote.  The illustration above was made to depict the fact that people didn’t know which way MacKenzie was going to side in the beginning.

The following spot illustrations are portraits of Nellie McClung, King, a Suffrage button to help support women, the male dominated parliament’s initial reaction, and the women pushing forward the constitution.

In the next illustration, focusing on suffrage hats, which women wore in support of their cause, I decided to try something different in my approach.  I thought I would see how a scanned pattern/texture would play against my black and white illustration.  For the most part, I think it turned out quite well, but next time I will have to plan to incorporate it in a more balanced way across the rest of the illustration, as well as in the series as a whole.

As usual, click the images for larger versions!  All of these were done utlizing brush and ink, brushpen, dry brush, splatter, on bristol.  Texture added for the last one in Photoshop.  Let me know what you think!

Equality, not just of women and men, is an incredibly important issue which I stand by.  Getting the vote all those years ago made a great dent, but I don’t think we’ve come much further in the fight against prejudice in all its forms since then, and that is quite sad.  I think all people should have equal rights and shouldn’t be judged.  Its also my opinion that there’s always going to be bad in the world in order for there to be good, but I hope that at some point the majority of us can learn to get along!