Bold colors, big ideas, these are the types of projects I love working on. This year for Día del los Muertos I got the chance to create some artwork for a Spanish celebration. The first image is a alebrije, which is a fantastical creature from Mexican folklore.

My take on the alebriije is a cat with antlers and raptor claws. Not really sure where this idea came from but the client gave me free reign to create something unique and wild, and this was the result!

The brightly colored creatures in the excellent Pixar movie Coco are all alebrijes. I used the movie for color and pattern reference and based this drawing off the general shape of an ocelot. I also textured the alebrije with a watercolor paper pattern to give it a textile feel.

The second image is an owl done in the Día del los Muertos style. Here the image is framed with marigolds, the flower traditionally placed on alters during Día del los Muertos.