Von Allan's art, comics and graphic novels

With the 2022 Ottawa Municipal Election just around the corner, the Ottawa Transit Riders tasked me with the illustration and design of their issue-based campaign signs. I wanted to keep “within the ballpark” of what I had done for them in the past, but try to give a fresh spin on things, too. Part of the challenge this time around is that these signs are much larger than before (24" × 18" versus 17" × 11"), but at the same time they needed to be clearly legible and eye-catching from a distance. I wasn’t going to get away with a lot of fine hatching or subtle colour here!

Another challenge was to have a double-sided sign with both French and English text. Working within their requirements was challenging, but that’s also part of the fun!

The “extra” challenge was that they also wanted the illustration to be used for a campaign button, too. That’s hard; the button itself is only about 2" in diameter, so too much fine detail would be lost if I simply shrunk my art down from 24" to 2". What I wound up doing instead was taking my initial design for the campaign sign, shrinking it down alright, but re-inking and re-colouring the entire thing in a different way to make this smaller version “work.”

What makes this election fairly fascinating are the number of incumbents who are not seeking reelection. These include Councillors Jean Cloutier (Alta Vista), Diane Deans (Gloucester-Southgate), Keith Egli (Knoxdale-Merivale), Mathieu Fleury (Rideau-Vanier), Jan Harder (Barrhaven), Catherine McKenney (Somerset), Carol Anne Meehan (Gloucester-South Nepean), Scott Moffatt (Rideau-Goulbourn), as well as Mayor Jim Watson. Catherine McKenney is running to replace Jim Watson as Mayor, but I’m not sure if any other current Councillor is doing so (Councillor Deans was, but announced that she had dropped out). The nomination period is still open, so this could all change.

Anyway! My sign designs are below. I added two mock-ups in attempt to show what they’ll look like “out there” in the world at large. Pretty neat, eh?