Book Review: Journey: Digital Plein Air Paintings and Sketches by Dorothy J Hwee

Dorothy J Hwee is a concept artist who currently works at Bandai Namco Studios Singapore, and previously at LucasArts and Imaginary Friends Studios. She has sent me a copy of her new artbook called Journey: Digital Plein Air Paintings and Sketches.

Whenever I see a book from a local artist what I do not know of, it always makes me wonder how many of talented local artists there are that I don't know of. So it's always a pleasant surprise when I see a new name. I went to her blog and saw a post where she was with Luis Esteves, another artist based here who's book I've recently featured.

Journey is a 128-page hardcover book, about A5 size, that collects the digital plein air paintings and sketches that Dorothy has made in recent years.

The places featured in the paintings are from Singapore, Indonesia, Taiwan and Japan. The artworks are beautiful. They definitely have that digital art look, or the digital concept art vibe with the lighting and colours. Most artworks I've seen of Singapore are drawn with traditional media so it feels unusual to look at digital plein air art of Singapore. It makes me feel like those places are from other countries, but that's because most digital scene paintings I've seen are from other countries. It's nice to see how typical Singapore residential neighbourhoods, cafes and iconic landmarks are being interpreted and drawn.

Dorothy enjoys creating digital plein air paintings around Singapore and other countries. And from the paintings, I can tell that she's a very hardworking artist as well. Some paintings can be quite detailed so those must have taken a lot of time. There are selected artworks where she shows her process from the start with sketches and layout, to how she adds subjects and colours until the art is completed. And she published a book. Anyone who publishes a book is hardworking.

And lastly, there are around 30 pages of sketches at the back of the book. These are a random mix of sketches, like trains, buildings, layouts, interiors, characters and more imaginary stuff. They are quite detailed sketches.

Overall, it's a pretty impressive and cool portfolio of personal art.

The book is available at Kinokuniya Singapore, Basheer Graphic Books, Naiise and on her online store. The official retail price is SGD $36.

There's currently a Christmas promotion going on until 31 Dec 2017 where you can get extra postcards including a limited edition Christmas one signed by Dorothy.

You can check out more of her work at https://haruningster.deviantart.com/gallery/ and https://www.instagram.com/dorohwee/