Inspiration: Charming world of Olesya Shchukina

Olesya Shchukina is a very talented illustrator and animation filmmaker from St. Petersburg, Russia. She is currently living and working on her new animated shortmovie in France. I'm lucky enough to know her personally, because we've studied together Directing of animation in St. Petersburg's university of Cinema and TV. She is an amazing artist with an easily recognizable style. 

Cute mugs available in Ko-ko-ko etsy shop

Olesya calls herself Spitsbergen (it's an island far to the north, google it, it's terribly beautiful).  She is vegetarian and loves bikes. Olesya, together with her russian friend Ksusha, makes wonderful things (plates, mugs, prints, clothes for kids). They created Ko-ko-ko, where they sell their adorable creations. 

I should definitely get this one =)

I love this fox on the bike

Olesya studied in La Poudriere animation school in France.  She made lots of little animated stories there (watch them here), and her graduation film "Mal de Terre" is absolutely wonderful. Now it's traveling around the world thanks to film festivals, but you can watch the trailer right now! It's made in TV paint animation programme. 

Olesya was sharing lots of back stage photos on her old blog. It's always great to be able to see how artwork comes to life! Cut-out animation has a wonderful charm in it. Now you can follow Olesya's art adventures on her new blog on tumblr. She likes to experiment with new techniques and believes that the story could be told in 5 minutes as well as in one image.

Character research for "The red heels" 

Cutouts for the shortmovie My little hamster

I'm looking forward to see more works by Olesya Shchukina. I hope you enjoyed discovering this young artist and don't wait too long, have a look at her website for more artwork.