The southern elephant seal is one of those animals most people will travel their entire lives without ever meeting, let alone sharing a quiet morning coffee with, which is partly why it ended up in my Uncommon Animals of the Alphabet series in the first place. The series has always shown the animals straight on, like a passport photograph or, if we are being honest, a hunters trophy on the wall, and with the dear southern elephant seal that approach produced something that sits somewhere between a blob fish and the unfortunate silhouette of a poo emoji, but once a path is chosen sometimes you simply keep walking it and let people decide for themselves.
There is a quiet satisfaction in taking these strange little animal portraits and letting them step off the page into something physical that people actually live with. A mug is a small thing in the world, but it sits in your hands every morning, and it carries with it both design and a gentle nudge toward the existence of a creature most people will never see in the wild.
What movies or TV series have you watched more than 5 times?
Films rarely push their way directly into my artwork, yet The Big Lebowski has quietly done exactly that over the years. I have watched it more times than I can sensibly justify, not for the plot but for the strange calm orbit of The Dude drifting through chaos, which is a useful reminder that creativity often works best when you stop wrestling with it and allow your own oddities to steer the boat.
There is something deeply appealing about a story that celebrates the awkward, the overlooked and the slightly ridiculous, because that is exactly where the beauty often hides. The same philosophy guides these animal drawings and the mugs they become, because persistence matters more than brilliance and sometimes the most useful thing an artist can do is simply keep showing up, day after day, drawing odd creatures and trusting that somewhere inside the absurdity there is a quiet kind of meaning.
Kids Book Illustrator Andy C Marshall 