How Bleak Illustration Started

“Life sucks and it is okay.”

In this civilized age, having negative feelings/emotions is frowned upon. However, these feelings and emotions are a part of what makes us human and it does us no favours to deny them.

Bleak Illustration was born amid a sea of uncertainty and lack of outlets for expression after the artist graduated from school and was thrust into the carnival of horrors known as the working world. The illustrations and products explore and showcase her existentialism and inner thoughts and struggles while tackling the game of life.

Through these articles, the artist hopes to show those going through a bleak time in life that they are not alone in their struggles and that there are in fact people that do relate.

Bleak is not tied to just ‘illustrations’ it is a series of products that are ever-growing with the artist’s material/product knowledge and software skill. When I started in 2012, my only products were handbinded notebooks and stickers. Since then the brand has grown to include paintings, customisable 3D printed stainless steel rings, Ezlink charms, handpainted totebags, coasters and uniquely designed socks, ceramic wares and many more new/crazy products that has yet to be explored.

About the Artist

Mui Ping is a social designer by day and illustrator, product designer and hamster-mum by night. An aspiring artist growing up, the harsh realities of life led her down the road of design instead. In an odd twist of fate however, she not only ended up enjoying her chosen course of study, but found an unexpected outlet where she could express and implement her art.

With an artist career being an uncertain one, she relegated drawing and illustrating to the side, choosing the stability of full-time work as a designer instead. Despite this, her love for drawing culminated in her own brand, Bleak illustration, as a way of documenting the hardships and life struggles through quirky illustrations.

She also has a weakness for adorable animals.