Claire Scully

“Mycelium Paradise” is a series of illustrations that invites the viewer to explore a utopian world of rounded architecture, towering giant mushrooms, and an atmosphere of psychedelic dreams and fantasy. Driven by a deep rooted sense of home and belonging, this series of images presents an alternative reality where harmony, imagination and natural wonders intermingle, living in a utopian harmony. A work in progress, each illustration stands as a potential doorway into another world, a fantasy but a believable fantasy. Rounded architectural structures merge into seemingly giant mushroom forms with a suggestion of sentience. As with much of Scully’s other work the use of scale works to evoke a sense of awe and wonder, hopefully nudging the viewer of the possibilities that can be realised in a utopian world that strives to be better, to live better.

This is part of an ongoing series, started in 2023 and part of a journey into a (still developing) realm where architecture and nature becomes a fantastical symbiotic relationship. A playful mix of both intricate and delicate natural forms with solid more man-made structures that merge together to for a slightly surreal dreamlike landscape. The project as a whole comes from a visual manifestation for a sense of place in an ever-growing insecure world, escaping the real for an alternative world that tries to establish a connection between the ideas of ‘home’ and ‘environment’.

These images, still part of the other ongoing project exploring a sense of home with the world of fantasy, explore in more detail the buildings themselves within this imagined landscape. Rounded Architecture with a nod to a rich architectural history with a slight sense of otherworldliness to them are the main focal point to these illustrations. Like portraits of houses, each image shows us a glimpse into this world, or possible reality where homes are a living breathing part of the environment.

Illustration commissioned by Aeon Magazine for an essay called ‘Octopus time’ by Phd Student David Borkenhagen.

Poster Artwork created for the Burning Hell Band.

32 full colour pages printed on Tintoretto Gesso stock, 102mm x 152mm.

Outer Wilderness: the third journal of a sequence of events that occurred over a vast period of time in an undefined region of deep space.

Outer Wilderness is the conclusion to a long term project which has interrogated our relationship with physical and emotional environments. In this book we look out into the depths of the universe. The viewer is invited to investigate the unfamiliar and potentially hazardous landscape of these projected unknowns.

Each landscape forms part of a mysterious journey across a universe of strange worlds of undiscovered life. Touching on a primal curiosity for adventure and the inevitable childlike desire to poke things with a big stick to see what they do.

Buy here at Avery Hill Publishing

Parkland is an ongoing series documenting the meeting between nature and the urban landscape. Observing the interaction and relationship people have and their effects on urban geography. Moments of anarchy, whitewashed and removed or left to decay slowly, becoming the white noise on the periphery of everyday. Time passing, moods change, Brexit, Extinction Rebellion, Black Lives Matter & Covid-19.

Illustration for a beautiful short story titled ‘Saipan’ by Dave Gregory in issue 12 of Firewords Magazine

Fevral looked upon the land. Illustration for a folklore project exploring the creation of myth and legend by Stewart Easton.

Available to buy as a print HERE.

Sometimes I find myself in a rather inane spot just standing, like an involuntary act of mindfulness, or maybe it’s total mindlessness? either way I get a strong sense of calm when noticing the stillness of these moments.

Council Architecture: A visual exploration of time passing, the ageing conditions and the changing environment of a council estate in north London and its surrounding environment. Built post war during the 70’s the architectural utopian ideals of working class families building communities and a flourishing economy. Over four decades on - how do these environments stand the test of time?

Let us take a moment to reflect on old spaces in a constantly changing landscape. Some of the best architectural design of late 1960’s and early 1970’s has matured (as I mature) into beautiful cutaways from the uniform regularity of the predominantly Victorian terraced streets that surround. There is a playful quality to some aspects of council estate design that still warmly lures me into walking a winding circular wall or running up the slanted brickwork of a nicely rounded diagonal edge. Not all designs put into practice the held the values or ideals of their architectural creators, in fact many had the opposite effect creating dead spaces for more unsavoury business to thrive. I would however like to celebrate a few of the places that I hold in my heart with a fond nostalgia, as these were the bricks and trees of my childhood. From the first journeys on foot as a child to the outer edges of my universe (the end of the street) to the hours spent learning how to exist in this world as an individual among my fellow peers. Memories of power cuts, water fights, first tastes of alcohol and smoking and the beloved game of ’shit-stick’… I accept the world has changed and kids don’t have the same independence children of the 70’s and 80’s were afforded but these urban spaces with their curves and socially inviting layouts were an important part of my journey from childhood into adulthood as they will be for many others. Though we lived ‘hand to mouth’ for many years I feel lucky to have grown up in an environment that had a wealth in community and friendship when other forms of wealth were few and far between. 

First in the series of commemorative drawings in celebration of the upcoming milestone of the Moon Landing. 50 year anniversary (July 2019).

The first in a series of drawings based on observed spaces of London where the city meets the earth. Connections to man made constructions, evidence where people have been, slow decay of time, continued growth underpinned with the soundtrack of engines and birds.

A series of drawings created in response to the joint artist residency with Stewart Francis Easton at St Mary's Art Centre in Virginia City - Nevada, America. Drawings from memory of the places we visited on our adventure in America.

A journal of a sequence of events occurring over a period of time and location in space.

AVAILABLE TO BUY HERE

Internal Wilderness is part of an ongoing project looking at ‘landscape and memory’ - our relationship with the environment, effects we have on the world and space around us and in turn it’s profound affect on our own memory and emotions.

Each of these landscapes is a starting point to a much bigger adventure that strives to answer the question of what lays beyond the horizon.

Within the space on each sheet of paper a world can be created either from a distant memory of a childhood holiday or from the desire to see parts of the world that for now are only dreamed about.

The 'Internal Wilderness' book has a selection of drawings from this series. 32 full colour pages printed on Tintoretto Gesso stock, 102mm x 152mm.