By Adam Blanchard/Cardinal Points
Abbigail Bruno, art major at SUNY Plattsburgh, has developed a realistic art style inspired by scientific illustration. Art has been passed down in Bruno’s family, with her interest developing at a young age competing with her sister.
“Every time she’d make something, I’d be like, ‘Oh I want to make that,’” Bruno said. “As I progressed, I just started to love it more and more.”
Bruno said art commissions were another step she took toward taking art seriously. She started working on commissions six years ago, with the majority of commissions being for pet portraiture.
“Commission work is so special to me because I get to share my work with people while also creating a lasting memory for my clients,” Bruno said.
Now in her senior year, Bruno has honed in on wildlife illustrations, but the path to finding her style wasn’t always clear. With a concentration in drawing, Bruno worked to master charcoal as one of her go-to media. Much of Bruno’s recent artwork has been influenced by scientists rather than artists. She looks at scientific illustrators Lauren Richelieu and Carl Brenders to draw inspiration.
In previous semesters, Bruno hadn’t fully developed her style. She said her subject matter was all over the place, causing her to struggle creatively.
“I kind of hit a rut halfway through my junior year and I was in a spot where I was falling out of love with art,” Bruno said. “It was just a lot of stress and a lot of pressure.”
Bruno discovered scientific illustrations, reigniting her passion for art.
“I’ve always loved animals more than I like people. That’s how it’s always been, and so it catered to that anyway,” Bruno said.
Bruno’s detail-oriented approach requires a reference. She reaches out to photographers to acquire images suitable for an accurate scientific illustration. Bruno said she typically starts by drawing background elements like in her piece in the Myers Lobby Gallery, “Amur Leopard.”
When working in color, Bruno starts with dark colors, then goes to light colors, making many of her art pieces have darker tones. To achieve texture in her charcoal pieces, Bruno works subtractively.
“I’d take a very fine point eraser, and I’d erase some of those strokes back in so that it’d layer nicely,” Bruno said. “It’s a lot of push and pull. I’m going back and forth with the pencil and really deepening those shadows and pulling back out the highlights.”
Bruno has had her artwork in Malone’s Downtown Artist Cellar, Albany’s Best of SUNY, and SUNY Plattsburgh’s Studio Select exhibits.
Bruno is also the president of the Plattsburgh Association of the Visual Arts. She said most of her time in her role is spent trying to get more people involved in the arts. Bruno also handles communications with mural commission requests and organizes events for students to attend.
Bruno hopes to attend graduate school at Rhode Island School of Art Design and land a job as an art education teacher at the collegiate level.
Bruno’s current series, “What Meets the Eye,” focuses on how the rod and cone cells of an animal’s eyes perceive the world based on colors they can or can’t see. The animal in the foreground will look like how humans see them, while the backgrounds will depict how animals see the world around them. Bruno said she will submit this series to the graduate program she is applying to.
To see more of Bruno’s work, visit her art Instagram, @artwork_byB.
