J.A.W. Cooper was born in England and grew up in Africa, Sweden, Ireland, various other locations throughout Europe, and California. Cooper’s love of drawing and curiosity toward the natural world evolved naturally as she traveled around the globe. Inspired by forms found in nature, curio cabinets, fashion photography, the grotesque, alien, and flawed, Cooper makes a living as a freelance illustrator, gallery, and sketch artist and currently lives and works in downtown Los Angeles, California.
Pulling inspiration from artists including the likes of Mucha, Sargent and Audobaun, her illustrations convey the delicate balance between life and death, as well as nature and mankind’s interaction. Cooper’s female characters are nymphs, maidens, selkies, mother goddesses, feral women, and warriors. At any given time, they could be both at peace or at war – fighting the strong and nurturing the weak, but constantly in conflict. Strength, sorrow, fear, peace, and mourning are not uncommon themes, oftentimes appearing simultaneously in her artwork.
Cooper is talented in multiple media types, including drawing, sculpture, and digital, but her go-to media is ink and gouache (an opaque watercolor-like medium). Utilizing this easy-to-use method allows her to paint almost anywhere, and she is frequently found in Redwood forests or museums painting or working on studies for later projects. Her delicate line quality is a hallmark of her illustrations, as is her love for cut paper, adding additional dimension.
