My name is Milo Pennington.  I’m a senior at Pacific Grove High and I love creating imaginative scenes involving dynamic perspectives with aquatic inspired characters. I gain most of my inspiration from marine environments juxtaposed with everyday occurrences. I am inspired by the ocean and its abundant sea life, and I enjoy adding irony and humor to tell a story. In the future, I aspire to illustrate entire stories with my art and hope to pursue this passion as an animator and illustrator. I plan to have a career where I continue to draw fantastical marine characters and places from my imagination.

Regarding art materials, I like to use ink pens or color pencils because they give me control where I am putting colors. These tools also make it easier for me to focus on smaller details with figures or with body parts, as in the hands and facial expressions of the characters I draw. I have extensive experience with gouache and markers.   I really love the results I get from layering colored pencils and the expressive lines I can create with ink,  so I used the latter materials for this piece.

The piece I am submitting, Wrong Bus, features a scared widow rockfish hybrid who caught the wrong bus, finding itself in the wrong neighborhood after dark. When the fish realizes it is seated with harbor seals, which are natural predators to the rockfish, the fish knows it's in trouble. I tried to convey the terror of the rockfish, and a relaxed harbor seal, legs casually crossed and simply waiting for his evening meal. This piece went through many iterations as I chose to use color pencil in order to layer and blend cooler colors that contrasted with the blazing sunset.