'Loving All Kinds of Connections' VOL182 Issue 6 Cover
Spring 2026, Week 6
Description
This is our Sex, Love, and Gender issue, which appears annually around Valentine's Day-ish. The pieces are themed around this, and our covers are always a mish-mash of stuff from it instead of it being for a specific piece.
This year, we're going to focus the main illustration around a scene of people making zines and Valentine's Day cards. This will be a fun way to incorporate a lot of Valentine's Day imagery and also easter eggs from our articles. The view will be of a table with a bunch of craft materials on it. We want to see 3-ish people separately making zines, but not their faces. Maybe we can just see their hands. One of them could have cool painted nails or rings on.
Colour
Requested to make the colour palette like the 'Love is in the air' colours; saturated, pink, and cute.
Specific Items
--> stationary
--> paper
--> stickers, stamps, decals (Valentine's Day theme)
--> scissors
--> DVDs of the films 'east palace, west palace' and 'late chrysanthemums' (this is a reference to a piece)
--> some candles
--> matching friendship bracelets are on the peoples' wrists.
--> a silly ad flyer for a matchmaking service where the method is physically shoving people into each other (this is a reference to a piece).
--> there's a radio visibly playing music (maybe music notes are coming out of it?).
--> coffee, tea, matcha, whatever in mugs/glasses (1 per person).
--> various valentines-themed baked goods on a plate like heart cookies, or whatever else sounds fun to draw.
--> everyone is making zines or valentine's day cards about different things related to love and romantic stuff. one person's has the words 'sex work is work' in their zine.
Sketch
Rough Colours
Final Illustration
Published Cover
