Developed designs - Vis Journal

I have found it really difficult trying to fill my visual journal with ideas whilst not actively working towards a finished product or end of a brief as I'm used to with the other modules. I wanted to experiment with colour outside of my sketchbook and try to elaborate on some of my visual ideas with more focused and finished illustrations, as most of my work inside my book has been investigative and idea driven, rather than visually focused.
Keeping with the theme of destruction I chose to just elaborate on some ideas of Trump as an over the top violence obsessed lunatic, and express this in vibrant colour. To do this effectively I chose to use Promarkers, which give a rich colour but don't lose tone and vibrancy like some digital work does. I very much enjoyed using this method and it's one I'll definitely carry over into my other work.

ihateyoutrump ihateyoutrump ihatehatehateyoutrump

The only reason I'm trying with all my might not to utterly hate Donald Trump after cartooning him for weeks is that I'm now 96% certain that hatred is his actual power source like the sun is for the rest of us, and I don't want to make him any stronger.

I feel that I have had a unique opportunity having this project align with the 2016 Presidential elections, as I've had the chance to experiment with caricature on someone who truly deeply deserves the mockery.
Trump's entire manifesto is focused around "Make America Great Again!". To me this speaks of a man who wants to take the country backwards rather than into the future. Slowly but surely over the past couple of years, acceptance of different races, religions, sexuality, and opinions has been on the rise. Nowhere near to the level it should be, but big steps in the right direction have been made, such as US Congress legalising gay marriage last year for one. Trump is entirely against this progression and wants to go backwards to some idealistic 1950s period where men were men and women were women and everyone was white and happy with an electric lawnmower and cherry pies for dinner. That is absolutely fucking bizarre.
The core mission of his campaign is one of destruction, tearing down the liberal world in favour of a "strong" one. How one country versus every other country on the planet is stronger than a unified planet, I cannot get my head around. His envisioned America is also fully equipped with a wall at the southern border, designed to keep Mexico and South America out of the US, and also be paid for by Mexico. Following the Paris attacks, he suggested a nationwide database be constructed containing all the information for every Muslim in the United States. This all sounds like I'm confusing real life with comic book narratives but it's all true which is far more terrifying.
PLUS RIGHT
The United States is a country of immigrants and since its Western discovery it always has been. The Native Americans were killed and overtaken by immigrants that eventually led to people like Donald Trump who feel they have some God given right to the land, when they don't, they took it with bullets and force, and those are the methods he sees fit to keep using to maintain it.

Researching Trump has been eye opening and also pretty awful, so I've enjoyed deconstructing his character and message into the ridiculousness that it is, whilst not overlooking that it is a dangerous time in our history when such ridiculousness could become the basis for the most powerful office on the face of the planet.
I wanted to express Trump as a destructive force in my illustrations, or at the very least, visually disgusting in some way.