Candice Purwin is an illustrator, graphic novelist and animator living and working in Edinburgh.
Her work is feminist, political, poetic and fierce. Her ability to communicate powerful and emotionally complex ideas through images has led to her co-creating work with a wide range of artists, academic bodies and collectives. While Candice is able to adapt her traditional hand drawn craft across many disciplines, panelled storytelling remains her first and best language.
Candice’s first graphic novel Idle Women on the Water came out in the autumn of 2020. A 200 page comic which documented the arts project of the same name. Her second graphic novel The Shenk was completed in 2024 and is out looking for a publisher. She has had short comics published in Neon Literary Magazine and the Geometry Literary Journal and was shortlisted for the Jonathan Cape Graphic Novel Competition in 2015 and 2016. The diary comics she made throughout the Covid-19 pandemic became part of the Drawn Out readings curated by artist Rachael House.
Candice’s animation for the play STARS was nominated for an OFFIE in 2024. Her illustration and graphic design work has been a defining part of the Making Feminist Spaces network, Teenage Kicks with Hazel Burke and Penny Tinkler at Manchester University, I Had To Dig Deep with Women’s Centre Huddersfield and many more projects, predominantly centering vulnerable or marginalised women’s voices.
Also, since 2016 she has been putting the goblins out into the world. Originally born in a coffee shop in Edinburgh they have become beloved little monsters in their own right.
If you have any questions, drop her a line. Commissions are currently closed but it’s always worth getting in touch. If the project is right, Candice can be tempted to work on something new…