A butterfly that crosses continents.

The Painted Lady definitely deserves its own infographic. It is one of the most widely distributed butterflies on earth, absent only from Antarctica and South America, and its annual movement north into Europe and back south again is completed by successive generations rather than by any single individual. A round trip of roughly 14,500 km, much of it flown at 500 m and above, out of sight of anyone watching from the ground.

On process: coloured pencil is a slow medium, which is largely why I use it for self-indulgent projects. Colour cannot be mixed on a palette; it has to be built on the paper, one translucent layer over another, until the layers add up to the value and hue you’re after. The darkest darks might be up to ten passes, laid in browns and reds and greys that only become black by accumulation. There is no shortcut, no undo, and no way to speed it up without the surface showing it.

I find that entirely absorbing. It is a self-indulgent way to work, hours spent on a passage the size of a thumbnail, for a gain most viewers will never consciously register, but the slowness is the point.