Jonathan McHugh is a freelance artist and illustrator living and working in Northern Ireland.

He has illustrated extensively for advertising, design and editorial clients in the U.K., Germany, Japan and Ireland.

After graduating with a BA(Hons) from the University of Ulster, he spent several years travelling and working as a scenic artist and muralist on various large-scale themed construction projects in Europe, Ireland and the UK. Eventually, he realised that he preferred a warm illustration studio to being covered from head to toe in paint, and decided to follow his muse back to painting and illustrating by returning home to Northern Ireland...

His work has won several awards, including a gold at the 2010 Association of Illustrators Images34 'Best of British Illustration' Awards in London, a gold at the Society of Artists’ Agents Illustration Awards in London in 2004, and a bronze at the 2007 Publicity Association of Northern Ireland (PANI) awards in Belfast. He also had work shortlisted at the SAA Awards in 2005 and 2006, and at the 2007 APA Creative Awards in London's Design Museum.

More recently, an illustration for the Financial Times in London won an award for 'excellence in illustration' at the prestigious European Newspaper Awards in Vienna.

His paintings and illustrations have been exhibited in Japan, London, Dublin and Belfast, and many have even found homes there.

More recently, he also had work selected for inclusion in the 3x3 annual, New York.

He lives by an old windmill on top of a hill overlooking Belfast Lough on the East coast of Ireland and surrounds himself with scraps of paper in an attempt to keep warm. Sometimes he scribbles on them.





Clients include:
Financial Times (London),
National Trust,
easyJet,
BBC,
Allied Bakeries,
Allied Irish Bank,
First Trust Bank,
Public Prosecution Service (NI),
Hankyu (Japan),
Land's End (Germany),
Redactive Publishing (London),
Centaur Communications (London),
Personnel Publications (London),
Transport for London,
Quarto Children's Books (London),
Ulster Bank,
Bank of Ireland,
Workers Educational Association,
Northern Ireland Voluntary Trust,
Queen's University Belfast,
Action Cancer,
Phoenix Natural Gas,
Trocaire,
Toyota,
Hennessey,
Belleek Pottery,
Marble Arch Caves,
Livestock & Meat Commission,
Department of Agriculture and Rural Development,
and many others...