Sometimes it takes a while to fully understand something. I find that answering big questions like that right away, keeps me from discovering the real answer. A deeper answer. 

When my friend asked me this question, I felt that it was a question given to me by the Universe, not so much her. She was being Great Spirit asking me without judgement, without fear; "How do you see these images and relate them to your work?". 

Today, the penny dropped. The answer is that my illustrations and my larger canvases are two sides of the same coin. It's like comparing a one-liner stand-up comedy joke with a 300 pages long novel. They don't compare. In this way I am not saying that my illustrations are 'gone' the next minute - I for one believes that humour lingers on and on, and that the same joke can make us laugh throughout a life time.
And the larger scale images are something else. More intense. Deeper.
And they crave from me two different things. One is witty and simple. Quirky and light. The other is a long-time journey evolving as the painting itself is being made. It is a process of discovery, of finding a core and bringing it out from the deep.

It's all part of the same circle. Expressing and creating. Breathing.