monday: book illustration.

Today was the first Monday class of the semester, and oh what a class it was. Titled Book Illustration, it is, as you can rightfully assume, a class on illustrating for books. It is taught by Jamie Zollars, who instead of totally gushing about, I will just direct you to her website so you can do your own amount of oggling, and with it, gooey gushy-ness.

Okay, maybe a little gushing. First, Jamie is baller. Super friendly, she's tall and skinny and easily relate-able (mainly because I too am tall and skinny and at most times friendly). Most importantly, she's been in and out and through the industry and knows what there is to know and was just spouting endless facts and snippets about, just, everything.

Like, did you know that under large house publishers are what is known as imprints, which is, essentially, a person designated and rightfully chosen to represent the large house publisher and so is deemed with an imprint that is further printed on every book that s/he publishes under the big umbrella of corporation. Most beautiful example of the imprint is Arthur A. Levine, who found, of all things, Harry Potter. He is a most trusted and noted publisher within the industry and, after the glory that is Harry Potter, well, you know, he's pretty much rolling in it. Just his name makes me drool.

But, the most-most important thing about Zollars is that she had direct correspondence with non-other then Rob Ryan. For him, I will gush: Rob Ryan is a British artist who utilizes the craft of cut paper to create sincere images of everyday life complete with picaresque settings illuminated by color and love. Out of the million and one cut paper illustrators, he has transcended the craft of perfectly cut renderings so typical of the style and instead thrust his own creative ingenuity, also known as illustrative style, into something that was content in shelved library books and frilly Valentine's Day cards. Zollars edited a book on paper craft and so made sure to feature Ryan, as she too seriously enjoys his work. My jaw hit the floor when she said, 'Yeah, I've corresponded with him a few times through a project...'

Zollars also introduced us to her illustrator friend Dan Santat by showing us an interview of his up on the youtubular. Funny thing about the interview, he wrote it himself. He went ahead and said, yes, I want my name out there and so I am going to force some big name person (Elizabeth Bird, big name children's librarian at the Children's Center at 42nd Street of the New York Public Library system, and is super influential in the world of children and books and reading things, as well as is super silly) to interview me. So, over video chat Bird interviewed Santat questions that he told her to ask him. The interview is at points superfluous, but also is a great insight to the life of an illustrator who just made it for himself. Seriously, he just went ahead and did it, and did it big. He's a huge look into the change in the market, as he took it upon himself to promote the books he illustrated as the publishing companies that hired him did not budget to do so themselves. He began book trailers (which are now a super big deal, what is them kindles and things), as well as hosting charity events under the name of the books he illustrated. It was all on him, not the publisher, not the author, not the anybody but him. Super cool dude. Below is part one of the interview:



What's so great about the interview is that it shows Santat's obvious and genuine interests/obsessions and how those things that he so enjoys play a huge factor in his art making. This was the big idea of today's class, utilizing what you love, what you're obsessed with, that one thing that you just know and will always love, and how as artists, we come to separate the two. But why? Why do we decide to seperate our two loves? Why not make a big puddle of love, a cuddle puddle, if you will, that just conceives beauty and greatness. I know that this is a huge factor in my art, that there is a divide between what I love and the work I make. Why can't work be what I love?

We had to go around the room and say what we are obsessed with. I said thrifting. The first thing out of Zollars's mouth was, 'Right off. Right there, that's a tax right off.'

So good.

Finally, we culminated class with the beginning of an assignment. Titled 'Amazing Artists Allegorizing Alliterations', we were to write a four word alliteration that then must be created into an attention-grabbing illustration, something playful, something surprising, and something super fun. Some of my alliterations were:
Average Accountants Appropriate Apples
Bald Base-players Bake Bountifully
Cartwheeling Campers Cook Carrots
Dainty Deer Dance Dramatically
Dirigibles Dart Dangerously Downward
Horny Hipsters Hurry Home
Penelope Pushes People's Products
Trained Tarantulas Trek Tracklessly

But, for the assignment, I chose:
Kitschy Kittens Knit Knottily

Yes, that's right. Who doesn't love some knotty knitting by kittens that will likely be wearing cat eye glasses, lots of feathers and flannel, and be surrounded by wall paper and seat cushions and the like?

Got any other alliterations you want to see me illustrate? Post them and I'll see what I can do!