How to use this Page

Post by Jeanine

It’s hard not to fall in love with the work of French illustrator Rebecca Dautremer; Her picture books are like stepping into magical worlds filled with charming characters. With warm color palettes, subtle textures, and unexpected compositions, she tells her fairy-tale & folklore inspired stories with a surprising twist & a touch of humor, making them extraordinary stories for children and adults alike.

She often collaborates with her husband, French children’s book author Taï-Marc Le Thanh, and has also worked on a few animated projects. Stop by her website to see more her beautiful work!

This Art Crush entry has truly been a long time coming. I first came across Lisa Congdon by way of Meighan O’Toole’s former art blog and podcast, My Love For You (which is post-worthy in its own right–it was an enormous source of inspiration for me during my college years). While I definitely gravitated to Lisa’s work on a visual level, it was her personal story that drew me in. Freelance illustration had been her second career. She didn’t start painting or making art until she was 31, and here she was, participating in museum-level shows, working with clients like Chronicle Books, and just being a genuine, successful badass. Lisa is not only someone I look up to artistically–she’s also a prime example of a human being.

Lisa’s art career was secondary, after she accumulated over a decade of experience in the education and nonprofit industries. By pure chance, she stumbled into a painting class and began making art of all kinds from that day forward–fueled by pure joy instead of the desire to succeed quickly. Having always been an avid collector, her random ephemera would find their way into countless collages as well as a series of photos, drawings and paintings that would eventually make up her A Collection A Day project. As she continued to develop her craft and share it with the ever-expanding Internet, people began to catch on. Today, she is an accomplished and prolific working artist, blogger, illustrator, public speaker and writer. Some of her most notable clients to date include The Land of Nod, The Museum of Modern Art, Harper Collins, 826 Valencia and Martha Stewart Living Magazine.

Lisa unabashedly tackles the subjects she is most passionate about, and that fearlessness is expressed effortlessly in the execution of her work. She describes herself as a “visual junkie,” and is deeply inspired by patterns, travel, architecture and vintage packaging, just to name a few. A faithful blogger, Lisa writes about her own process in addition to other artists whom she admires, as well as her life “outside the studio,” which includes swimming, biking, sewing, and traveling. In other words, she’s just making all of us look bad! (I only kid.)

One of the reasons I relate to Lisa’s work is due to the versatility and ever-evolving nature of her aesthetic. Certain characteristics like neon hues and her penchant for all things Scandinavian are mainstays, but she continues to branch out and explore all kinds of mediums (block printing and calligraphy, to name a few). These explorations fuel her work and expand her direction, which is most recently geared towards abstract painting. She’s a wonderful example of why you don’t need to narrow yourself down to one specific style (something I often grapple with).

Lisa is quite a unique artist in that she is not only a creator, but a mentor as well. Breaking into freelance illustration can be a challenging and solitary undertaking, and she continues to give her generous time to those who wish to pursue and learn more about the field through classes, speaking engagements and conferences around the country. I first met Lisa at her first Freelance Illustration class at Makeshift Society back in December 2012, and it was one of my most pivotal learning experiences to date.

Lisa recently released her new book, “Art, Inc.: The Essential Guide for Building Your Career as an Artist,” which is a revolutionary and timely answer to the starving artist stereotype. It covers all areas of the freelance artist’s domain, such as photographing fine art, finding printing services, copyright, and diversifying income. It sits on the shelf above my working desk (I like to call it my “VIP” shelf) as I reference it constantly.

On that same note, I’m very excited to be taking Lisa’s “Become A Working Artist” class through CreativeLive next week! You can follow along with the class virtually by RSVPing here.

To listen to Meighan’s podcast with Lisa, click here. I also highly recommend her feature in The Great Discontent.

Follow along with Lisa below:

Website

Twitter

Blog

Instagram

Purchase Lisa’s books below:

Art, Inc.

Whatever You Are, Be A Good One

A Collection A Day

Found these wonderful interviews with Mo Willems, I thought I would share them with you.

This week we feature the wonderful illustrator Barbara Johansen Newman. Barbara has been illustrating professionally for more than 20 years. She’s done art for books, art for magazines and newspaper articles, art for calendars and advertising, greeting cards, corporate reports, medical reports, and invitations.

For the ten years before she was an illustrator, she worked with puppets and created figurative fiber sculptures which she has exhibited at shows and galleries around the country.

She holds  B.F.A. in Art and a ceritificate in Art Education.  She lives in Massachusetts with her husband Phil, her three sons, Dave, Mike, and Ben and her dog Bitty (in picture on left).

Here is a picture of Barbara’s studio.

When Barbara paints big, she uses antique dough boards. I asked about them and Barbara said, “They are large slabs of wood, usually one single plank wide, probably cut from old growth trees, mostly of pine. They are also called “noodle boards.” Women used them for kneading dough for bread and noodles of sorts. They are often fairly large–20 by 28 or more. Some have lips that hung over the edges of tables to make them more stable.”

Here’s a good example of one: http://www.antiquepeek.com/wood_dough_board_2.htm

I like painting on them and have purchased them whenever I can find them at a reasonable price.

This is the first color illustration assignment Barbara ever got–a piece on Turkey farms for Boston Magazine back in the 80s.

Tell us a little bit about the puppets and dolls you did right out of college.  Where the puppets marionettes? What materials did you use to make the dolls?

While I was still in college I met Lois Bohevesky and with her  and Frieda Gates I spent a summer studying puppetry and puppet making at the Bil Baird Theatre in New York. (it is no longer there)  I learned to make and operate hand puppets, rod puppets, and marionettes. That course planted the seed of a love of puppetry and everything puppet related. By summer’s end my future husband had built us a portable stage that could be used to do small shows. We packed up our rented van and moved to Buffalo, where we had transferred for our fall semester in college to be together. I posted puppet show flyers in different places and somehow we began to get calls and jobs from out of nowhere to do puppet shows all around the Buffalo area.

The big change in our lives came when we were hired to perform at a craft show. Instead of paying us a full fee, we took a table to sell puppets, because I had discovered that I loved making them as much as performing with them (actually more). After that show we were hired for othe

I would like to introduce you to Casey Girard. She studied Illustration and Graphic Design at RIT in upstate NY and currently works out of the Boston, MA area. When she moved to Boston in 2006, she joined the Publishing world at Houghton Mifflin; first as a temp in the marketing department of the School Division and by the end of summer a full time marketing designer in the Trade Division.

She says, “It was a blast getting to be a part of all their amazing books and helping them be received into the world.”

In 2009 she stepped out of her full time position with Houghton Mifflin Harcourt to become a full time freelancer. She continues to create marketing materials for a few companies including Houghton Mifflin Harcourt, The Boston Conservatory, and Shambhala.

Casey says, “My illustration has been ongoing throughout the years in my own projects, pieces that fit with my marketing jobs, and attendance at SCBWI conferences. Now as a freelancer I am putting more emphasis on my illustrating through time and marketing.”

She works in colored pencil, using the process of burnishing to create soft surfaces, and watercolor, to keep my pieces loose.

Here is Casey’s Process:

With all these animals I use lots of reference. I do my best to collect my own. In the case of this story I was able to use my photos from our zoo trips.

When I start my illustration I begin with sketching. Getting to the illustration is usually after I have done numerous studies to fully know my characters. Once I get to drawing an image I will usually sketch out a piece over and over to get it right. Although, even then I may have to go back and rework am image once I see how the color changes things. Especially in this example. I challenged myself, which I love to do, by having a scene with over 20 animals. It caused need for a lot of back and forth.

Generally once I have my sketch fully worked out and tight, I will scan it into my computer to do a color comp. Since I paint on wood it’s not desireable to start over. Photoshop is a quick way to flesh out a color idea and know if something is working.

With this image I originally tried to use a blue tone for the background. In photoshop I felt this worked, on the board it did not. Things got muddy fast. So, for this image I repainted the final. I did not complete a second color comp. I went right into using yellow as the background tone.

Before I began my final painting I addressed other compositional problems. I changed my sketch by moving some of the animals around and removing a few of them. They were making the image look cluttered and distracting from the main action.

1 Comments on Illustrator Saturday – Casey Girard, last added: 2/4/2012