My nieces had baby girls weeks apart two years ago. They are now expecting again (due this summer). One of them asked me to design an artwork with letters because her daughter was learning them. 

She had me at letters. The question was what to do: a poster, a set of cards, a book? If a book, what size, what colors, and how? Agonizing over the style of the letters ensued. I started pinning on a board examples of letters that looked like designs for children and another board to pin children’s books. Still, I felt lost for a couple of weeks. 

I started to research children’s books, went to the library, and started to read a bit about children, especially about two-year-olds. Then, I remembered some geometry and reading lessons from Wheaton Montessori School when we lived in Chicago. There are many similarities between design education and the Montessori method, but that is for another post. A particular aspect from my kid’s days at Montessori has always stuck with me: I remember my son tracing shapes with his index finger. He’d do this with words and objects he’d see. That memory helped me decide what to do next. 

The letters needed to be thick enough for a two-year-old to trace with their finger. This is not unlike some of the letters I have written in my daily practice. I thought I would add a simple graphic of an object—food or otherwise— that started with that letter. I also wanted the book to be small enough to fit in the hands of a two-year-old. Thankfully, Blurb offered a 5” x 5” book in softcover at a very reasonable price. Then, I got to work.

Looking back, I could have been more consistent in the type of letters I created. Same with the style of the objects. I also realized that designing for children was more intimidating than designing for adults. There are a plethora of questions floating around. For instance, is this stroke thick enough? Should the O be more like an oval or a circle? How much information is too much or too little? Ultimately, I decided to go through with it all and make edits later. One of my niece’s birthdays has passed, and the other is coming up. Deadlines always work, don’t they? 

The book has been uploaded to Blurb; however, it is not yet listed in their bookstore. Here is the link if you are interested in getting one.

Some photos of the project are below:

Alma Hoffmann is a freelance designer, design educator, author of Sketching as Design Thinking, and editor at Smashing Magazine. This is an edited version of an original post on Temperamental amusing shenanigans, Alma’s Substack dedicated to design, life, and everything in between.

All images © Alma Hoffmann.

That’s why when I came upon photos of the new RIXO location in the Marylebone neighborhood of London, I was instantly captivated and had to learn more about the unique design concept and those behind it.

RIXO is a contemporary clothing boutique specializing in bohemian sundresses and vibrant prints. Their new Marylebone location brings the whimsical energy of their clothing to life, with brightly colored architectural motifs organically illustrated all over its otherwise crisp white walls. The saturated color palette and hand-drawn line quality create a pop-art-like look, infusing the space with a playful take on classical design elements. Illustrator Sam Wood developed this aesthetic in partnership with the design studio Cúpla, helmed by Gemma McCloskey. I reached out to Wood and McCloskey to learn more about the process behind their design concept and what it was like bringing such a fresh take on retail space to fruition.

(This interview has been lightly edited for length and clarity.)

What was the development process like for this distinct store design concept?

Sam Wood: The initial process was driven by Gemma. She approached me after seeing some of my work with Claridge’s and other clients in the UK and asked me to devise something bold and colorful that told the story of RIXO in a distinctly new way.

GM: When I first stumbled across Sam’s Instagram page, his use of color felt really bright and fresh alongside his beautiful, fluid style. I knew instantly Sam would be perfect for the new Marylebone RIXO; his handwriting lent itself to enveloping the whole space while still allowing it to breathe.

SW: After I had taken a look at the other RIXO stores and got a feel for their story, it was a pleasure to bring something of Marylebone to the space and interpret that in my own line. I spend a lot of time in the area because a local gallery I work with is down the road, so I’m always roaming about looking at the mishmash of architecture from Gothic Revival (which was the basis of the alcoves) to Neoclassical (which was the basis for the floral details). I hope the eventual style reflects the multiplicity of the area and is a playful reference to how I see things existing alongside each other.

What was the rest of the collaboration process like?

GM: We had an initial meeting where I discussed the concept, design, and materials being used in the space. One of the threads from our concept for Marylebone was this nod to classical London architecture; therefore, creating illustrated paneling with a whiff of Jean Cocteau was the foundation of the design. Within this framework, it was important to give Sam the breathing space to be creative, and it was exciting seeing him embrace the concept and bring his own stamp to the design. 

Once we had reached the final internal designs, we decided we needed to use these on the external windows to fully embrace the concept. When Sam was actually onsite doing the mural, it was a very fluid process, and we would discuss colors and tweak a few things with the benefit of actually being in the space. We also added in some of the pendants which sit centrally in the space and look great.

Did you first map out the design digitally and then bring it to life on the store walls? What was it like free-handing the motifs? Nerve-wracking, exhilarating?  

SW: I am a stickler for being analogue early on; I work on full-scale drawings on paper, which gives me an idea of how the motifs will work at scale as well as the tones and quality of line. The client does not always see these, but they are an essential part of how I conceive of a design and have the confidence to execute it. After this, I can mark up the digital renders to hone the design so the client can get a full idea of the vision.

A great deal of forward planning and preparatory drawing goes into making sure that when I put the pen on the wall, it’s all where it should be. That’s an essential collaborative exercise, in this instance, with Gemma, who was fantastic to work with. Building sites are often chaotic places, which is a far cry from my day-to-day in the studio, so yes, it’s a heart-in-mouth moment every time with the first mark on the wall, but I do get a kick out of it!

Is this markers-on-walls technique a style you’ve done before? Or was it specially created and executed for this particular project?  

SW: I’ve used Posca markers for years in various contexts, they have such a nice uniformity of tone, which is ideal for bringing to life a design which needs to keep its clarity and “poppyness.” I used them for the first time in a mural context last year for Bryan O’Sullivan Studio, painting a celestial ceiling which is still on show in their gallery on Brook Street Mayfair.

Ordinarily I use a brush and acrylic when doing murals, so it was fun to what is possible with these works in the medium.

How did you feel at the end of the process after drawing your last line, stepping back, and seeing the completed store? 

SW: It’s always a moment of thinking, “Is it finished now?” There’s always the possibility of another line, filling out this corner, or changing that line. I habitually look for flaws in a work, and the “finished product” is always an opportunity to see how everything has worked together. It’s a strange feeling to hand the thing over— after a couple of days of the room being yours, it now belongs to the client and, of course, the public, who interprets it in their own way. That’s why I love working so spatially— the works sometimes divide people, but once I’m finished, that’s down to the viewers.

What sort of experience do you hope shoppers have when stepping into this RIXO store? What sensations do you hope they feel as they move about the space you all created? 

SW: So much of what I do is about storytelling and creating places where people can escape in some way. Here, the murals are front and center in the design and are a key part of the store’s identity. I hope anyone coming into the space gets a sense of the layers of detail that go into evoking the story that RIXO wants to tell, as well as how my own journey as an artist marries with that.

GM: We want the shoppers to feel invited like they’re stepping into someone’s living room at home. We didn’t want a sterile interior, which can sometimes be intimidating for a shopper. There is also a sense of escapism with the store, which we hope the customers find uplifting.

In a world that seems to get bleaker by the day, children’s media reminds us to keep our sense of wonder—that innate curiosity that all children have.

Anyone who came of age before social media, smart TVs, iPads, and even the internet understands the glory of magazines. Here at PRINT, we have a particular affinity for the form, as a formerly printed publication founded in the 1940s, and we’re quick to wax nostalgic about other printed magazines of yore. I have strong memories of growing up in the ’90s revering Highlights, for example, a monthly magazine for kids filled with games, puzzles, and written features. While the magazine landscape has changed immensely since my Highlights days, some small but mighty publications are still kicking and doing their darnedest to keep printed media alive.

Studio Anorak, the publisher behind ‘Happy Mags for Kids,’ has produced two titles geared toward kids, Anorak and DOT, for 18 years and counting. Founded by Cathy Olmedillas in 2006, who now helms Studio Anorak as the editor-in-chief and creative director, issues of ‘Happy Mags for Kids’ are released quarterly and are sold on newsstands and in museum gift shops, boutiques, and bookshops worldwide. Both Anorak and DOT are geared toward kids ages 6+. Printed on recycled paper with vegetable ink, the magazines offer illustrated stories, games, and activities, with each issue structured under a given theme.

In celebration of their 18th anniversary, Olmedillas answered a handful of my questions about the ins and outs of keeping a printed magazine going during the digital age and the power of children’s media. Her responses are below. 

(Conversation edited for length and clarity).

What’s the origin story of ‘Happy Mags for Kids’? When did you first decide to start a children’s magazine? 

Around 20 years ago, I was working for The Face, where I fell in love with the craft of magazine-making. I was itching to launch my own but wasn’t really sure what it would be about.

In 2002, I became a Mum, and that’s when I realized the children’s magazine market was poorly served. It had evolved into a sea of pink or blue plastic-filled throwaway magazines. I had fond memories of the ones I used to read as a child, so I set out to launch one that reminded me of the ones I used to enjoy: one that would educate, look great, make us laugh, and last beyond one quick read.

In hindsight, I realize how bold that was because every aspect of our magazine went against the super well-established rules of children’s publishing: our paper, our tone of voice, our aesthetic, our frequency—everything, basically! Nonetheless, I just did it (despite many people advising against it), and with very little money.

I publish our Happy Mags because I love making them, writing them, working with illustrators, and receiving feedback from families about how they spark creativity in their children.

What is it about the magazine form specifically that you love so much? What sets magazines apart from other mediums? 

As a child, I loved that magazines were like a good “brain snack,” i.e., something that didn’t require as much commitment as a book. As a teen, they were my Bible because we had no internet back then! As a grown-up and parent, I love the craft that goes into making them and the fact that they are multi-faceted, i.e., they carry many different types of content. I love the niche magazines; the ones that focus on one passion.

As a publisher, I love the process involved in making a magazine: putting words on a page, sending them to an illustrator, seeing them turn into a story, and, a few weeks later, ta-da! You have this physical thing that you can share with people. Doing that for the children’s market is the most rewarding thing.

What’s the team makeup behind ‘Happy Mags for Kids’? How many people do you work with day to day, what are the roles, etc.? 

We are a tiny but mighty team. I write, commission artists, and run the business. Ben is our main illustrator and designer. We commission many different freelance illustrators who come on board for specific issues. We have Karolina, who does our PR; Max, our proofreader; Slava and Eritobi, our accountants; and Marcus, who looks after our site. That’s it!

I know that in numbers magazines aren’t doing as well as they were 20 years ago, but their role is just as important, if not more.

How do you feel about the changes in the magazine and printed media landscape over the years? Do you feel a sense of responsibility or pressure to keep ‘Happy Mags for Kids’ going while so many other magazines have folded?

The role of magazines has certainly changed in the last 20 years. They—along with newspapers—went from being essential for culture and information to being an alternative to what the internet offers. I know that in numbers magazines aren’t doing as well as 20 years ago, but their role is just as important, if not more. Plenty of titles are closing down, but many great independent ones are also launching. Whether they last as long as the behemoths of the past or sell as much is doubtful, but you never know! We are celebrating our 18th anniversary this year with new markets opening up in China and Korea, so … there is hope!

I publish our Happy Mags because I love making them, writing them, working with illustrators, and receiving feedback from families about how they spark creativity in their children. These are the only reasons I keep our magazines going, along with the crucial fact that they sell! As soon as they stop selling or I stop loving making them, I will reconsider.

What’s been the most rewarding part about helming ‘Happy Mags for Kids’? What’s been the biggest challenge? 

The most rewarding thing is seeing children explore their creativity, receiving drawings from them (which we feature in the magazines), and getting emails from parents about how much our mags spark conversations.

The most fun is putting the mags together. 

The most challenging part is distribution. Magazine distribution is wasteful and expensive, as no one in that chain pays promptly, so I focus on the business online, where most of our revenue comes from. We are lucky that because of our high production values, we are accepted by and work directly with bookshops, and we have one trusted book distributor who looks after our titles well.

In a world that seems to get bleaker and bleaker by the day, children’s media reminds us to keep our sense of wonder; that innate curiosity that all children have.

What lessons can people of all ages learn from children’s media?

In a world that seems to get bleaker by the day, children’s media reminds us to keep our sense of wonder—that innate curiosity that all children have. That fuels our Happy Mags, and it’s a gentler way to approach the world around us!

Coffeehaus at COLLINS hosts a monthly communal gathering for people from all walks of life who share the goal of simply showing up to experience creative community. March’s event featured a conversation, book signing, cocktails, and treats with the illustrious Craig Frazier, who discussed his newly released book Drawn, a compendium of his illustrations for prominent publications and businesses around the globe.

An internationally renowned illustrator with a career spanning since 1978, Frazier’s illustrations are celebrated for their wit, optimism, and simplicity.

His creative contributions have appeared in the New York Times, Time Magazine, Fortune, Bloomberg Business Week, Harvard Business Review, and The Wall Street Journal. Frazier has an impressive roster of blue-chip clients, including Adobe, American Express, Boeing, Chevrolet, Deloitte, MasterCard, Mohawk Paper, Navigant, The Royal Mail, U.S. Postal Service, and United Airlines.

He has also designed eight postage stamps, including the beloved 2006 Love stamp and the commemorative Scouting stamps in 2010/11.

Frazier’s artistry goes beyond fulfilling client requests; he illustrates what he feels will make people stop, look, and think. Coffeehaus at COLLINS was a packed event, buzzing with creative energy from like-minded folks. I was fortunate to connect with Frazier at the event and followed up with some questions about his process and the importance of work that invites people in.

(Interview edited for clarity and length).

During your talk, you emphasized the importance of creating an approachable book with meaningful stories rather than just a visually striking but weighty coffee table book. What is the significance of incorporating narrative elements, and how does this approach enhance the reader’s experience? Additionally, how did you strike a balance between narrative and visuals?

It’s not unlike my work. You must invite people in and make them feel welcome. Physically, I wanted the book to have weight yet a manageable footprint. I wanted it to be functional on a desk, in your lap, or on a plane (thus the slightly smaller dimension than many monographs). I wanted it to feel useable, not monumental. There is something intimidating about an oeuvre of someone’s lifetime of work—so I wanted to soften the barrier. The scale of the book, the use of Garamond, and the size and pacing of each illustration contribute to its approachability. My amberliths, sketches, and sketchbooks demystify the process and invite the reader backstage. The idea of narratives woven throughout the book breaks the rhythm and reminds the reader that the illustrations are the products of a greater effort—both conceptually and professionally.

My life experience and my choices inform my work—the two are inextricably connected. I have found the result immeasurably rewarding and hope the work reflects that. This is the part of work life that I wanted to reveal. Things happen. We can’t control everything, but we can lend a guiding hand.  

This book is for the curious. Whether you are a designer or not, revealing the ‘whys’ of my work will alter your understanding of it. My intention is to allow people to see parallels to their own lives and careers, regardless of their profession. We all make choices that shape how we feel about our jobs. I’m curious how creative people make their work and connect their life stories to it. Asking those questions leads to a deeper appreciation and a chance to learn something. I want that experience available to the readers of Drawn.

It is predominantly a visual book, no question. One can enjoy it on that level alone. The written content is micro-dosed to not compete with the visuals but complement and contribute depth.

I draw elements that support the story, not decorate it.

Your work is celebrated for its visual riddles and graphic wit, often embodying both simplicity and depth. How do you balance clarity and complexity in your work, especially when dealing with abstract concepts or visual puzzles?

Simplicity is a guiding principle in all of my work—design or illustration. I subscribe to both the aesthetic and conceptual orientation, so it’s easy to abide by. It works—simplicity serves comprehension in its elegance and functionality. Simplicity is necessary now more than ever when we are all operating at the edge of our visual threshold—it becomes an attractor because it asks less of us. When we overload our messaging (or visuals), it’s at the risk of getting passed by. I stick with singular messaging, which makes for singular illustrations. I draw elements that support the story, not decorate it. Simplicity equals clarity. The more abstract, the simpler the equation must be. If done right, there is beauty in simplicity. Embedding riddles and wit in the illustration brings a smile to the mind. The illustration’s depth is in the reader’s mind—it’s the place the illustration takes them.

When discussing your creative process, you mentioned taking something to the brink and then stepping it back. How do you recognize when you’ve reached that edge, and what factors influence your decision to pull back or further refine your idea?

This question is challenging because I don’t have a specific formula for it—it’s intuitive. The best way to describe it is to say that when I think I have found an angle to tell the story—I then attempt to regulate how the reader discovers the answer within. It’s a matter of leaving breadcrumbs rather than the whole loaf. It’s always a matter of leaving room for a reader to invest time (often only seconds) and mental energy to understand the message. Breadcrumbs also leave room for interpretation, crucial in talking to a larger audience. I’ve learned that people are smarter than we often give them credit for. Clients always want to make sure their readers get it, but in doing so, they often eliminate the fun by over-explaining it. It’s a delicate balance, and I stand my ground with clients. I’ve got a good instinct for it by now.

There is a lot of attention to creativity, how we do it, and the secrets to turning it on. I’ve never paid much attention to that and tried to develop good habits and a problem-solving discipline. If you sign up to be a designer, your job can’t wait until the muse shows up.

Drawn delves into curiosity, self-doubt, and confidence, all of which are common experiences for creatives. How have these themes influenced your journey as a creative? Can you share any personal anecdotes or pivotal moments where you’ve grappled with self-doubt and how you overcame it to push your creative boundaries?

Curiosity is key. We must be curious about what others make and how to inform and inspire our own creativity. We also must be curious about the oddities around us. These are the fuel for ideas. Self-doubt and confidence are opposites, yet both motivate us. Both are necessary to keep the other in check. Self-doubt—however uncomfortable it is—is critical to doing good work and growing. The better our judgment, the easier it is to become complacent and make safe work. I find my own self-doubt to be often an indicator that I’m breaking new ground. We all experience self-doubt because creativity isn’t science—it’s experimental by design. The good news is that with experience, self-doubt wanes and gives way to confidence, and if we are lucky, humility lies right in between both—the most essential element of personal growth.

I frequently have doubts about my work particularly when I’m sketching on assignment. When I give it a little time to breathe and look at the work with fresh eyes, the doubt often subsides. I remind myself that new is often uncomfortable and these are the chances we must take.

There is a lot of attention to creativity, how we do it, and the secrets to turning it on. I’ve never paid much attention to that and tried to develop good habits and a problem-solving discipline. If you sign up to be a designer, your job can’t wait until the muse shows up. Though she does make appearances, we must operate in an ‘always go’ position.

As it relates to ideas, my solution is to keep sketching. It is the cheapest and fastest prototyping method out there. It is a discipline that I have practiced my entire career, and it never fails. Every sketch I make is an experience of seeing something and understanding it better. I have far more unsuccessful sketches than successful ones, but they are not mutually exclusive. You must turn over rocks until you find what you are looking for. I have a confidence in process—the more you produce, the better the chances are of arriving at something new—it’s that simple.

Your work has inspired many aspiring illustrators and designers. You offered the valuable insight that “style comes just as much from your deficiencies as well as your expertise.” Could you elaborate on this concept and explain how embracing one’s shortcomings can contribute to the development of a unique artistic style?

Understanding what we each ‘have to offer’ is an endeavor you can’t suddenly take on one day. It’s an understanding that comes over time and practice. We never fully understand it, but we must move toward it and often get out of its way. That said, we work to develop personally and professionally, and the goal is to find where we can each put a spin on things. Our fingerprints on our work are the characteristics reflective of both our strengths and weaknesses. Our ability to accept both of those—our deficiencies being the toughest—is where our individuality and point of view reside. The world is full of people—and companies—trying to create a mass consumable perception. But—as practitioners—we shouldn’t take that approach. The baseline is to be a good problem-solver. However, the expression and articulation of those solutions can be personal and unique to each of us. Herein lies the risk and the satisfaction. One reason this works is that it is honest and defendable. It’s easier to stand up for our own ideas than it is for others. The second reason is that unique work stands the best chance of being novel in the eyes of the public. As designers, we don’t have to have thousands of clients. We must have enough to support the economy of our practice. I have found that making what I can make and searching for audiences that appreciate my sensibilities is much easier—and more satisfying—than working in the inverse. Differentiation serves the competitive nature of our job.

As designers, we don’t have to have thousands of clients. We must have enough to support the economy of our practice … making what I can make and searching for audiences that appreciate my sensibilities is much easier—and more satisfying—than working in the inverse.

If you want to get your hands on Drawn, which I highly recommend — it’s fantastic; you can order his book here.

Plasse is fascinated by the energy and tone of a space and is hellbent on harnessing that in his imagery. He and I connected a few weeks back, where we chatted about his creative journey to a unique space within the art world, and his distinct signature style. Early in our Zoom call, I had a hunch Plasse was live-illustrating me as we talked. And I was correct! He followed up afterward with this fun (and flattering) interpretation of me in my messy home office:

I’ve conducted countless interviews with artists over the years, and this is a first! Our conversation, brought to life in his sketch, is below.

(This conversation has been edited and condensed for clarity and length.)

What’s your origin story as an artist? 

I went to school for illustration at Parsons School of Design. After I graduated in 1995, it was the dawn of commercial digital art and the commercial use of the Internet. During the last year I spent in college, I got really into using interactive media, in addition to doing illustration work, and I learned how to use what was called Macromedia Director, which was a precursor to what was called Flash, and then eventually became what’s called CC Animate, which has become a little bit defunct. It used to be a big tool for creating websites, interactive games and CD ROMs as well. I liked it because I had done a little bit of animation in college, and I could animate in it, use sound, and create interactivity in it. That was exciting to me: taking my art and making it come to life so that people could interact with it.

Right after college, I took a five-hour HTML class and learned everything you needed to know to build websites in 1995. So, in this burgeoning era of interactive media, I started working for little multimedia and interactive firms. Big ad agencies didn’t know how to do any of that stuff, so they’d hire these little companies that worked out of lofts to do all of this exciting work. I found a niche in starting to do that type of work because I had a design and art background, but I also knew how to use some of these tools, which were pretty novel at the time.

I found my way into advertising through interactive digital media. Some ad agencies were starting to add that skill to their teams while everyone else was still doing traditional print, TV, direct mail, and out-of-home. I knew all these tools and built websites, but they liked that I could illustrate, too. Eventually, I went off on my own, and I decided to freelance. This was during the dot-com boom, so there were jobs a-plenty. I did that for six years, but then dot-com went bust, and all that work went away; it just disappeared. So, I started doing apparel design and eventually got into TV animation.

Eventually, I got another full-time job at an agency as an art director. We built a lot of websites—fun, interactive, engaging stuff. We pushed the envelope of what people were doing, which was exciting. My background in animation came in handy because I could use that technology to bring things to life in a cool way. 

At what point did you introduce sketching the people around you into your art practice? 

I started drawing people on the subway in the ’90s, and then, in the mid to late 2000s, it became an obsession of mine. I’d carry these little Moleskine sketchbooks around, and since I lived in Brooklyn but worked in Manhattan, I’d be on the train for 20 to 30 minutes every day. This is before your phone worked on the train, so while most people would be zoning out, sleeping, or reading, I thought, look at all these amazing people around me! So I started sketching. 

While most people would be zoning out or sleeping or reading, I thought, look at all of these amazing people around me! So I started sketching. 

It taught me a new approach to drawing. When you’re on the subway, the subway is moving; sometimes, you’re cramped, and people are moving on and off in front of you, so you have to draw quickly. I’d look around the car and say, Oh, this is interesting, and zone in on something. I’d quickly capture the essence of what I saw and then add other details instead of doing a slow, meticulous rendering, which didn’t work in that environment. I’d been an illustrator before, but this was when I started drawing from life in an expressive, capture-things-quickly kind of style. 

Were these subway sketches purely personal, or did you share them with the public in any way? 

I created a blog because I wanted people to see the subway in a different way. Nobody ever thought anything good or interesting about the subway, it was always this blight that we had to deal with. But here I was, highlighting all the interesting things and people that you can come across on the train, and the tapestry of cultures that all came together for 20 minutes in these little sardine cans under the ground.

Here I was, highlighting all the interesting things and people that you can come across on the train, and the tapestry of cultures that all came together for 20 minutes in these little sardine cans under the ground.

How did the public receive these sketches back then? I could see a modern-day Instagram account posting daily sketches of people on the NYC subway being a big hit.

It had a decent following. I wouldn’t say I blew up, but I got some people’s attention and write-ups. This guy made a short documentary about me, and then in 2012, I published a little book of 80 of my thousands of drawings. That was fun! I didn’t get famous from it, but I made some inroads and some people saw it and appreciated it. 

At what point did you move to Austin, and how did that affect your art practice? 

Around 2011, I was getting sick of what was happening in New York, and it was a difficult place to live with three little kids. My ex-wife was also ready to leave (she worked in technology, too). So, I managed to get a job in Austin. There’s a train there (sort of), but I wouldn’t take it; I drove everywhere. But I was kind of addicted to drawing things like that now, so I started going to see a lot of music; the music scene here is very accessible. I thought, well, this is where I’m going to start drawing because this is where the energy is here.

I started going to see a lot of music; the music scene here is very accessible. I was like, well, this is where I’m going to start drawing, because that’s where the energy was here.

I started going to festivals and discovering bands. What was cool about drawing in Austin, unlike New York, was that I could access that community. When I drew people in New York on a train, I drew them, and then they were gone, and I never saw them again. Here, I draw people, I tag them, they see me drawing, and I get to know a community and interface with them.

When drawing someone, what features or details do you typically focus on to characterize them visually?

Whatever calls to me when I look at them. A lot of times, it’s a gesture. Starting with a gesture, an expression— it’s the energy and movement of things as opposed to more static details. Whatever a person’s energy is, that’s what I pick up on.

When sketching a band, I’ll try to figure out what’s drawing me in and start there. I call it “gonzo drawing”— the idea of being immersed in the subject matter. There’s a lot of motion in the crowd and many things happening, and I try to reflect that in the drawing. So, the drawing isn’t a perfectly still representation or an aloof observer. It’s from the point of view of where I am, which is generally surrounded by people.

This style is about not trying to overly intellectualize the composition, it’s more about what you feel.

I’ll hone in on a particular point, which sometimes differs from what you’d expect. Sometimes, there’s someone who’s really interesting on stage, the most dynamic in some way. There are just certain things that compel me. I like to focus on little details, like how the bass player holds their hands or the way the singer holds the microphone. This style is not about trying to overly intellectualize the composition; it’s more about what you feel. Outside of it being instinctual, it’s an expression of what I see and feel at the moment.

You often illustrate on your iPad. How is that drawing experience different from using paper?

When I draw on the iPad, I create more compositions. When I draw on paper, even though instinctually I’ll draw a composition, I’m completely flying by the seat of my pants. When I use the iPad, I’ll throw a lot of things down, but then I’ll move them around and almost create a composition out of them. 

The iPad is also much faster. I can immediately get things down. Obviously, I can’t carry around big tubes of gouache in the middle of a crowd. With the iPad, I have all the tools. When I have a little more time or space, I like to bring watercolor, markers, or sometimes gouache so that I can paint what’s going on.

Another element of your practice is a sort of performance art: projecting your iPad screen as you live draw at concerts, shows, and events. How did this come about? 

Austin Design Week invited me to be part of the projection show in 2017, and I created a reel of all the animations I did to live music. They had it run on the wall; I loved that vibe and having something come to life. I love bringing my stuff to life in real space, and that was an amazing way to do that. When I got the iPad, I could hook it up to a projector or any type of display. I started by drawing some conferences and meetings that way, and people were excited about it. People like the drawings on their own, but when they see them come to life in real-time, it really excites them. 

Then, a couple of years ago, I was invited to a jazz dance performance, and they wanted me to paint on stage. I told them I thought it’d be really cool if I drew with my iPad and projected it. The dance performance had a bunch of different vignettes, so I drew them when they were performing. Then, in between, for the segways, I’d re-project what I just did and run the time-lapse so it became part of the performance.

Are most of your subjects appreciative and flattered that you’ve drawn them?

People really like it, bands especially. I get a lot of good feedback; it’s something different. I’m not the only person who live sketches, but there are not many of us, so it’s novel, especially when it happens in real time. That’s what I love about it; there’s a place and time and being out in the world, I feel really connected to the bands.

I hate going to arena shows; I find them super uninteresting because I like to be as close as possible to draw. That’s why I like going to small clubs, where I can be five or ten feet away. It’s harder to connect with the artist when you’re far away. A lot of times you see a side of someone when they’re on stage performing that’s really genuine, that’s harder to capture when you’re just talking to them; it’s inspiring to me.

Founded in November 2006 by a team of insurance experts, Go.Compare has long been recognized for its meticulous approach to comparing various products and services, including insurance policies, financial products, energy tariffs, and more. Unlike traditional comparison sites, Go.Compare distinguished itself by prioritizing the display of policy details alongside prices, setting a new standard in the industry.

Over the years, Go.Compare’s mission has evolved while remaining steadfast in its commitment to providing reliable and comprehensive comparisons. The company has cultivated a vast network of trusted partners, ensuring users can access a wide range of reputable options. Authorized and regulated by the Financial Conduct Authority (equivalent to the SEC in the US), Go.Compare offers users peace of mind in their decision-making process.

The rebrand signifies a strategic step forward for Go.Compare, solidifying its reputation as a dependable ally for consumers while injecting a burst of new life and character into the brand.

Go.Compare’s standout feature is its accessibility. The service is free for users, a testament to the company’s dedication to empowering consumers with transparent information.

Unlike others, Go.Compare doesn’t just list options; it serves up choices that are genuinely beneficial for users, placing their interests at the forefront,” says Max Ottignon, co-founder of Ragged Edge. “So we amplified that difference, positioning Go.Compare as the Champions of Choice.”

With an impressive 97% awareness rate, the recent rebranding initiative aims to capitalize on the website’s recognition and attract even more users. At the core of Ragged Edge’s rebrand is a genuine point of differentiation: Go.Compare is the sole comparison site accredited by BIBA (British Insurance Brokers’ Association), emphasizing trustworthiness in every recommendation.

“Ragged Edge worked closely with every part of our business to ensure they understood exactly what our aspirations were and how we wanted to evolve in the future,” says Paul Rogers, Marketing Director at Go.Compare. “Insurance can be heavy going – a grudge purchase. Ragged Edge has made it fun and rewarding. The rebrand has helped us to evolve visually and strategically and given us an even stronger sense of purpose, authority, and momentum as we continue to provide transparency and support for customers across a broad range of complex products.”

Central to the rebrand is the iconic figure of Gio Compario, Go.Compare’s beloved mascot. Gio, portrayed with exaggerated features in charming cartoon form, serves as the brand’s “choice champion,” advocating for users across every aspect of the Go.Compare experience.

In collaboration with artist Rami Niemi, the rebrand introduces an illustrative style that breathes life into the brand’s insurance products, departing from conventional stock imagery to offer a fresh, engaging visual narrative.

Complementing the visual overhaul is a new verbal identity – “the voice of choice” – characterized by relatable wit that resonates with customers. A custom-designed typeface adds warmth and character, reinforcing the brand’s distinctive personality.

The rebrand, designed to be instantly recognizable and scalable, ensures maximum visibility and engagement across various platforms. Ragged Edge’s collaboration with Go.Compare extends to the brand’s high-profile sponsorship of the Wales rugby union team, further solidifying its presence in the public eye.

He continues: “Last year I noticed that more than the usual share of notable people passed away. This past fall I started doing quick digital drawings of some of the major figures we lost. It was both a way to honor these accomplished folks but also a means to experiment with my iPad and draw quickly. Here are some of those remembrances.”

*My criteria for choosing my top African American Designers were simple: a) I must love their work, and b) they must be older than I (born in 1966).

I do not intentionally exclude well-deserved and talented younglings. But I wrote this article as a call back to my younger self, to recognize that the path before me was designed Black and beautiful.

Now, read on and shine on.

Charles Dawson (1889 – 1981)

Best known for his illustrated advertisements, Charles Dawson (Charles Clarence Dawson) was an influential Chicago designer and artist through the 1920s and 30s.

He was born in 1898 in Georgia and went on to attend Booker T. Washington’s Tuskegee Institute. After two years, he left when he became the first African American admitted into the Arts Students League of New York. Dawson abandoned the pervasive racism of the league when he gained acceptance to the Art Institute of Chicago, where, in his own words, their attitude was “entirely free of bias.” During his time there, Dawson was heavily involved and went on to become a founding member of the first Black artists collective in Chicago, The Arts & Letters Collective.

After graduation, he went on to serve in the segregated forces of WWI, where he faced combat in France. He returned to find a changed Chicago: one racially charged due to a slowed economy and trouble finding jobs. In 1922, Dawson began freelancing, producing work for other black entrepreneurs. Five years later, Dawson played a major role in the first exhibition of African American art at his alma mater called Negro In Art Week.

Dawson took part in two different Works Progress Administration programs under Roosevelt’s New Deal, including the National Youth Administration, where he designed the layout for the American Negro Exposition, a piece composed of 20 dioramas showcasing African American history.

He eventually returned to Tuskegee, where he became a curator for the institute’s museum and passed away at the ripe old age of 93 in Pennsylvania. Dawson will always be remembered for his great contributions to African American art, design, and advancement.

Aaron Douglas (1899 – 1979)

Known as a key artist in the Harlem Renaissance, Aaron Douglas was a pivotal figure in developing a distinctly African style of art through his blending of Art Deco and Art Nouveau styles with connections to African masks and dances. His illustrations, published in Alan Locke’s anthology, The New Negro Movement, showcased his detachment from European-style arts and evolution into his own style, clearly communicating African heritage.

Douglas graduated from the University of Nebraska in 1922 with a BFA. He then taught high school art before moving to New York two years later to study under German artist Winold Reiss.

He became the most sought-after illustrator for black writers of his time after his covers for Opportunity and The Crisis, dubbed “Afro-Cubanism” by leading art critic Richard Powell. Among his other notable covers and illustrations are his designs for Carl Van Vechten’s Nigger Heaven and God’s Trombone, James Weldon Johnson’s epic poem.

Douglas was well-versed in Harlem nightlife, where he spent many nights gaining inspiration for his designs and depictions of the black urban scene. His murals, adorning the walls of various institutions, cemented his name as a major artist of the Harlem Renaissance. His best-known work is a series of murals called, Aspects of Negro Life, which Douglas created for the 135th St. branch of the New York Public Library.

He later left New York to become chair of the art department of Fisk University in Nashville, where he resided until his death in 1979.

Leroy Winbush (1915 – 2007)

One week after graduating high school, Winbush left Detroit for Chicago to become a graphic designer. His inspiration and mentors at the time were sign designers on Chicago’s South Side. He began creating signage, flyers, and murals for the Regal Theater, where he rubbed elbows with some of the most famous black musicians of the time.

Winbush then went on to join Goldblatt Department Store’s sign department, where he was the only black employee. In 1945, after years of working for others, Winbush started his own company, Winbush Associates, later Winbush Designs. Here, he landed accounts with various publishing houses, doing layouts for Ebony and Jet, among others. His ambition and charisma eventually helped him gain acceptance as a black designer and entrepreneur.

Later in life, Winbush began teaching visual communications and typography at various Chicago universities. He concurrently mastered the art of scuba diving, a feat that helped him land a position as part of the crew tasked with creating Epcot Center’s coral reef.

Winbush was adamant in his desire to be remembered as a “good designer,” as opposed to a “Black designer,” but was well aware of the influence he could have on the progression of the Black community. He designed a sickle cell anemia exhibit and exhibitions of the Underground Railroad for different Chicago museums to illuminate Black history, past and present, to the public. His accomplishments throughout his lifetime make LeRoy Winbush a notable African American graphic designer worth checking out.

Eugene Winslow (1919 – 2001)

Born in Dayton, Ohio, into a family of seven children, Eugene Winslow’s parents stressed the importance of education and encouraged their children to study the arts. Winslow attended Dillard University, receiving his Bachelor of Fine Arts degree. He then served in WWII as part of the revered Tuskegee Airmen.

After the war, Winslow nurtured his lifelong artistic interest by attending The Art Institute of Chicago and the Illinois Institute of Technology. Winslow then went on to co-found the Am-Afro Publishing house based out of Chicago, where in 1963, they published Great American Negroes Past and Present with Winslow’s illustrations. That same year, he also designed the seal commemorating the 100th anniversary of the Emancipation Proclamation for the Chicago Exposition. Throughout his career as an artist, designer, businessman, and entrepreneur, Winslow always sought to promote racial integration wherever possible.

Georg Olden (1920 – 1975)

Born in 1920 in Birmingham, Alabama, to the son of an escaped enslaved person and opera-singing mother, Georg Olden was a revolutionary designer who helped pave the way for African Americans in the field of design and the corporate world.

After a brief stint at Virginia State College, Olden dropped out of school to work as a graphic designer for the CIA’s predecessor, The Office of Strategic Services. From there, the connections he made helped him land a position at CBS in 1945 as Head of Network Division of On-Air Promotions. Here, he worked on programs such as Gunsmoke, and I Love Lucy and eventually went on to help create the vote-tallying scoreboard for the first televised Presidential Election in 1952.

Praised in his day and posthumously, Olden appeared multiple times in publications such as Graphis and Ebony. In 1963, he became the first African American to design a postage stamp. His design showcased chains breaking to celebrate the centennial anniversary of the Emancipation Proclamation. By 1970, he had won seven Clio Awards for creative excellence in advertising and design and eventually won the AIGA (American Institute of Graphic Arts) award in 2007. Celebrated for his talent, charm, and business intelligence, Olden was a revolutionary African American graphic designer who made advancements in the industry and for all African Americans.

Thomas Miller (1920 – 2012)

Born in Bristol, Virginia, the grandson of enslaved people, Thomas Miller’s talent, hard work, and ambition helped him become one of the first Black designers to break into mainstream graphic design.

Miller graduated and earned a Bachelor of Education with a focus on the arts in 1941 from Virginia State College. Soon after, he enlisted in the army and served in WWII, achieving the rank of First Sergeant.

After the war, Miller was determined to learn about commercial design. He gained acceptance to The Ray Vogue School of Art in Chicago, where he and fellow student Emmett McBain were the only African Americans besides the janitors.

After graduation, Miller searched for jobs and denied one offer in New York because he worked “behind the screen.” Unwilling to tolerate the company’s overt racism, Miller passed on the offer and eventually joined the progressive Chicago studio Morton Goldsholl Associates. It was here that Miller, as chief designer, worked on high-profile campaigns such as the design for 7-Up in the 1970s. As a supporting member of the design team, he also worked on the Motorola rebranding, the Peace Corps logo, and the Betty Crocker “Chicken Helper” branding, earning accolades for himself and the company.

Miller also freelanced, starting when he served in WWII and continuing through his work with Goldsholl. Through his independent work, Miller was commissioned to create a memorial to the DuSable Museum’s founders. This job resulted in one of his most well-known pieces, the Thomas Miller Mosaics, now featured in the museum’s lobby.

Miller’s hard work, dedication, and artistic talent helped him pave the way for many African-American artists and designers to come.

Emmett McBain (1935 – 2012)

Emmett McBain, born in Chicago in 1935, is lesser known than some other designers I’ve profiled. But McBain made major contributions to the advertising and design world and for all African Americans through his successes in the business world.

Emmett McBain, a true visual thinker and communicator, attended The American Academy of Art and the Illinois Institute of Technology, where he became a talented watercolor artist. Post-graduation, McBain worked for several notable agencies and firms as a designer, art supervisor, and creative consultant before co-founding Burrell McBain Incorporated. This advertising agency, which later became the largest African-American-owned agency in the States, aimed to serve their accounts while gaining the trust and loyalty of the Black community. McBain was key in running the agency, landing valuable accounts, and constantly developing new and fresh ideas. His former partner, Thomas J. Burrell, praised his leadership skills and ability to think outside the box.

McBain left Burrell McBain in 1974 to focus on independent art and design in his Hyde Park, Chicago neighborhood, where he later passed away in 2012 at 78.

The University of Illinois at Chicago has a collection featuring his works entitled Emmett McBain Design Papers. You’ll find print ads, record album covers, and transparencies of Billboards, all McBain designed.

Archie Boston (born 1943)

Known for his blatant self-deprecation and humor, Archie Boston was a pioneer in challenging the racism of the 1960s and 70s through his designs and attitude.

One of five children, Boston grew up poor but well aware of the importance of education. In 1961, his artistic talent landed him acceptance to Chouinard Art Institute. While at university, he interned with the advertising agency Carson/Roberts, where he cemented his desire to work in design and eventually returned to the agency years later.

After graduation, he worked at various advertising and design firms before forming Boston & Boston with his older brother, Bradford. It was here that they created provocative pieces showcasing their race, as well as creativity, in pieces such as “Catch a Nigger by The Toe” and by selecting the Jim Crow typeface for their logotype.

For the majority of his career, however, Boston was an educator. He landed a position as a full-time lecturer in the art department at California State University, Long Beach, before creating their design department and eventually becoming head of the visual communications design program. He influenced countless young designers there, inspiring them through his encouragement and standard for excellence.

Emory Douglas (Born 1943)

The former Revolutionary Artist and Minister of Culture for the Black Panther Party, Emory Douglas’ career in commercial art has been centered around civil and equal rights propagation from its beginnings.

Douglas’ first exposure to design came when his crimes landed him in the Youth Training School of Ontario, California. Here, he worked in the print shop and learned about typography, illustration, and logo design. Later, Douglas enrolled in commercial art classes at the City College of San Francisco after running into a former counselor from the center who encouraged him to do so

During this time, Douglas became active in the Black Panther Party after being introduced to the founding members, Huey P. Newton and Bobby Seale. Douglas offered up his design skills while watching Seale work on the first issue of the party’s paper, The Black Panther. He was well aware of the importance of having illustrations and artwork to help reach the many illiterate members of the communities the party was targeting. Much of his art and illustration for the paper initially focused on Black rights, but it soon expanded to include women, children, and community figures alongside the party’s focuses. While working on The Black Panther, Douglas coined and popularized the term “pigs” in reference to police officers.

In the 1980s, the Black Panther Party, as Douglas had once known it, was mostly dissolved by law enforcement efforts. Later, Douglas moved to care for his ailing mother and continued to pursue some independent design. His revolutionary artwork helped to educate and agitate repressed and suppressed communities of the time.

Sylvia Harris (1953 – 2011)

Noted for her unwavering desire to help others, Sylvia Harris was a graphic designer, teacher, and business owner who used her research and skill set to reach far and wide.

Born and raised in Richmond, VA, Harris experienced the desegregation of the 1960s directly. This experience provided the foundation for her interest in social systems and their effect. After receiving her BFA from Virginia Commonwealth University, Harris moved to Boston, where she worked with various creative types. Through her work with WGBH and Chris Pullman, she realized the design field’s breadth and depth. After much prodding from her mentor, Harris enrolled in Yale’s Masters in Graphic Design program.

Two Twelve Associates was created with two of her former classmates in 1980 after graduation. Here, Harris began to explore how to use and grow her skill set to develop large-scale public information systems. Her work with Citibank set an early precedent for human-centered automated customer service.

In 1994, Harris left Two Twelve to create Sylvia Harris LLC, where she changed gears and began focusing more on design planning and strategies. Harris helped guide some of the largest public institutions, hospitals, and universities with systems planning. As creative director for the US Census Bureau’s Census 2000, Harris’ rebranding efforts helped encourage previously underrepresented citizens to participate.

Harris was awarded the AIGA medal posthumously in 2014, three years after her untimely death at the age of 57. Harris will always be remembered for her contributions to the design field and far beyond.

Art Sims (Born 1954)

From his first foray into the art world with the “Draw Me” test from magazines and TV of the 50s and 60s, Sims excelled. He attended Detroit’s Cass Technical High School, known for its dedication to the arts. From there, Sims gained acceptance to the University of Michigan on a full scholarship. During the summer between his junior and senior years, Sims landed a job with Columbia Records to produce a series of album covers. After graduation, the Sunshine State called his name, and Sims headed to LA.

Sims scored a job with EMI, but he was ultimately let go for pursuing freelance work. He went on to work for CBS, where he continued building his independent portfolio. When he was let go this time, Sims was prepared and already had the office space for his firm, 11:24 Advertising Design.

After seeing one of Spike Lee’s films, Sims knew he had to work with the director. He went on to design posters for Lee’s New Jack City, Do the Right Thing, Malcolm X, and most controversially, Bamboozled.

Ever the entrepreneur, Sims is developing a greeting card line and writing screenplays while teaching graphic design to African American middle schoolers. Art Sims is the epitome of talent, drive, and ambition, someone every graphic designer should know.

Gail Anderson (Born 1962)

Known for her uncanny ability to create expressive, dynamic typefaces perfectly suited to their subject, Gail Anderson is a designer and teacher with an impressive tenure in the field.

Born and raised in New York, Anderson’s ever-burning curiosity about design began with the teen magazines of her adolescent years. It was cemented while studying at the School of Visual Arts in NY. Here, Anderson began to develop her methodologies and no-holds-barred approach to design.

After college, Anderson eventually landed at The Boston Globe for two years, working with those responsible for pioneering the new newspaper design of the late 1980s. Moving on to Rolling Stone in 1987, Anderson worked seamlessly with AIGA medalist Fred Woodward, where their creative process always included lots of music, low lighting, and late nights. Her work with Woodward was always exploring new and exciting materials and instruments to create Rolling Stone’s eclectic design. They utilized everything from hot metal to bits of twigs to bottle caps to create their vision.

After working her way up from associate to senior art director, Anderson left Rolling Stone in 2002 to join SpotCo, where her focus shifted from design to advertising. At SpotCo, she’s been the designer behind innumerable Broadway and off-Broadway posters, including that of Avenue Q and Eve Ensler’s The Good Body.

Praised as the quintessential collaborator for her inclusive, expressive, and encouraging attitude towards working together, Anderson also admits that many of her “high-octane” designs occurred at night, solo. Whether it’s her collaborative work, solo projects, magazine layouts, or theatrical posters, Anderson designs work with and for her subjects, always emphasizing their highest potential.

The Unknown & Overlooked Designers

They are many, often invisible, but we feel the impact of their work throughout history, and we should acknowledge them. Many African American graphic designers worked behind the scenes and did not receive credit for their work due to the racist norms of the times. 

These include:

• The logo creators for the uniforms of the Negro baseball and basketball leagues;
• Trail-blazing entrepreneurs like Madam C.J. Walker, Annie Malone, Carmen C. Murphy, Mae Reeves, Anthony Overton, Frederick Patterson, and many more;
• The unknown graphic designer who painted the bold and sobering “A MAN WAS LYNCHED YESTERDAY” flag, hung by the NAACP from their New York offices whenever they learned of a hanging;
• Those presently active (Black Lives Matter) are creating banners, posters, signs, and media protesting discrimination of all kinds. Graphic design, after all, is about communicating a message effectively.

The truth of all history cannot be understated. As a designer of the African diaspora (African-Jamaican-Canadian), I believe in knowing those who paved the way. These men and women boldly pushed past racial inequality with their talent and perseverance to help create the way for all.

Glenford Laughton is founder of Toronto-based agency Laughton Creatves, a design studio that believes design is a highly-collaborative endeavor (hence the missing ‘i’). This article was written and researched by Glenford Laughton and originally published on the Laughton Creatves website. Republished with permission of the author.

Sources: AIGA, The Design Observer, The University of Chicago Library, Atlanta Blackstar, The History Makers, Wikipedia, Chicago Tribune, Chicago Design Archive, and The Root.

Yesterday, Maurice Sendak’s Ten Little Rabbits, a posthumous picture book, was published. Happy are those who have missed Sendak’s gifts.

When Mino the Magician waves his wand, poof, a rabbit appears. Another wave, and out springs a second, and then a third. By the fourth rabbit, Mino yawns. With the sixth, he’s annoyed. By the ninth, he’s exasperated, as the rabbits crawl all over him. What did he expect? They are rabbits. Mino conjures them back, one by one, allowing young readers the chance to count up and back again. This is purported to be just one of Sendak’s “lost” or unknown manuscripts, and this interview with Lynn Caponera, Executive Director of The Maurice Sendak Foundation, hints about things to come.

This lost Sendak book is simple and charming. Why was Ten Little Rabbits not published before this? Was it ever considered for publication while Maurice was alive?
When Maurice passed away, he left all his original artwork to his foundation. He knew that one of our blessed responsibilities would be to care for the massive amount of work he created over his lifetime—his childhood drawings, sketchbooks, dummies, everything up to just about every one of his books. This was a man who worked nonstop his whole life. So, you can imagine the totality of his archive.

With Ten Little Rabbits, the decision to publish it was easy. It was a completed work whose first incarnation was in 1961 to be one of the volumes in the Nutshell Library. As Maurice went deeper into that project he decided to go in a more elaborate direction with Nutshell. 

In 1970 he decided to go back to the 1961 drawings he did, and out of that created the 1970 tiny version he made for a fundraiser for The Rosenbach Museum and Library. This version is even smaller than the Nutshells; the 1970 version was soft-covered and stapled together. Basically, a sweet little pamphlet that goes back to Maurice’s early exquisitely beautiful dummies that he created for each book.

During Maurice’s lifetime he very often would go back to early sketches or projects he began that got waylaid for something else. In fact, even Wild Things came out of one of these early sketches. Over the 40 years that I was privileged to look over his shoulder while he worked, we would talk about his work and what makes a great book. Maurice made this very easy for us—he would say, “you’ll know what to do,” and thankfully because of his constant tutoring we know what he would have wanted. 

So, the idea that Ten Little Rabbits is a lost work isn’t actually correct.

He was a genius when it came to engaging the adult reader and, therefore, the child too. This is a great book to read over and over—was that Maurice’s intent?
Yes, I think the more you read it you fall in love with Mino. Maurice’s line in this book is so reminiscent of A Hole is to Dig, which is still after all these years a favorite of young and old alike. 

Are there any more unpublished gems in the vaults?
Absolutely.

I count myself as one of Howard’s many admirers who has fallen under her spell. She captures an abundance of spirit and character within her illustration style, from her soft and soothing color palettes to her free-spirited yet impeccably controlled lines. Howard’s illustrations ooze playfulness, joy, and retro timelessness. I connected with Howard to learn more about her point of view as an artist and to figure out, most importantly, why shoes?

Howard’s responses to my questions are below.

How would you describe your illustration style? How did this develop?

I’d say hand-drawn is the main component. I love messy, thick lines with lots of texture and imperfections.

I’ve always been into art. I embroider, draw, sew, paint, and build stuff, and I’m just a doer. In 2019, I made it my goal to draw people. The first face I drew looked like a kindergartener had drawn it, but everyone has to start there. I had a handful of artists who inspired me and helped me land on the style I have now: Damien Cuypers, Yu Nagaba, and Haley Tippmann, to name a few. They have very different styles, but I’ve always admired their bold and effortless lines. I would try to straight-copy an illustration they’ve done, not putting any of it out there but using it to help me work on my technique and see if anything felt true to me. Then, I’d try to emulate their style on other subjects

Eventually, I started coming up with a style that was unique to me. One of my biggest accomplishments is coming up with my own style. It was a long and frustrating process, but something I’m really proud of. My style developed with hours and hours and hours and hours of practice— there’s no shortcut.

I occasionally like to look back at my old sketchbooks to see how far I’ve come and to motivate me to keep going. It feels good to see an illustration I was proud of at the time and think, “Wow, I sucked.”

When I’m looking for inspiration, I like to find a challenge.

Your shoe illustrations have clearly struck a chord with the masses. Why do you think that is? What do someone’s shoes say about them?

I think shoes, especially the loafers I’ve been drawing recently, strike a chord because they’re distinct and tend to remind people of someone. I get comments about how I’ve drawn the exact pair someone’s grandpa wore. There are comments from people who think I’ve drawn Tyler The Creator’s shoes or shoes from the movie Jojo Rabbit. I absolutely love hearing whose shoes people think I’ve drawn.

I don’t know what people’s shoes say about them in real life, but they’re often the focal point in my drawings. Oversized shoes that are either polished or sloppy add character to my characters.

How do you decide which shoes to draw?

I love sneakers with long loopy laces. I’m into the loafers now, partially because the shine allows me to draw the harsh shadows that I love. Primarily, I find shoes that lend well to my style, and any shoes I think are fun.

What’s your creative process typically like? Do you carry a sketchbook with you at all times? What sorts of people, things, and scenarios compel you to draw them?

I love the idea of being someone who sketches people at coffee shops, but really, I do my best work snuggled up on the couch.

I take pictures of people, shoes, or interesting color combos out and about, but you can’t beat Pinterest for inspiration. I also love collecting old books for reference photos or kids’ books from my favorite illustrators. I recently found a pair of red leather shoes at a thrift store, and I took a photo of them to draw. You’ll be seeing those soon!

I like drawing people in motion and exaggerating my favorite part, the shoes.

What do you hope your illustrations communicate to your viewers? 

Honestly, I’ve never thought about that. When I’m looking for inspiration, I like to find a challenge. A different angle I haven’t tried or new subject matter. Colored pencils were also new to me when I started to develop my style; they’ve always been my least favorite medium. I like to use colored pencils like a crayon: with a dull tip, ultra-pigmented, bold, and messy. So I hope my process inspires people to try something new and challenging.

Illustrative calendars are interactive artworks that allow us to dream of optimistic futures or pleasant presents. Many illustrated calendars are designed not just to count off the passing days but to produce needed surprise. For 2024, the Italian illustration-design duo known as the Ballbusso Twins (Anna and Elena) illustrated this year’s Epson Calendario, Spectacular, producing a hypnotic series of lavish images that represent sports and dance in colorful patterns to calming and curative effect.

“When Epson commissioned us for this fascinating free-theme project, our first thought was to reconcile its communication needs with our boundless passion for art and the desire to recover the origins of our artistic education,” Anna and Elena write. “We learned about color theory and visual perception at the Brera Academy in Milan, where we graduated in painting. Our work combines two core elements, graphic design and painting, with a clear reference to art history. Our sources of inspiration range from the frescoes of Pompeii to the avant-garde of the 20th century, right up to contemporary art.”

For the Epson Calendar, they wanted to create “a visual narrative with a human focus and with a strong perceptive and emotional impact, enhancing the expressive power of color. The idea for the narrative path from dance to sport came from the famous sculpture Unique Forms of Continuity in Space by futurist artist Umberto Boccioni, which represents speed and dynamism. We created compositions in which geometries, patterns, circles and lines interact with the human body in motion, creating ‘abstract spaces’ that stimulate vision. In dance as in sporting disciplines, the body becomes a spectacle, expressing talent, commitment, the determination to overcome your own limitations. We hope to have succeeded in creating images that are a visual pleasure for the observer!”

The result is a tour de force of illustrative design that makes each month extra special. Take a brief look at them here, and then wait until the months are over before looking again for the artful surprise.

The effort has gone viral and Pablo quickly built a website to house the burgeoning results. I had the opportunity to talk with him about how and why he started this initiative, his thoughts about artificial intelligence and why he’s not worried about the future of artificial art.

Debbie Millman: Pablo, I understand this project really started as a joke. What was the inspiration?

Pablo Delcan: I spend a lot of time drawing with my son, drawing things he wants to see, or things that make each other laugh. The day when I started this project, I was at the studio starting a fire, trying to get the studio to a decent temperature, while I waited to see if the logs were catching the flame, I had this idea that made me laugh. I thought it’d be funny if I turned myself into a non-AI artist that spits out simple drawings of any prompt it gets, I named it Prompt-Brush 1.0. So I put this on my social media, announced that I had created the very first non-AI art generator model and that I was taking in prompts to showcase it.

I had recently seen the latest announcement from Google Bard and I had been toying with the new GPTs feature from OpenAI, where you can train your own AI model. I’m in awe at how powerful and useful these tools are already. 

The response was immediate and viral—why do you think people responded so vigorously?

There is a real tension about how AI is going to change everything. I think the excitement is overshadowed by the destructive potential it could also have. The idea of poking a little fun at this serious concern drew people in. It’s also really fun to be able to ask someone to draw something for you, see them interpret something you’ve thought of. With AI we’re all commissioning endless amounts of images and text, but it’s interesting how different it is when that same process is applied to one person instead.

Talk about the new website: what do you hope to accomplish?

I’ve done around 200 drawings that I’m slowly updating to the website every day, there is also an embarrassing queue of more than 200 prompts that I’m trying to catch up to. I think by the end of this month I will have chipped away at most of these prompts, I’m getting faster and better. It’s hard not being an AI. 

I’m not sure where this project will lead but I’m really enjoying it as it is. I’m connecting with people in a new way, and I’m developing these drawings at the same time. I want the drawings to get looser as this progresses. As opposed to Midjourney and Dall-e, that keep getting better and better and highly detailed and hyper-realistic. I want these drawings to get rougher, still communicating something but in a more direct way, more child-like. 

How can people participate?

I’d love for more people to participate. If anyone is interested, it’s very easy.

Visit Prompt Brush.com input your prompt in the text box on the main page, add your email so I can send you the drawing, and then be patient… The biggest difference right now between Prompt-Brush 1.0 and any other generative model is how slow it is. Prompt-Brush doesn’t operate on weekends and sometimes takes vacation days.

What have been some of the prompts that have surprised you?

I really enjoy the ones that become a mental puzzle. I’m trying to create something that speaks to the prompt, so the image and the text compliment each other but aren’t redundant. Those are more challenging. “5 second rule” was fun in that way. There are some that are more abstract, there is more for me to interpret. For example, a one word prompt I got was “Forgiveness”, it took some playing around to get to an image for that.

I want these drawings to get rougher, still communicating something but in a more direct way, more child-like.

Pablo Delcan

Any particularly difficult or challenging prompts?

The harder prompts are the ones where there is something that I don’t know how to draw. Yesterday I had to draw some frogs, different breeds of dogs, an ostrich and some horses. I don’t think I had ever drawn a frog before. So it’s a bit of a crash course on drawing anything well enough that someone might identify what it is.

What are your goals for the site?

I’m hoping the site keeps archiving these drawings for the rest of 2024. It’d be fun to see how these drawings change, or don’t change. I’m hoping to finish the year with hundreds of them and see what the next chapter, Prompt-Brush 2.0, might be. I’d also like to offer the option to have an original drawing of their prompt delivered. That might come next. 

You’ve stated that that this is “a topic that has consumed so much of this year, and will likely pick up even more next year – especially for artists and illustrators.” How are you feeling about AI? Are you scared, worried, excited, all of the above? What do you think its power really lies?

Once AI is able to do the work that I do better, there won’t be a reason for me to continue doing it anymore. I don’t think I’m scared of that possibility. I think there is an existential edge to it too, would anyone want to create something that a robot can do faster and better? Once that happens the work will have to change, maybe my work will need to be more human, and I’ll have to figure out what that means. I’m mainly very excited to see all the changes that AI will bring. So far, at it’s current stage, it’s been an immensely helpful tool.

There is something AI can’t replace yet. The uniquely human need to connect with the maker.

Pablo Delcan

Have you used any AI prompts in your own work? If so, which ones and how did you feel about the results?

I use AI every day for my work. I created a GPT assistant to help me organize the prompts and keep a running queue for the Prompt-Brush project.

For my editorial images or the book covers I make, I frequently use Midjourney, Chat GPT and the new Photoshop generate tool for sketching. The results are great and get better and better each month. It’s fun and empowering.

You’ve stated that “there is something about being able to make people laugh or smile with what I’m doing that just seems so incredibly gratifying!” How do you try to do that in your practice with other projects?

I’m always trying to spark some kind of emotion in myself with the work that I do. Either making myself laugh or get that feeling of a deep breath of fresh air you sometimes get when you see something beautiful or profound. If I can get a bit of that during the process, hopefully that eventually carries through to someone else.

Anything else you’d like to share?

There is something AI can’t replace yet. The uniquely human need to connect with the maker. Consuming music, reading a book or watching a movie generated by AI is going to be an artificial connection, no matter how good it is. And I don’t think most of us will want to consume artificial art, I don’t think I would. I’ll want to feel a real connection and the real warmth of something made by another human.

In the mid-’50s, Robert Weaver, Cliff Condak, Alan Cober, Tom Allen and Bob Parker were at the crest of a new wave of representational American illustration. Of course, this is a subjective list, many more names can be added. But this was a group with varied styles, mannerisms and interests, and all brought an expressionistic intensity and impressionistic fluidity to editorial illustration. Parker’s work was arguably the most lyrical of the group; I always sensed he was making his art while in a trance. Hence, the parrot (which I will donate to the Norman Rockwell Museum this spring) is not just a bird but Parker’s vision of inner peace.

By way of remembrance, the following essay is a slightly edited form that I published as a precis to a Graphis magazine portfolio of Parker’s work in 1983. (Video by A’Dora Phillips and Brian Schumacher/AMDF/the Vision & Art Project.)

He had no intention of becoming an illustrator, but Robert Andrew Parker is today one of America’s most influential. In the early ’50s, when he inadvertently entered the field, his unique blend of Impressionism and Expressionism—a marriage of fluid line and color—was anomalous, particularly compared to the mannered realism and literal sensibility of the postwar period. Parker’s idiosyncratic watercolors and etchings—in terms of content, a convergence of literary allusions and imaginary situations—were apparently better suited to experimental art galleries than to editorial illustration. Yet three important magazine art directors—Cipe Pineles, Leo Lionni and Robert Benton—who independently of each other saw his exhibitions, commissioned and published his editorial work, causing a snowball effect in popularity that provided him with a loyal following. In the wake of Parker‘s significant breakthroughs, other illustrators began to move toward simplicity and modernism.

If Parker’s work has the look of a child’s energetic scribbling, it is because he began drawing at the age of 10, and admits he never changed his style. Creating pictures of soldiers and battles was a way to entertain himself while enduring a drawn-out bout with tuberculosis, isolated from the rest of the world in the New Mexico hinterlands. Ironically, upon regaining his health he stopped drawing, as if art was a curative for which he had no more need. Instead, Parker turned his interest to books: “I devoured every wildly unsuitable volume in the schoolhouse,” he recalls, “from The Mysterious Stranger to King Solomon’s Mines.” Music was his second passion. He played clarinet and saxophone in small combos. And, had he not thought that it was impossible to be as good as his musical idols, he would never have returned to the visual arts.

In 1948, after Army service, Parker entered the Chicago Institute of Art on the GI Bill. He studied painting and print-making, and was inspired by the work of the famed Stieglitz group of the 1920s, Arthur Dove and particularly Charles Demuth, whose watercolor style he emulated. Moreover, Max Beckmann’s emotionally charged prints and Otto Dix’s horrific World War I etchings made a lasting impression. His classmates were Claes Oldenburg, Robert Indiana and Leon Golub, and were all influenced by the teachings of R.O. Taylor—an obsessionist whose own fixations with cultural ephemera were central to the emerging Pop Art movement. Parker later fine-tuned his printmaking skills at the prestigious Atelier 17 in New York City. Next, a job on the set of the film A Lust For Life rendering facsimile Van Gogh paintings [for the star Kirk Douglas to use as props] filled his pockets with coin and his head with knowledge.

Although Parker came of age during the Abstract Expressionism era, he shunned it, choosing instead to capture narrative form in impressions of variegated internal and external stimuli, including his dreams, monkeys and apes, Marat/Sade, Thelonious Monk, and images of war. It all somehow served as fuel for numerous expressive, often witty images. “I always courted ideas,” he says, “in the hope that I would find something that would hit me, in which I could totally involve myself.” This courtship has taken him all over the globe, including a climb up the Himalayas and treks across Africa, resulting in journals filled with sketches for future projects.

He creates a prodigious number of images on specific themes in as many different media as possible. “I have an embarrassing amount of paper at the end of the year,” he says. Once, during the Vietnam War, he visited his town’s garbage dump and found a surgeon’s operation manual with terrifying graphic examples that became the source of a year’s worth of powerful antiwar imagery.

Parker practices a deceptive form of Expressionism. “My work is not Expressionist in the usual, Germanic manner,” he says. “My primary colors are Naples yellow and shrimp pink.” But when he has a message to impart, it is definitely articulated. His most well-known series, “The Imaginary War,” published in Esquire, was as much an antiwar statement as it was a series of boyhood fantasies. A similar cycle of narrative protest images, “The Death of the Ball Turret Gunner,” is so counterintuitively calming to look at—almost naïve in its simplicity—with the inevitable death scene at the end of the story so surprising that it is more powerful than many overt depictions of warfare. Parker’s subtle approach to picture-making and its youthful energy make his art so enticing.

I recently read an excellent interview with UK-based independent lettering artist and type designer Jamie Clarke (part of an announcement that Jamie Clarke Type has joined Type Network). Lucas Czarnecki, Type Network’s director of content, chatted with Clarke about his practice and why illustration is central to his typographic work.

Before starting Jamie Clarke Type, Clarke co-owned and ran a web and digital design agency in London from 2003 to 2013. Creative burnout left him looking for his next chapter and he turned to his love of typography. In the ensuing decade, Clarke has produced a host of interesting typefaces, including Brim, Rig Shaded, Span, and SideNote (the latter sparked by his desire for “business casual” annotations).

Learn what it was like to work with Folio Society on a limited edition cover for the 70th anniversary of Casino Royale and why he’s itching to do some work for a wine or spirits brand. Read the full interview on Type Network.

Launched in 2016, Type Network partners with type designers around the world (45 foundries from 15 countries so far) to “provide their clients with the best type in the world.” Czarnecki plans more in depth interviews in the coming weeks. Typophiles can find more stories (and fonts by Jamie Clarke Type) at typenetwork.com.

For Edel Rodriguez politics is personal. As a child, he and his family fled Castro’s Cuba as part of the Mariel boatlift. Once settled in Miami, a young Rodriguez became fascinated with the Bill of Rights in school. His first adult job was working the New York Times op-ed page. As an illustrator, Rodriguez has always been in the business of political commentary, speaking truth to power through his art.

His truth unfolds in Worm: A Cuban American Odyssey.

The Cuban dictatorship was great about sending the ‘right’ kind of propaganda out into the world. I hope my book dispels some of this. A ‘hero’ like Che can be someone else’s oppressor.

Edel Rodriguez

Debbie Millman’s and Steven Heller’s recent conversation with Rodriguez covered a lot of ground, from how he devised Worm’s visual language to the reclaiming of a derogatory term as the title to the deeper philosophical reasons for why this book (and why now). Rodriguez also delves into the parallels between the Cuban Revolution and the January 6th insurrection. As for a future film adaptation (we’re calling it here!), he’d cast Pedro Pascale as his father.

If you missed the livestream, register here to watch the episode.

Don’t own a copy of Worm? You can order one here.

“Ugly Books from designer Jon Contino. I love these vibrant, multicoloured notebooks and their delightful colourway names (Wharf Rat, Devil’s Night, Pink Moon!). You can grab a Mystery 3-Pack for a fun, surprise mix. Their Instagram @uuglybookss highlights the beautiful ways people have filled the books, too, for inspiration.

Prints or cards by illustrator Samantha Curcio (pictured). She has such a playful, fun style that lends itself very well to sending a loved one a note to let them know you’re thinking of them. The posters are fantastic for kids’ rooms. She also has a sweet children’s book called Hello Every Body! that I’ve given to several friends with little ones.

The Closure Pin is a cheeky pin that I made based on a real text message an adult man sent me. Great for all your inside jokes and nihilistic jean jackets.”

Lola Landekic is a graphic designer and writer working in film and branding. She is also the Editor in Chief of Art of the Title, which she runs from her studio in Toronto, Canada.

Banner photo by James Aldrin on Unsplash.

Mark your calendars for our next PRINT Book Club. Artist and illustrator Edel Rodriguez, creator of over 200 magazine covers for publications such as The New Yorker, TIME, Newsweek, and Der Spiegel, will discuss his latest book with Debbie Millman and Steven Heller. 

Rodriguez’s work is singular, striking, and often controversial and his graphic memoir, Worm: A Cuban American Odyssey, is a stunning example. Rodriguez illustrates the story of his childhood in Cuba and his family’s decision in 1980 to join a hazardous flotilla of refugees, the Mariel boatlift. He uses his own experiences to capture what it’s like to grow up under an authoritarian government and sound an alarm for the future.

A sharply observed document of totalitarianism and its discontents—this gifted artist in particular.

Kirkus Reviews

Through vivid, stirring art, Worm tells a story of a Cold War boyhood, a family’s exile, and their tenacious longing for those they left behind. It also recounts the coming-of-age of an artist and activist who, witnessing America’s turn from democracy to extremism, struggles to differentiate his adoptive country from the dictatorship he fled. Confronting questions of patriotism and the liminal nature of belonging, Edel Rodriguez ultimately celebrates the maligned and overlooked immigrants who guard and invigorate American freedom.

Don’t miss this exciting talk on Tuesday, December 12 at 4 PM ET! Register for the livestream discussion and buy Worm: A Cuban American Odyssey by Edel Rodriguez.

Banner image: illustration from Worm: A Cuban American Odyssey. © Edel Rodriguez

The Norman Rockwell Museum presents Lionni’s full story in the exhibition Between Worlds: The Art and Design of Leo Lionni, co-curated by writer and historian Leonard Marcus and Steven Heller. Read Steven Heller’s thoughts on the exhibition in The Daily Heller.

I recently sat down with Leonard Marcus to discuss Lionni, his work, and the exhibition. There were many highlights for me. One is his multidisciplinary yet compartmentalized talent. Another is the deeply thoughtful and philosophical way in which he wrote and illustrated for children. 

These days, we recognize and celebrate multidisciplinary creativity. It wasn’t always the case. As a working graphic designer in the era of abstract expressionism, Lionni and his fellow applied artists understood that their commercial work wasn’t viewed as ART. In the pecking order of the art world, applied artists couldn’t be fine artists as well. Children’s book illustrators worked under the weight of dual sins: they depicted the narrative realm during an era when the abstract was king, queen, and jury, and in the hierarchy of publishing, works for children were an afterthought.

Despite narrative art being the main Western art tradition, Marcus says that “many illustrators of Lionni’s era had to resist the pressure to draw abstractly from their instructors in art school. To become an illustrator in those days, you had to rebel against a very strong orthodoxy that discouraged the narrative.” (The art critic Clement Greenberg once called illustration “prostitution.”) So, when you consider that children’s book art was one of few realms that sustained narrative art during the time it wasn’t favored, “Lionni’s book illustrations come into focus in a different way,” says Marcus.

Piecing Together a World

Seeing the whole picture of Lionni’s creativity helps us understand and admire him all the more. As the child of an art-loving family in Amsterdam (Marc Chagall’s Le Violonniste hung outside his bedroom), Lionni received an education focused on nature, arts, and crafts. As a young adult in Italy, he rubbed shoulders with the Futurists, who emphasized dynamism and progress. Emigrating to the US in 1939 on the eve of WWII, Lionni had experienced a lifetime’s worth of adversity at the hands of others’ small-mindedness. You can see how his experiences shaped his work, which often incorporate collage elements: how an individual thing (a child, a shape, a concept) informs and inspires the bigger picture (a community, a composition, an outlook). 

“Collage became an important way of art-making after World War I. With European society in shatters, artists like Kurt Schwitter set out to put it back together. You can view Lionni in this aesthetic tradition, along with Ezra Jack Keats and Eric Carle,” says Marcus. “Collage is also a common way of making art that children do from a young age. Lionni’s work suggests that we need not be reverential towards the art but rather to offer up to people with open minds a way to think boldly about what the world could be.”

The subtext of Lionni’s books for children is ‘What if?’

Leonard Marcus

Lionni’s children’s book illustrations are not just about beautiful pictures, “Leo realized that children are the people who can change their minds.” Marcus says, “He was making art to shape the future. He was always aware of what was happening in society. He didn’t want to tell people what to do, but rather offer up to people with open minds to think in a big way about what the world could be.”

Vivian Paley, a kindergarten teacher in Chicago, recognized this future-creating theme in Lionni’s books and that they built on each other. “They are reconsiderations, one after another, of the relationship of the individual to society,” says Marcus. Paley understood this is an issue that always comes up for children, so she created a year-long curriculum using Lionni’s picture books. “Lionni’s children’s books help children find their place in that constellation of alternatives.” 

Marcus’ favorite is Lionni’s award-winning Inch by Inch, and he believes it’s where his signature style came together for the first time. “Lionni’s depiction of ‘out of frame’ images–the crane is so big it doesn’t fit on the page–is mindblowing from the perspective of a child trying to understand what’s going on. His children’s books speak to the power of what art can do, how it can stretch your way of thinking about things.”

Between Worlds: The Art and Design of Leo Lionni is on view at the Norman Rockwell Museum until May 2024.

Image galleries:

1) Left: Leo Lionni (1910-1999), World on View, n.d. Poster, © Leo Lionni. All rights reserved. Courtesy of the Lionni Family; Middle: Leo Lionni (1910-1999), New Building Techniques, 1956, Cover design for Fortune, March 1956, Tearsheet, © Leo Lionni. All rights reserved. Courtesy of the Lionni Family; Right: Leo Lionni (1910-1999), Two famous globetrotters. The smaller one—the Olivetti Lettera 22—travels the year and the world ‘round, 1957, Advertisement for Olivetti’s “Lettera 22,” reprinted from The New Yorker, December 7, 1957, Tearsheet, © Leo Lionni. All rights reserved. Courtesy of the Lionni Family

2) Left: Leo Lionni (1910-1999), And so the days went by, Illustration for Fish is Fish, 1970 (Knopf), Colored pencil on paper, © Leo Lionni. All rights reserved. Courtesy of the Lionni Family; Right: Leo Lionni (1910-1999), “And hang from my tail.” Cornelius was amazed, Illustration for Cornelius: A Fable, 1983 (Pantheon), Mixed media collage, © Leo Lionni. All rights reserved., Courtesy of the Lionni Family

Banner artwork:

Leo Lionni (1910-1999), Cover illustration for Frederick, 1967 (Knopf), Mixed media collage, © Leo Lionni. All rights reserved. Courtesy of the Lionni Family. (left) Leo Lionni (1910-1999), BDC Rex Rotary M-4, n.d., Brochure for BDC (Bond Duplicator Company, New York, New York), © Leo Lionni. All rights reserved. Courtesy of the Lionni Family (right)

Mainly I just draw and draw and draw.

We’re officially in the thick of spooky season, with Home Depot 12-foot skeletons wreaking havoc in front yards across the country and parents making those dreaded last-minute Halloween costume runs to Party City. For illustrator and author Edward Carey, every season is spooky, as the England native is fascinated with surrealist folklore characters that he brings to life with pencil and paper. He’s been posting one of these sketches a day on his Instagram since mid-August, counting down to the release of his newest book, Edith Holler.

To get in the seasonal spirit, I asked Carey a few questions about his creative practice and affinity for folklore. His responses are below.

How did you develop your signature illustration style?

I didn’t train as an illustrator and haven’t taken art lessons since school, but I study a lot of illustrators and they give me ideas. Mainly I just draw and draw and draw. A couple of decades ago I started doing cross-hatching and haven’t stopped since.

What about folklore and folklore characters do you find so compelling as an illustrator?

Folklore characters say so much about the landscape they come from; they describe it in shorthand. Suddenly you understand a place much better and feel its personality. I love all those old tales and stories. They’re primal, they describe people and their fears so perfectly. And suddenly the landscape springs to life. To paraphrase Claude Levi Strauss: “Monsters (he said animals) are good to think with.”

I love drawing, I love the pencil; I feel you can never fully fathom the pencil. The longer you work with it, the more it shows you.

Edward Carey

You’re incredibly prolific, seemingly sketching constantly, and are posting a character drawing a day up until Halloween on your Instagram. What is it about this drawing cadence and structured nature of sharing your work that you enjoy so much?   

I picked it up during the pandemic. I said on Twitter, very near the beginning, I’d do a drawing a day until this was all over, thinking it might last a month or two at most. In the end I drew for 500 days. 

I love drawing, I love the pencil; I feel you can never fully fathom the pencil. The longer you work with it, the more it shows you. Daily drawing was a sort of exercise for me, a challenge—especially to fit it in among other things—but also something peaceful and constructive, a quiet moment in every day. 

The continuity was a comfort during COVID, and now it’s a daily way of pushing myself. But doing drawings from folklore has made me look closer at those tales and they’re so extraordinary, bizarre, moving, and compelling.

How do your writing and visual arts practices inform one another?

I always draw the characters I write about, it’s my way of getting to know them. If I can’t see them, I feel they’re a mystery to me and drawing them challenges the writing. Sometimes they argue with each other and it takes a while for them to agree. I try to make different pieces of art for each book. Sometimes it’s sculpture in clay and then cast, or pencil drawings that I say are made by the narrating character, or pen and ink sketches in squid ink because the narrator’s stuck inside the belly of a massive shark and that’s all he can get hold of. 

My latest novel, set inside a theater, is illustrated with sections and characters and backdrops and side tabs from a Victorian toy theater— but this theater tells the story in the novel. Technically, you could cut the book up and assemble the theater, or you could download it from my website. I love making things related to my books— busts or full-size wooden puppets, or death masks in wax. 

When I’ve assembled enough words and objects, I think a book must be getting close to being done.

What are you being for Halloween?

Just myself I’m afraid. I’m not much for dressing up, though my daughter adores it. 

Growing up in England we didn’t have Halloween really, instead we had Guy Fawkes night which could be called, rather unfortunately, “burn a Catholic night.” It always seemed amazing to me that you’d make your Guy and burn him on a bonfire.

I do love Halloween. I still can’t get over the fact that you simply walk up and ring people’s doorbells and ask for some candy and that, for one night a year, is completely acceptable.

Grimes has been consumed by the prospect since he saw the 1958 sci-fi film The Space Children at 14. Unlike most of today’s galactic narratives—where creatures are drawn to Earth for sinister reasons—the aliens in the film were good guys, a point that made a lasting impression on the artist. Evidence for Contact documents Grimes’ never-ending exploration for their existence. Creating his personal mythology using references taken from astronomy, science-fiction iconography and pop culture, Grimes seeks hidden messages to decode how life on our planet is influenced and shaped by such visitors.

His work will be presented at Ricco/Maresca Gallery New York on Oct. 26, and will also be presented at Parrasch Heijnen Gallery in Los Angeles on Jan. 16, and Galerie Christian Berst in Paris on Feb. 8.

As a fellow alien follower, I was lucky to have Grimes’ manager Julia Pardi give me the opportunity to ask him a few questions about his galactic quest.

Where does your long fascination with ETs come from?
Movies such as Space Brain, ET, and Close Encounters of the Third Kind. I have never seen a Star Wars movie. I am fascinated of answers with big questions.

Why is your work so monochromatic? Does it have to do with certainty or uncertainty about ETs?
I believe that we have made contact by radio telescopes with a computerized starship at Epsilon Eridani. I think ET is a hybrid between a once-living alien entity and advanced computer intelligence. My work is so monochromatic because we either have made contact or we have not made contact. White is a compilation of all colors representing everyone. Black represents space, things outside of our atmosphere, and the absence of everything. 

Have you ever seen an ET? 
No, I have not. I have only seen ETs in movies or on TV. 

Would ETs all live on planets? Is there another place from which they might live?
Possibly, all biological lifeforms got their start on planets, like Earth. Like extrasolar planets, I would not rule out space habitats because we have people living on space stations. I see colonies on Mars and the Moon. I see habitats in our solar system. I do not see lifeforms going from interstellar solar systems because the distance is too great between stars.

Please explain project OZMA.
Project OZMA is the first use of a radio telescope to look for ET radio signals from two stars including Tau Ceti and Epsilon Eridani. There are a lot of aspects of this project that do not quite add up. Why was this project covered up by secret radar jamming experiments? Why was the US Naval Laboratory listening to the same signal for six months, which was the same signal Frank Drake heard when he pointed his radio telescope at Epsilon Eridani? 

Why do most ETs have the same basic look? Are they all ostensibly from one group?
Basically, we have made contact with only one alien civilization on a global basis. There is only one ET symbolization that we are aware of, so all ETs look alike as a result of the one signal. ETs are a global phenomenon, so there may be other ethnic groups, but because we have only made contact with one civilization, we are not aware of other alien civilizations. We may have picked up on other alien civilizations but we have no way of knowing that right now. The first signal is the toughest to figure out. Once we get one, we may find others. 

I realize, as you do, that we can’t be alone in the world. But can ETs have similar operations, operating systems, life support, as earthlings?
Basically, I do not think living entities such as humans can travel from star to star. I would not expect humans to meet a live living alien, but I will say that we have sent four spacecrafts into interstellar space that will be around for a billion years. I think there is a limit of mortality to human life being like 110 years, and ETs have the same limit, so I am unsure if they are still living and around. I think if we discover a computerized spaceship we would discover that there are other civilizations in the galaxy. Interstellar life does not have the environment to keep ETs living because there is nothing to keep this life warm. We have not designed any spacecraft for interstellar travel because it would take a million years to get to different solar systems, but human mortality is too short.

What is the message you want your audience to take away?
First of all, I want people to have a sense of wonder and awe of the universe. Lifeforms from other civilizations may have been walking on other planets similar to Earth a billion years ago, and other solar systems in the universe. They will also be around when our sun goes nova in five billion years. Second, I want people to be aware of the mind of God.  

What is next in your journey?
I would like to leave this world a better place when I pass away and know that I made a difference. I want to help us achieve a better understanding of our solar system and life in our universe. We all make mistakes and we learn by making mistakes so that we do not repeat the same mistakes. We must learn from our mistakes. I want other people to learn from my mistakes and hope my work helps answer questions on my journey to understand our place in the world and galaxy and learn that we are not alone. I will continue to do artwork on ETs because if we do not ask questions, we do not get answers. There are always more interesting things out there to learn. The truth is out there. I hope other people are inspired to carry on the work I started and that I will leave a lasting legacy for the next generation. 

Urban Sketchers, the organization he founded in 2009 to foster the art of on-location sketching, grew out of an online publishing project—a group blog where visitors could “See the World, One Drawing at a Time” through dispatches from artist correspondents all over the world.

Sketcher Press’ most current book, Different & the Same, features from-life sketches by Melanie Reim, whose work accompanies articles, books and exhibits. They are also part of the U.S. Air Force Art Collection in the Pentagon. A former associate dean and professor at the New York Fashion Institute of Technology School of Art and Design, Reim has been recognized as a distinguished educator by the Society of Illustrators and was a Fulbright Scholar.

I asked Campanario about the struggles involved in publishing this kind of visual material in a tentative market, and what he has in store for the future.

Gabi, what motivated such an ambitious publishing, well, gamble?
I’ve noticed a new breed of visual storyteller emerging in recent years, but no publishing houses that focus exclusively on their work. These artists tell stories from their travels, like Eleanor Doughty in Nepal; from their own backyard, like Nishant Jain in Vancouver, BC, James Hobbs in London or Daniel Winterbottom in Seattle; and even from the fringes of war, like George Butler in Ukraine. They are documentary photographers without cameras. Instead, they make drawings on the spot and on the go, sketching as witnesses. With Sketcher Press—and by extension with my Substack newsletter, On the Spot—I want to elevate this unique form of visual storytelling.

I believe books of reportage art and urban sketching can tell stories in a special, artful and intimate way, like no other medium can.

You clearly have a deep appreciation for reportage illustration, but do you believe there is a large enough audience to support a publishing program?
As the “Seattle Sketcher” columnist at The Seattle Times for 12 years, I drew and wrote about Seattle and heard from many readers who loved the feature. They appreciated the storytelling behind the drawings and the words.

I do believe there is a much larger audience of people who will appreciate this form of visual storytelling if it is well-presented. Drawings inspire curiosity, discovery, human connection and appreciation for the world at large, from places close to home to the most remote locations where some of us may never be able to travel.

The more we are inundated by images generated by AI algorithms, the more we are likely to value what a reportage artist can offer. Nowadays photographs and video can easily be questioned as manipulated. But you can’t fake a sketch. The work of reportage artists and urban sketchers feels authentic.

What is your background?
I have worked as a newspaper infographic artist, design editor, art director, columnist and illustrator since earning a journalism degree in my native Spain in the early ’90s. As an author, I have written books on urban sketching (The Art of Urban Sketching, The Urban Sketching Handbook: Architecture and Cityscapes and The Urban Sketching Handbook: People and Motion) and a compilation of my Seattle Times columns (Seattle Sketcher: An illustrated Journal).

What attracted you to Melanie Reim’s work that you published in Different & the Same?
I have been captivated by Melanie Reim’s drawing style and choice of subjects ever since I first connected with her in the early days of Urban Sketchers. Her art is instantly recognizable for dynamic linework, bold use of color and lively scenes that jump off the page. A confident artist, she is unafraid of expressing the world through her own filter. I love that. Also, Reim has been genuinely interested in portraying women, especially working women, like no other reportage artist I know. That powerful body of work had to be published. Different & the Same brings together a remarkable collection of Reim’s work that deserves a prime spot in the art library of anyone who appreciates good art and storytelling.

What is the impetus for the previous release New York Reawakens?
Rita Sabler’s reportage of New York had been selected for inclusion in the 2022 Rendez-vous du Carnet de Voyage festival. I jumped at the opportunity to publish it so she could present it at the renowned festival in France last November. Her vibrant ink-and-watercolor sketches are a record of an important time in the history of New York—as the city emerged from the pandemic. They transmit a sense of hope and renewal that anyone who loves New York would appreciate.

How are you able to finance these projects? Do you have a distinct business model?
So far, I’m trying to cover costs with a mix of fundraising from Kickstarter, book preorders and online and event sales. As the word about Sketcher Press gets out, I hope more people will be interested not only in following sketchers on social media, but also in owning all the beautiful Sketcher Press books by them that I hope to deliver.

What’s next on your bucket list?
I’m hard at work with the next Sketcher Press book and excited about how it’s shaping up. I’m also looking forward to new opportunities to promote Sketcher Press authors through more events. Next in our calendar is the artist talk and book signing with Reim at the Society of Illustrators on Oct. 11. I’m also planning for the second edition of Sketcher Fest Edmonds near Seattle in July 2024. If you are looking to escape the New York heat next summer, come for a visit. You can’t beat the Seattle weather in July!

3×3 is now 20 years old, and 99 illustrators have been profiled on your pages. What keeps you going?
The short answer is I’m constantly seeing artists that I want to promote. Not only the three profiles but also the 18 we spotlight in our Seen & Noted section in each issue. It’s so much fun finding artists that I don’t know and others I do who are doing such great work. If I didn’t have 3×3 I believe I’d be frustrated that there wasn’t an outlet to share what I found. And then there’s the joy of selecting the images, the design of the spreads—finding images that complement each other in color and then looking at the following spread to make sure they’re compatible—working with great art is so much fun.

You’ve brought out the magazine in print, and are continuing in digital. What have been the highs and lows of keeping 3×3 going?
Yes, we went on hiatus with the magazine for a few years and came back 10 issues ago. We started to see a decline in interest in the magazine when social media started to play a bigger role in showcasing illustrators. Founding a brand-new magazine in 2003 was a challenge but I received such support from illustrators and am forever grateful to those first supporters who bought ads in our gallery section when there wasn’t a published magazine yet. They showed great faith in me to deliver—that was the first definite high.

The response to the publication was great, though even today, it’s never been a money-maker. It costs so much to put a magazine on the newsstand with so little return that it barely covered the cost of printing and shipping. Today our magazine is subscription-based with limited newsstand presence overseas. And then our wonderful U.S. Postal Service threw a real kink in by increasing postage costs for shipping overseas. And it remains a challenge. For instance, it costs as much to ship a magazine as the cover price, which prices it out of the market; thankfully, our affordable digital issues do allow wider foreign distribution. The postage obstacle also affects sales of our 3×3 International Illustration Annual, but again there’s a digital option.

A major high was when 3×3 was selected to be in included in your 2014 book 100 Classic Graphic Design Journals—a highlight for 3×3 and a huge highlight for me personally. And I still get a high in working on each issue of the magazine, but there’s always a low when I find even a tiny mistake. A low continues to be the lack of interest in magazines and the focus on social media. I have a hard time seeing how in 10, 20, 30, 50 years, social media will be able to identify what happened in the illustration field in 2023. Magazines and books were the bulk of my education as an illustrator, as a graphic designer, as an ad agency art director. Graphis magazine was a huge expense for me, but it and the other magazines like PRINT and Art Direction were worth it. I have a library of nearly 1,000 books on design, illustration, photography, advertising that has nurtured my development. (I can remember taking the Art Directors Annual, blowing up an ad, researching the typeface used, the size, the leading, the column width, size of the logo and headline, just to see what made it something I gravitated towards.) When I’m looking at any fine artist’s studio on YouTube, I see books all over the place, but I don’t always see that when looking inside an illustrator’s studio. Artforum and similar art publications are ones that artists want to be featured in; and the public, the collectors, the galleries and the editorial all supports it. I’m still perplexed why illustration is not more sought after, promoted and supported—it’s an artform, for god’s sake.

In your current issue you have a wonderful story on Bob Grossman, who passed away four years ago. Also in the same issue is a memorial to Bruce McCall. Do you feel there are more illustrators of their caliber coming up, or is the golden age gone?
I remain excited about the illustration field, but I understand it’s much tougher today to gain the reputation Bob and Bruce had. I’m enjoying our new feature where we promote the illustrators I grew up with, including many—including Bob—that I had the pleasure of working with. We’ve profiled Jean-Michel Folon and Roland Topor, both of whom I’ve worked with, both on advertising campaigns; in fact, Topor’s original art is hanging behind me in the studio. Others have included Pierre Le-Tan and someone I wasn’t familiar with, Ferenc Pinter. And one of my idols, Bernie Fuchs. All were highly original and famous in the public sense. It’s harder to be famous now. There are so many bright faces out there creating truly original art, it’s just amazing to me. You have illustrators like Jon Han, Keith Negley, Johanna Goodman, Miriam Martincic, Haley Wall, and someone I just discovered, Oyow, pushing the envelope and creating art that’s fresh and new.

Where do you situate 3×3 in the continuum of illustration?
The biggest disappointment with the field of illustration is the lack of other publications that promote what’s going on today. When you compare the number of magazines on the newsstand for photography and fine art, there should be an equal number on illustration. And now without UK’s Varoom, 3×3 is alone in promoting contemporary illustration worldwide.

What determines what you’ll feature and what you will not?
We try to get a good mix of illustration work, but in each issue we always feature someone from outside the U.S., a female illustrator … and a U.S. illustrator. In the latest issue we featured all illustrators outside the U.S. apart from Giselle Potter, our issue’s Icon, and of course the late Robert Grossman. We select our issue’s Icon as one who has had an impact on the illustration field, [whose] personal voice has remained constant throughout their career. Our Legend is someone who made an indelible impact in the ’60s and ’70s. There are so many choices for all parts of the magazine; focusing on nine profiled illustrators (3×3=9) leaves a lot out and there will never be a dearth of Icons to feature. I also like to look at the broad field of illustration, so we’ve recently featured Stuart Bradford and Javier, whose approach to illustration is more photographic. As long as there is something distinctive about their work, I want to feature it. I do avoid illustrators who haven’t quite found their way because I want the art director who sees an article to click on their website and see more of the same. Unfortunately, there’s a trend lately where there is no consistent style, and that will confuse art directors.

You’re obviously determined to champion the art of illustration. Do you believe that in the next few years, with AI in the mix, there will be an art to champion?
Of course. I have mixed views on AI illustration, and have done two research studies of leading editorial art directors about their views. Most worry about the copyright issue, and very few have tried it. However, what we saw is that designers seem more drawn to AI as a resource, and they have tried it and for the most part like it. As an art director I’ve never asked an illustrator how they created an illustration; that was not my concern. My concern was whether the illustration solved the visual problem I had. I’ve seen a lot of AI art; too much of it is generic with limited application. Like anything else, you’re seeing good and bad AI art out there. There’s the argument about entering a phrase and an illustration pops out; I think that’s an overly simplistic way of looking it. First, in some respects it’s no different from a creative brief provided an illustrator—they’re given words to illustrate. And secondly, from what little I’ve investigated, for good AI art to be created, it’s a process and not something that happens in a flash. Looking on Instagram, illustrator/designer Q. Cassetti is doing some marvelous illustrations in a multitude of styles, which in a way is exciting to see. Artists like Cindy Sherman are experimenting with it, as is the designer/illustrator Marian Bantjes. And yes, I believe the process of scraping the web for content is not kosher. (As an aside, reading your article on Otto Bettman, I doubt he had the copyright on any of the trunk-full of clippings and negatives he brought over from Leipzig. The Archive was always a good resource.)

You could make the argument that AI is just a tool, or source for inspiration, that with any illustrator there are influences they’ve found that help create their distinctive art. And the argument could be made that you can’t copyright a style, and from what I understand very few, if any, illustrators have copyrighted their images. As I say in the current issue: “Will AI compete with artists? Yes, but it won’t replace artists. In fact, in some cases it may help solve problems faster or take care of menial tasks or help with more complex visual solutions, allowing illustrators the luxury of time to develop the ever-important concept or storyline.” The absolute wonder I see with original art is the diversity of personal voices, the multitude of different treatments of art. That’s not going to change.

What’s next for you and 3×3?
Let’s start with 3×3. I’d like to continue doing the magazine and to continue supporting the illustration community. Other than the magazine and juried international annual, we hold webinars for new grads, we have a biannual webinar on how to approach art directors, we have a new YouTube channel that I’d like to use as a Q&A vehicle for young illustrators, as it’s so rare to hear from an art director’s perspective, and I’m rethinking our 3×3 Illustration Directory that’s sent to U.S. art directors. The pandemic meant we didn’t print our directory in 2021; instead, we chose an online gallery, returning to the printed directory in 2022. This year we’ve conducted two research studies and found that the majority of art directors like to be reached by email, not mailers. Being on the receiving end of emails, the emails from illustrators are always plain-text emails, whereas artist reps, photographers, designers all use HTML emails, so we’re looking at a plan to do that this year in developing individualized emails using a curated list to pinpoint art directors who might be interested in a particular illustrator’s work.

As for me, my partner in life and work would prefer that I drop the magazine and just enjoy life. Being in my golden years, I understand that there’s only so much time left, and I must decide how to spend it wisely. With my free time I do dabble in photography and enjoy the results. I’ve completed a book on my travels to London, Random London, and one after a trip to Vienna to speak to DesignAustria, Wiener Secessionsgebäude. I am currently working on a photobook, ME, about my travels in Maine. I’m also entering photography shows and have been featured in a number of exhibits with my series of torn advertising posters found in the New York subway system. I have a site where you can buy my prints, but don’t really promote it. And a final short answer, as long as I can get up in the morning and still want to come into the office, I’ll continue to love what I’m doing and doing what I love.

Throughout his career, he’s specialized in creating narrative and concept-based illustrations using the scratchboard medium, in both analog and digital forms. All told, his work has been featured in books, magazines, newspapers and advertising. Today he talks about drawing, journalism and legacy.

When did you start to chronicle various illustrators and journals of illustration?
I’ve always been an illustration and reportage enthusiast. I was fortunate at Parsons to be in Murray Tinkleman’s first History of Illustration class. I also had two extraordinary teachers, Tom Allen and John Gundlefinger, who showed their reportage projects for Fortune and Sports Illustrated. That left a lasting impression on me. 

Now I honor (posthumously) some of the great reportage artists of the past on my Substack.

How did you develop such a deep dive passion for illustration and legacy?
I taught illustration at California College of the Arts in San Francisco when Dugald Stermer ran the program. I encouraged my students to integrate written narratives into what they drew in their sketchbooks. I wanted them to use all their creative capabilities for storytelling.

You’ll often find me in used bookstores in the cities and towns I visit, scouring for books and monographs of illustrators and visual journalists.

In my later stage of life, legacy is a preoccupation.

There have been a fair number of illustration “historians,” and recent waves of books on the subject. What do you believe you’ve added to the stew? What has been missing from the existing coverage?
I don’t consider myself a historian as much as a fan. When I discovered Nick Meglin‘s book On-the-Spot Drawing (Watson-Guptill, 1969) I saw the importance, necessity, and viability of reportage drawing. Your own article on sketchbooks from PRINT magazine in 1976 was an inspiration, as were other writings of yours.

When Substack appeared a year ago, I finally saw a publishing platform that would work for me. First I wrote a few histories for Gabi Campanario, founder of Urban Sketchers, but I realized quickly I had more to say. I also owned the illustratedjournalism.com domain, so I had a place to point it.

I took inspiration from the photojournalism in Robert Frank’s The Americans. There is an essential humanity and newsworthiness in his work. I knew there were illustrators who also produce compelling and informed narratives. 

What do you bring through your writing that pushes the field of illustration history and documentation further along?
My writing is not academic. I realized I was an artist who could write and bring an illustrator’s sensibility to this subject. 

I’m passionate about shedding light on some of the undiscovered and under-represented artists in the culture. I hoped that by acknowledging them, I would inspire others that follow.

Do you feel that illustration as journalism is undervalued or under-represented in the histories? And if so, why?
I think so. I worked for seven years as a staff artist at the San Francisco Chronicle. I was in the trenches, always pitching stories to the editors. Many didn’t get or appreciate my approach to illustrated narratives … not “journalistic” or “too subjective,” they would say. Though I did find opportunities on the Op-Ed page of the paper, including illustrating a piece on the first gay marriages at San Francisco City Hall, and covering my own U.S. citizenship process. My weekly panel, the “Bay Folk Sketchbook,” featuring over 75 people and the work they do, was very popular. I continue to do my own personal reportage projects.

There are various ways of addressing illustration—art, ephemera, reportage, fantasy and satire among them. What are your preferred methods, and why?
Illustration work is graphic and inspired by historical styles, like German Expressionism and Social Realism. But it is in many ways the antithesis of sketchbook journalism. Reportage means getting out of the studio and working in situ. You look for people to tell a story, by asking questions and listening to the answers. It’s an experiential process, involving engagement and empathy. The artists I write about reaffirm that.

From my observation and practice, there appears not to be a decline in illustration, as many people fear. But there is also a lot of redundancy, owing in large part to digital tools. How do you feel about this statement?
I don’t necessarily mourn the decline of traditional print since the shift to new online platforms and social media offers exciting new avenues for publishing. I wish it were more tangible. Content is being consumed broadly, not deeply. While these technologies have made it easier than ever to express oneself, it’s the prevalence of “quick reads” that concerns me. People had more time for long-form journalism and the proclivity to study an image.

My only fine old whine would be that with digital tools predominating, it brings less good drawing.

What is your goal in writing the history of illustration? 
The “Histories of Reportage” essays I write are my small contributions to the legacy of illustration and visual journalism. Writing and researching are fun for me, and I earn a small income from my paid subscribers. Maybe I’ll compile them into a book and do some lecturing. 

Which reportage artists are you particularly impressed by?

Some of the more moving reportage artists I write about are:

Chittaprosad Bhattacharya, who drew people dying from starvation, malaria and other diseases in the Bengal Famine of 1943.

Chiura Obata, who landed in San Francisco just in time to chronicle the 1906 earthquake. In 1942 he drew during his time in a Japanese internment camp.

Amelia B. Edwards, who traveled up the Nile in 1865 to draw at Abu Simbel. Later she would share her story of how antiquities were being exploited, and the need for preservation. 

In 1964 Tracy Sugarman made drawings as one of the “Freedom Summer” volunteers that challenged America’s apartheid rule in Mississippi.

As a Special Artist in the Union’s Army, Alfred R. Waud‘s depiction of bloody Pickett’s Charge in 1863 is thought to be the only visual accounting published in newspapers of the time.

Are you an archeologist, digging up the tombs of the forgotten?
Nice metaphor, Steve. Perhaps I am. As I get older (and wiser), I see the need for bringing history forward and sharing some of the meaningful approaches to art (and life) others have made.

His work with Jon Scieszka for The Stinky Cheese Man (which just celebrated its 30th anniversary) was a groundbreaking achievement for its story, art and the innovative typographic work by Leach, who has designed all of his books since. A 2002 Publishers Weekly article titled “A New Day for Design” proclaimed that “Leach opened the door in a lot of ways. When we saw The Stinky Cheese Man, designers said, ‘This is what we want to do, too!’—and that it worked and sold made that possible.”

Smith and Leach will be adding another column to their hallowed pantheon when Stickler Loves the World is published at the end of next month. I am happy to give a preview of Smith’s Stickler with this interview about how and why he is a stickler for books for the child in all of us.

Lane, you’ve given life to so many fantastical characters, most all with human traits. Where did Stickler come from? And why?
Thanks, Steve. Before we start, I don’t know if you recall but you interviewed me way back in … 1984? It was a golden (silver, maybe) age of illustration. I was new to New York, having followed several of my ArtCenter classmates (Matt Mahurin, Greg Spalenka, among others) from California. I was hands-down the least skilled of the bunch, but having you, Steven Heller, take an interest in my work gave me the confidence and vindication I needed to make a serious go of freelance illustration. So, a belated and sincere thanks for helping me launch what has been a great job for nearly 40 years.

OK, Stickler. I published a book in 2022 called A Gift for Nana. My mom, my best friend and biggest supporter, had recently died. She was, and still is, on my mind always and that story just poured out of me. It was about her. But because it was a children’s book I turned her into a rabbit. In it, Nana Rabbit’s grandson goes on a quest to find her a gift and along the way he gets gift suggestions from a volcano, the moon, a big fish and, in a weird forest, a weird stick creature: Stickler. Stickler suggests a gift of a stick to the little rabbit grandson. It was only one page in the book. But I wanted to know more about that creature so I wrote Stickler Loves the World. 

There is a quality to Stickler that I’ve seen in certain Polish posters. Am I wrong, or has that genre been influential?
Hmm … starting out I was influenced by European illustrators like Andre Francois and Americans like Sendak and Gorey, and I was looking at and absorbing everything, so I am sure Polish poster art figured into my diet, but I can’t say it had a direct influence on me in the way that William Steig did or the Provensens. I do know I loved Polish animation. And Czech and Russian animation. And I was most definitely influenced by Jan Svankmajer, Jiri Trnka, Jan Lenica, Starevich … those guys. Stickler could easily be a stop motion puppet from one of their films.

I like the idea of unconventional-looking characters who are lovable. The book begins in a scary, foggy forest. The fog clears and most of the scary shapes are revealed as perfectly normal explainable things, but Stickler remains an unexplainable odd-looking creature. You wonder, what’s up with this guy? Then you turn the page and realize Stickler’s not a monster but a goofball. And you see Stickler running around proclaiming its love of everything in its world.

As I read Stickler Loves the World, I am seduced to love it too. I think the most fascinating love interests from an artistic point of view are the rocks. What influenced you to select the “things” themselves?
During the pandemic I painted large oils on canvas. Some six-feet tall. I used cold wax and even mixed dirt into the paint. (I stole the dirt technique from Dubuffet, one of my favorite painters.) I got some pretty interesting textures. Some looked like the surface of stone or weathered walls. A lot of those techniques found their way into the Stickler illustrations. Especially that Rocks spread.

Story-wise, the idea for the “things” in the book came from my daily walks with our dog Jojo and our cat Lulu. Molly and I live in rural Connecticut. Every morning I walk the pets around and, I guess, being a visual person, I am amazed by all the weird stuff in nature. I say out loud, “Jojo, look at the bark on this tree! It is so strange and beautiful!” Or, “Lulu, the clouds today, look at the shapes. Lulu, can you imagine an alien from another planet seeing all of this for the first time?” To anyone listening in I would sound like a nut. And Lulu and Jojo are not moved by any of this. Still, I continue to do it. Just like Stickler in the book.

(OK, I admit even when I have no pets with me I still talk out loud to no one.)

It is hard to separate one spread as the most powerful, since they are each a tour de force, but I have an affinity for the “sun.” What are your favorites?
Thanks, Steve! I like that image too. Now that you have singled that one out, looking at it, it looks a little like an editorial illustration from back in the 1990s, doesn’t it? Actually, I’ve never thought about this before, but my books owe a lot to my years as a magazine illustrator. If you look at something like The Stinky Cheese Man, what Molly and I did there with my images and her type all comes from the world of magazines.

Besides the sunrise spread, I like the spread about the wind. I like the mood of the image and I like the way Molly’s type moves on the page, as if being blown around.

Another image I like is the one where Stickler is commenting on the “space alien’s” three eyes. I like the textures on that illustration. I like the tree leaves. That picture has a nice feel to me.

There is a visual difference in this book than in others; what drives the decision to create the look, feel and texture of your work?
With my last few books I was experimenting with different media: watercolor, pen and ink, pencils, etc. But I wanted to get back to the look of my earlier painterly books. I was feeling nostalgic, maybe. A Gift for Nana and Stickler Loves the World have a similar vibe to older oil-painted books I’ve illustrated like Halloween ABC or James and the Giant Peach or The True Story of the Three Little Pigs.

Your books are always typographically exciting to match the voice of your writing and personality of the speakers. Molly does such a splendid job. How do you two work together?
I have been lucky to work with Molly on nearly all of my books. Due to the textural experimentation I do on them, some books look different illustration-wise from the others, but typographically Molly is very consistent, so in spite of the illustration style, our books always end up looking like “our books.”

Our collaboration is a back-and-forth one. I make a book dummy. From that stage onward, she is telling me where she wants to put the type. Sometimes I adapt the art to fit her vision and sometimes she’ll make a little concession to me. We go back and forth until the book is done. Some of my books I like a lot and some I wish could have been better but ALL of them share a great design that sets them apart from most other kids’ books. That’s all Molly.

Your books are classified as being for children (and the parents who read to them). Did you purposely make this a book for both to enjoy?
With Stickler it just turned out that way. Most of the time I make books for kids who are like I was when I was young. Kids who like stuff that’s a little stylized and a little odd. Usually my books are not for a broad audience. This one turned out really joyful and optimistic and kids and grownups both seem to like it equally.

Personally, as I get older, I seem to lose or misplace my “love for the world” (except when I’m in Northern Connecticut, in the late spring and fall). Your book brings some of that back. Can you even explain how that magic is accomplished?
Molly and I keep an apartment in NYC, but like you, we enjoy the seasons of Northern Connecticut, where we spend the majority of our time. It is a continual source of inspiration.  

What’s next for you?
I mentioned Dubuffet before, and I have been playing around with a story that would work really well with Dubuffet-like abstract portraits of kids. I envision the spreads as full-bleed close-up faces on one page and nothing but Molly’s minimal type on the opposite page.

But such is the aesthetic developed by the indie rock band Frankie Cosmos’s synth and guitar player, Lauren Martin. The NYC-based multi-hyphenate creative is a classically-trained visual artist who studied painting at the National Academy of Design before pivoting to the Fashion Institute of Technology. While at FIT, Martin found her way to Frankie Cosmos, where she began developing the band’s aesthetic through the merch she’d design and then screenprint. 

Now, Martin is going after her freelance illustration design career in full force, wracking up an impressive client list that includes Apple, Adobe, and The New York Times among many others. Her joyful, distinct style is more of a fully-realized universe of smirking egg yolks and mischievous, cherubic meatballs that has charmed brands and the public alike. The playful visionary was kind enough to step away from her trusty iPad for a while to answer a few of my questions about her work and life below.

How would you describe your illustration aesthetic in your own words?

I always find it so hard to describe my own art! I think it’s playful, colorful, influenced by old cartoons, but also influenced by my fine art background. It’s a combination of all my artistic pursuits up until now. I guess it is really a representation of myself!

Where does your unique illustration style come from? How did that develop?

In a way, I think my current style is most similar to how I drew as a kid. After high school, I studied fine art, and was doing mostly portrait painting, and I just didn’t feel a connection to that sort of work. It wasn’t until I started designing and screenprinting merch for my band that I started to channel some of that childhood artistic energy. My work became a lot more playful, and I think it’s continuing to get looser and weirder with time.

Why is anthropomorphizing food and objects so interesting to you as an illustrator?

For so long, my focus was only on drawing people, and it began to feel stifling. It felt easier to let go of what I thought my art should look like when I decided to anthropomorphize food and objects— less pressure or something.

Do you have any favorite client work that you’ve done? Which projects are you proudest of?

I feel really lucky to be able to say that there are almost too many good projects to choose from! But I really love my ongoing collaboration with Uniqlo— they give me so much freedom and really trust me. I also loved doing the visuals for Summerstage— it was so cool to see my work in Times Square, and on the Subway, and plastered all over New York. I felt iconic.

How do your music and visual arts practices inform one another?

I think I really honed my illustration skills while doing the merch for the band. And I’ve always been a visual thinker, so I think I approach playing music in an illustrative way, if that makes sense. I think the illustrations I made for the band matched the music, and the songs informed the color, vibe, and subject matter.

Is it hard to juggle being in a band with being a working visual artist? What has that process been like for you?

It’s changed a lot over the course of being in the band. When I first joined, I was in my last year of college and immediately went on tour after my last day of school, so I didn’t have time to start a personal art practice outside of school and outside of music. It really took until five years later, in 2020, when all of our tours were canceled for me to start to really pursue making my own work and really take it seriously. I recently started transitioning away from touring full-time to focus fully on my art.

What experience do you hope viewers of your work have when encountering it? 

I want to make people feel good, feel nostalgic, laugh, and connect.

The dreaded virus that immediately followed dashed a lot of plans and smashed as many dreams. Klaas Verplancke‘s tabloid masterpiece appeared to be forever dashed and smashed … but it survived! And today, BANG! is back.

Why is this cause for celebration? BANG! is no less than a curated selection of Verplancke’s commissioned and published illustrations, compiled, art-directed and redesigned into a 24-page tabloid. But it is much more than a self-promo. Like the first three volumes, Verplancke invited an upcoming guest designer to interpret it—in this case, Broos Stoffels. The collaboration takes on a life of it own. It shows what can be achieved when the stars are aligned, the type is well-spaced, and the artwork makes the art director, in someone like me, just feel good.

You’ll get a bang out of BANG! No. 4. I can hear the percussion from here.

Recently, I learned that Dr. Michael John Goodman is also a fan, and he has put his website where his fandom is. He just launched the Charles Dickens Illustrated Gallery. It contains all the original illustrations from Charles Dickens’ novels, and is free to use for everyone to download, share, create, remix, research, teach or do whatever they like with. (If you find it useful, you may also like his previous project, the Victorian Illustrated Shakespeare Archive.) The Dickens gallery is a great resource, and Goodman discusses it below. Ultimately, we’ve run through revivals of so many 20th-century methods and manners, it’s possible Victorian Punk is right around the corner.

Nicholas Nickleby, illustrated by Phiz

Why did you become so interested in Charles Dickens and his many illustrators?
This project has been in the back of my mind now for several years. I’m fascinated with making [images] accessible and working with public domain material, and I’ve been constantly surprised that no one has created a website that brings together all the original illustrations from Dickens’ novels in a way that is both intuitive and user-friendly. Dickens’s illustrators, who very much capture visually what we think of when we envision the term ‘Dickensian,’ also, I feel, need celebrating—they form a significant part of book and illustration history (in many ways they were the pioneers of the form), and they have been ill-served by modern editions, where the publisher has either discarded the illustrations completely or reproduced them cheaply and poorly. I have always found Dickens’ novels to be wonderful, but they are actually multimedia objects where word and image intersect to create meaning.

Martin Chuzzlewit, illustrated by Phiz

Which of the artists captured Dickens’ words the best?
The artist who captured Dickens’ words the best is Hablot Knight Browne, who went by the pseudonym Phiz. Dickens was not a man who suffered fools gladly (especially when it came to his own work), and the fact that Browne and Dickens had a creative relationship which lasted for over 23 years is evidence that Dickens found Browne’s ability to visually capture his words both valuable and rewarding. Indeed, in Dickens’ later novels such as Bleak House and Little Dorrit, Browne develops a visual style that directly parallels Dickens’ thematic concerns in those novels with an experimental printing procedure known as the “Dark Plate” technique. These images, such as “Tom-all-Alone’s” and “A New Meaning in the Roman” from Bleak House and “Damocles” from Little Dorrit, are extraordinarily evocative and atmospheric. By focusing on location as opposed to character, they visually reflect Dickens’ preoccupations with the cruelness of the institutional structures that determine people’s lives and provide the reader with an almost meditative space to think through the societal implications of Dickens’ text.

Little Dorrit, illustrated by Phiz

Did Dickens have a major say in how his work was represented?
Dickens very much did have a say in how his work was represented, and in many ways this is why exploring the working relationships he had with his illustrators is so fascinating, because it reveals that (for better or worse) it was very much a creative collaboration. Sadly, Dickens and Browne destroyed much of their correspondence they had with each other, but we do know that every month Dickens would provide Browne with information (whether in the form of a chapter, or some other instructions) for what he wanted illustrated (remember, Dickens’ novels were originally published serially in parts). Browne would then go and prepare the drawings (two per part) and these would be sent back to Dickens, who would then either approve of them or make further suggestions.

Dickens very much had “final cut,” as we would say today, and he was highly concerned with how his novels were to be illustrated throughout his career. When he was writing Dombey and Son, he wrote to his friend John Forster, “the points for illustration, and the enormous care required, make me excessively anxious.” When Browne’s illustration for that novel, “Paul and Mrs Pipchin,” went to press before Dickens saw it, he wrote once again to Forster: “I am really distressed by the illustration of Mrs. Pipchin and Paul. It is so frightfully and wildly wide of the mark,” [noting] that he would “cheerfully have given a hundred pounds to have kept this illustration out of the book.”

At all times Dickens was concerned with how his work appeared both visually and materially. For example, even though the first edition of A Christmas Carol was a publishing sensation in 1843, the expensive production (such as the four famous colored woodcuts by illustrator John Leech) instigated by Dickens meant the author was disappointed with how much money he received from the book.

David Coperfield, illustrated by Phiz

It seems that the illustrators captured the ethos of the times as well as Dickens did, if not moreso. Am I leaning too much on the artists?
No, I think this is such a good point, Steven. The Victorians very much were living in a visual culture where images were everywhere. New printing techniques and technology meant that images could be produced and disseminated widely and cheaply. A consequence of this is that the visual material from the period reflects back to us the values and ideologies of that time in all its dynamism and complexity, revealing anxieties as well as aspirations. Dickens’ illustrators, embedded in this culture, cannot help but capture some of these concerns and desires.

Oliver Twist, illustrated by George Cruikshank

Are there different artists who covered the same books when they were originally published?
No, for each novel Dickens worked with a single illustrator (for his Christmas books he would collaborate with several). For example, for Oliver Twist, he worked with George Cruikshank, and for The Pickwick Papers he worked with Hablot Knight Browne, etc. Interestingly, Great Expectations was not illustrated when it was originally published in 1861 in the United Kingdom, but it was illustrated when it appeared serially in Harper’s Weekly in the USA by John McLenan. The first time Great Expectations was illustrated in the United Kingdom was with illustrations by Marcus Stone for the “Library Edition” of Dickens’ works about a year later. In 1871, Dickens’ publishers Chapman and Hall produced the “Household Edition” of Dickens’s works, and this is the first time new illustrations had been commissioned for the novels.

Oliver Twist, illustrated by George Cruikshank

Are you working with originals and reproductions?
For this project I have been working with reproductions of the original illustrations. The reason has been both financial and for accessibility purposes. First, obtaining the original novels where the illustrations appeared is highly expensive (!), and second, because I digitize the illustrations, the editions need to be robust enough to handle quite a bit of man-handling without worrying too much about if they get ripped, etc. (If I ended up destroying a first edition of, say, Oliver Twist, I don’t think I’d ever get over it!) The editions I’ve used for this project all come from the early part of the 20th century—they are in the goldilocks zone of being perfectly affordable, yet the reproductions of the illustrations are of a superbly high quality. Indeed, many of these editions were published at the time using the original plates.

A Christmas Carol, illustrated by John Leech

How difficult has it been to obtain the editions?
eBay really is a gift that keeps giving! That said, it was not as straightforward as all that, as I had to determine which editions to use, and this was a case of trial and error. I initially bought a complete set of Dickens novels from the 1930s, only to discover when opening up the (very large) box they arrived in that each novel only contained a handful of illustrations. So this would be no good. I then bought a single edition from the 1920s, but the reproduction of the illustrations were very poor. Finally, after much browsing and zooming in on images on eBay, I felt confident that “The Authentic Edition” from 1901–1906 could be the key to unlocking this project. I bought a couple of volumes, and they were, indeed, perfect for my purposes.

A Tale of Two Cities, illustrated by Phiz

In 2013 I was asked to write an essay to coincide with his exhibition at the Norman Rockwell Museum in Stockbridge, MA; the first sentence was quoted in the Times‘ obituary. As a tribute to him, the essay appears below. In 2001 I also wrote a review of Minus Equals Plus (Abrams Books) for Eye magazine. This was Istvan’s first and only monograph. In retrospect I may have been too critical of the book, but my high expectations drove the writing. Istvan had a quirky eye, a cynical persona (born of his Iron Curtain upbringing) and sharp intellect that was best expressed through his pen-and-ink visions. His legacy will hopefully live on, but his unexpected end at 73 came much too early.

From the Norman Rockwell Museum exhibition, 2013:

Istvan Banyai is mad. Not angry nor despondent, but mad in the transcendent sense. He is perpetually in a state of creative lunacy that only a gifted artist can achieve—if lucky—and the rest of us try to achieve usually with little success. This madness is also a state of grace that enables this artist’s eye to see what the average person cannot, and allows him the ability to record what the non-artist is incapable of articulating.

Banyai is possessed by many inspirations, what he calls “an organic combination of turn-of-the-century Viennese Retro, interjected with American pop, some European absurdity added for flavor, served on a cartoon-style color palette.” And he inspires other artists through the translation of these disparate influences into a personal visual language manifested through exquisite illustrations that are vessels for complex narratives aimed at adults and children. His signature sinuous linearity is at once beguiling and hypnotic, lulling his viewers into a moment of wonderment, while inviting them to take part in his madness(es).

He understands and nurtures every aspect of his artistic behavior. Banyai has written, “I draw, and map my mind as I go along.” Yet rather than draw from the observed world, he trusts his fertile imagination to frame an internal world, refusing to inject what he calls “social realism” to his work. Perhaps this is a remnant of his early life in Hungary (born in Budapest in 1949) following the failed “uprising” in 1956, when after tightly shutting the Iron Curtain, the Soviet occupiers sucked the life out of the nation’s creative arts, replacing it with dreary Communist visual propaganda. For some, art was forever neutralized, for others, like Banyai, it became an opportunity to rebel against convention and revel in countless alternatives.

Rather than follow other artists’ leads (or censors’ decrees), Banyai asserts, “I can only see what makes sense to me. If I am lucky to have that, immediately a picture comes to mind. Now I just have to draw it.” If his mind and body are in sync, as they usually are, he will conjure an image that, he says, gets as close to that imaginary thing as possible. “It is all imitation, a semiotic game … [that] also works as therapy—and keeps me out of jail!”

I recall when Banyai made a trial visit to New York with his hefty portfolio in hand; he was testing the waters. It was vividly clear that he had an overpowering desire to live and work here like many other very talented artists washed ashore during a period of Eastern European emigration, when travel restrictions between Soviet countries were relaxed. What began with a few visually eloquent illustrators from Romania, Czechoslovakia and Poland, grew to include almost every Soviet Bloc country, including Hungary. The New York Times was like Ellis Island for these artists. Through its revolving doors on W. 43rd Street, literally one or two dazed Eastern European illustrators arrived each day and would present their wares. Because so many were well-trained in the art of symbolic subterfuge, they were perfect for the intellectual needs of the Times‘ OpEd page, Week in Review and other sections that used “conceptual illustration” and “graphic commentary”—illustrations of ideas that, as Banyai says, were part of a semiotic game.

Banyai’s work, however, stood apart from many of the earlier émigré arrivals. His mastery of line, ease of distortion and confidence with composition were expected, but his capacity to express himself in a visual language that was at once mysterious and accessible was a key asset. Additionally, but not inconsequentially, his work defied what some editors at the Times lamented was “lugubrious,” dark, morose, at times off-putting. Banyai may evoke the same kinds of cautionary messages as the lugubrious ones—protesting war, political intrigue, economic decline, et cetera—but did so in a cooler, minimalist, indeed more friendly manner. Or has Seymour Chwast, co-founder of the legendary Push Pin Studios told me, “Istvan’s work has a unique quality … a combination of solid drawing, engaging concepts and a joyous spontaneity.”

What’s more, he was not reliant on the frequent surreal cliches that became indicative of the OpEd style. He did not need such visual crutches because, as Chwast says, “Istvan knows how to create an illusion of space, painlessly and at any angle imaginable.” Meaning the man could draw rings around others.

Banyai was soon in great demand, employed by the dozens of editorial outlets (that have since dwindled to a mere few), notably The New Yorker and New York Magazine, The Atlantic and ultimately regular features in The New York Times. He also found work in advertising, but the most game-changing moment in his professional life was the first of his Zoom (1995), and later ReZoom (1998), children’s books and the subsequent short films made for Nickelodeon and MTV.

Because Zoom allowed him to tell a fully constructed story, it went beyond the limitations of his one-off editorial genre. Moreover, it revealed the mischievous side that has come to define Banyai’s work. Taking a page out of the Charles and Ray Eames classic film The Power of Ten, Zoom gave his child audience and their parents a new way to see how their small universes interconnected with the larger universe. The drawings were more “social realism” than others before and after, but done in such a way as to engage the younger eye without excessive mystery. Once they bought into the Zoom concept, they were hooked on what would come next. Sprinkled through the first and second volumes and also the optically delusional REM, Rapid Eye Movement (1998), which celebrates mysteries of sleep, are visual puns and graphic witticisms that are distinctly Banyai. “I don’t know if the Zoom books and The Other Side are his best works,” adds Chwast. “But I wish I had done them, and if I had I would have been exceedingly happy and proud.”

Over the years, Banyai’s work has become a staple of American illustration. His line, which was always assertive, has become even more fluid and expressive—a pleasure to behold and imagine how he does it so effortlessly. Banyai has added to his skills but retains the subversive wit—and madness—that continue to define him.

Gürbüz has been drawing cartoons since 1977. He has had nine solo exhibitions, including one in New York City, and his work has appeared on five New Yorker covers, and in various newspapers and magazines, such as Forbes, The Atlantic and The New York Times. I reached him in Istanbul through his translator, Ozlem Mutaf Buyukarman. I had been planning a feature on Gürbüz prior to the current tragedy, but his presence on this site is even more poignant in view of what has happened.

Natural disaster knows no boundaries.

How long have you been posting your illustrations online?
With the widespread use of Facebook in the 2010s, I started to draw and share drawings on current issues of that time. I was motivated by the interest of my followers. In April 2014, I had an exhibition of 192 works I drew only for Facebook, and it lasted for two months. After Instagram came out, I have been sharing my drawings there, as well, where I also have 136,000 followers.

Before social media, how did your work get distributed?
Before social media, I was working on oil and acrylic on canvas for several exhibitions. At the same time, I was doing illustrations for advertising agencies and print media.

Your work is commentary on current concerns and issues. Would you identify yourself as a “cartoonist”?
I benefit a lot from the creativity and intelligence of the cartoon (I received many awards in national and international cartoon competitions for a while). I benefit from the values of illustration and painting; I have never worked as a cartoonist in a newspaper or a magazine, thus I consider myself an illustrator rather than a cartoonist.

The language of surrealism spreads through your work. Where did you learn it?
I was influenced by Milton Glaser and Turkish graphic designer Mengü Ertel during my high school years. While studying at the School of Applied Fine Arts, Department of Graphic Arts (a Bauhaus School, now Marmara University Faculty of Fine Arts) … I was influenced by many artists such as Folon, Fukuda, Turkish cartoonists Turhan Selçuk, Ali Ulvi Ersoy (his caricature was published in the New Yorker magazine between 1952–1954). I was also influenced by graphic artists in magazines such as Graphis, Novum, PRINT, Idea.

In many countries where there is press limitation, surrealism has been a method of getting around restrictions. Have you had any problems with the reception of your work?
Since I do not draw for print media, I have not faced any pressure yet. But, I have been presenting self-censorship in recent years. I cannot draw as boldly as before.

How has the massive earthquake impacted your work and the frequency of your posting?
It is said to be the second-largest earthquake in the world. 13.5 million people living in 10 cities were affected by the earthquake; the number of destroyed buildings is very high and tens of thousands of people are waiting to be rescued under the rubble.

We are very sad as a country. I think that the artist should document the period in which he lives. Since the earthquake happened, today is the eighth day, and I have shared 16 drawings on social media (Instagram, Facebook and Twitter).

This is how I feel about NYC Storefronts by Joel Holland (Prestel), a book of 225 colorful pencil drawings of well- and lesser-known mom and pop shops around greater New York. All are portraits of the stores and their personalities—as different from one another as the customers who frequent them. When decontextualized from their surroundings, each is something of an icon unto itself—like the Yonah Shimmel Knish Bakery (below), which, despite its run-down facade, is a beauty of a bygone relic that has forgotten to be bygone. This and the other venerable storefronts suggest the greed-mongering real estate developers cannot eradicate and homogenize everything, no matter how hard they try. New York won’t let them.

When I first saw this book (with text by David Dodge and a foreword by New York Nico), I dismissed it as yet another of hundreds of sketchbooks I’ve seen. This is not to demean sketchbooks (in fact, I co-authored five books on and about sketchbooks). But I’ve also collected (and wrote an introduction to one of) James and Karla Murray’s photo books on storefront heritage, including Store Front: The Disappearing Face of New York. At the time of their respective publications, actual photographs satisfied my desire to see and feel the vintage beauty of each store. In other words, I preferred the real to the impressionist.

As I began browsing Holland’s drawings, though, looking closer at the details and reading the brief descriptive texts, I was entranced by the emotion embedded in each image. The Murray photographs are wonderful documents of distinct commercial architectural and sign styles, devoid of sentimentality, of what may or may not survive during my lifetime. Holland’s drawings capture his personal passion that translates into the viewer’s memory, recollection or imagination of these stores.

James and Karla Murray have done an essential service to anyone who loves old New York and lives in the contemporary city. I admire their thoroughness and tirelessness in preserving these images. Holland’s drawings are not about preservation but sanctification of the individualists in a city where glass and steel edifices are overpowering the streets.

His drawings are not postcard renderings (although they could make beautiful memory cards). He draws them as he sees them, introducing nothing that is not in his field of vision. What he adds that a photograph will not is an intimate eye and personal hand.

Holland is not the first nor last artist to pay respect to the city through its common and uncommon stores and shops, even as neighborhoods are devoured and starchitecture sucks up the air. But his collection of images is the first I’ve seen to capture the city exactly the way I saw it from the family car window as we’d drive up and down city streets looking for a place to park.

“The heart is a very, very resilient little muscle. It really is,” said Woody Allen’s character in Hannah and Her Sisters.

Heart: Anatomy, Function and Diseases (Dell, 1962) was part of a unique series of “Visual” titles brought to life by leading designers. Illustrated by George Giusti, the book is comprised of abstract and representational symbolic imagery that brings into view for the layman the power and importance of this “resilient little muscle.”

As Dell noted: “This launching of the international VISUAL series signals a new era in the world of books and ideas.” It goes beyond the conventional textbook, probing a theme of “universal interest through the eyes of a creative artist working in collaboration with an eminent authority”—in this case, Dr. Rudolf Hoffmann, M.D. It is a study of the structure, function and, yes, malfunctioning of the prime human organ.

The series was conceived and edited in Europe by Frédéric Ditis, with Heiri Steiner as artistic consultant. It lasted for four volumes, of which this was the last.

This specific campaign from AXA was launched in Thailand and Indonesia to promote AXA’s Emma, a tool that gives consumers free access to 24/7 emergency services and monitors investments. The campaign proves the company’s willingness to provide an insightful digital experience, support its customers, and empower them to make more informed decisions.

AXA is debunking myths in the wellness industry through a new playful campaign, which features illustrations by Chilean illustrator Camilo Huinca. 

 #BreakTheMyth is a social-first campaign designed to put truth before fiction by offering simple, science-based facts to people, helping them to sift out the signal from the noise. 

Every culture has certain myths or old wives’ tales, so AXA’s global creative partner Publicis Groupe set out to break them in a fun, light-hearted way, working with Camilo to create a series of Instagram-able visuals and social clips that cut through misconceptions and fake information with boldness and a touch of humour.  

Natalie Lam, chief creative officer of Publicis Groupe Asia Pacific, Middle East and Africa says: “Both Thailand and Indonesia—though diverse—are markets with a lot of texture, richness and tradition. A Gecko chirping 11 times will bring good luck is a common belief in Thailand, a popular belief in Indonesia is that toothpaste can soothe burns. Every culture has certain myths, or old wives’ tales and we aim to break these with credible and relatable advice, which is delivered in a fun, light-hearted way and leaves a clear impact.” 

AXA’s chief brand and communications officer for APAC, Sabrina Cheung, adds: “Since the start of the pandemic, social-media consumption skyrocketed. It means there’s a greater opportunity for us to effectively use this tool to engage, inform and connect with our target audiences through content that is relevant to them.” 

Launching in Thailand and Indonesia, the #BreakTheMyth campaign promotes Emma by AXA – an all-in-one health, wealth and well-being digital experience that cuts through the noise by offering simple, digestible and trusted fact-based guidance and advice to customers.  

The campaign includes a Goat man arm-wrestling activation – a uniquely Instagrammable experience in Indonesia, where the myth of a ‘goat satay makes you manlier’ becomes a true test of manliness. Individuals can try to outmuscle the robot goat as it challenges you to an arm-wrestling match right in front of Indonesia’s largest mall.