This book showed up "new" at the Ballard Library a few weeks ago. Originally published in 2001 it was endorsed and reprinted in 2005 for the Hans Christian Andersen Bicentennial by the Kingdom of Denmark and Groundwood Books respectively.

What a wonderful introduction to Hans. The illustrations by Lillian Brogger are fantastic and immediately reminded me of the Provensens fairy tale book. Wacky and skewed Brogger also uses collage to great effect. Hans Christian's own papercuts and drawings are in the book (though they aren't credited.)

Hans Christian Andersen: His Fairy Tale Life reads like a fairy tale, too. Hans had some amazing adventures but it is his reaction to the small things in life that mark him as an extraordinary character in a normal world. Adults will read between the lines--I'm not sure I could have been friends with Hans! A very sensitive and dramatic boy/man prone to singing anywhere and everywhere, reciting poetry and given to great lamenting. Or perhaps I have the child's reaction to Hans the man--here's an excerpt from the book:

Edvard Collin's wife was one of the people who lovingly tended to him when he was grieving for Henriette. She listened to his cries and laments. She comforted him and encouraged him. But every once in a while even she would exclaim, "Oh, now he's going too far!"

The her mother would scold her and say, "Just remember that it was Mr. Andersen who wrote 'The Nightingale.'"

Don't scold but it has been 20 years since I read any original Hans Christian Andersen stories: the strongest impression I have of him is Danny Kaye's movie role of Hans! Clearly Hans is much more complicated than that and there is much more blood, death and gore in his fairy tales than the sweetened Disney versions like The Little Mermaid. I'll be getting into some of his fairy tales soon--luckily Varmer's book has a Further Reading section at the back and recommends a Viking 2005 collection translated by Tiina Nunnally. Nunnally did the translation of this book and it is great. A good translation means so much. I'll also check out The Amazing Paper Cuttings of Hans Christian Andersen and for illustration's sake I'd love to see Lisbeth Zwerger's Fairy Tales.

One thing to take away from Hans is his indomitable creative spirit. Not so much ego but a desire to keep creating no matter how many people told him he stank. He had horrible self doubt but he just kept on trying and lordy, he REALLY didn't want to work in a factory! Facing a future like that can really make you get your butt in gear.

Jaime

Okay so this is weeks behind and still a sketch but I'm addicted to Penelope Dullaghan's Illustration Friday topics! I really like these kids and animals and want to challenge myself by using these characters for every topic as a good children's book illustrator exercise. To make these kids and animals look like themselves in different situations has to be helpful, right?

To jump further on the Penelope bandwagon: I'm trying to do my color comps in photoshop. The whole series I want to try doing in a limited watercolor palette. I thought I'd done a 'limited' palette for the Spring topic but according to my watercolor teacher I missed the boat. A limited palette is only two or three colors of paint that you mix to high heaven. For the spring one when I redo it he recommended the classic Italian Renaissance palette of Pthalo Green, Rose and Quinacridone Gold--great spring colors.

This is the first color comp I did for Robots in photoshop--I have no idea what those colors will be in my watercolor world but I'm trying very hard to familiarize myself with my palette. So much fun and such a brain drain. I'm terrible at photoshop and not sure if this is going to be beneficial for a while but I'll keep trying. I also like flat colors...

I'll try not to beat this sketch into the ground. But Bebop does look very much like himself. That pudgy little stinker. And Logan looks appropriately seal like. My sweet puppy dumpling.

Jaime

PS I just went to the newly redesigned Illustration Friday and um...there IS no robot topic? So Bebop must have whispered it to me in my sleep. I will try to do 'Angels and Devils' next since that is the current topic and sneak in 'Under the Sea' and 'Fat' as soon as possible.

Blogging has gone by the wayside what with deadlines and sad sinuses and allergic reactions to horrible medicines for said sinuses.

Here's what went down April 28, 2006. The 3rd Annual Professional Retreat for Illustrators in brief :

it was great!

In long:

PRERETREAT

The morning started off with Aaron and Gail and I arriving at the country club around 7 am. I had gotten permission from the club for the illustrator attendees to bring their least messy art materials (watercolors included) if I promised to cover the tables myself. So Aaron and Gail and I unrolled the butcher paper I'd precut and taped them to all our tables. To set the mood of the retreat I'd bought a bunch of kids art supplies: crayons, colored paper, tempera tube paints with brush tips, glitter glue tubes, etch-a-sketches, mini magnadoodles and silly putty.

These I scattered among the 8 tabletops. And then I had the brilliant idea to paint inspiring words with the tempera tubes on the paper covered table tops. Words like "Draw!" "Create!"

Note to self and future Retreat Directors: DO NOT paint big sloppy letters on a surface 30 people will be setting their portfolios and fashionably dressed elbows on 20 minutes before they arrive unless you want everyone to look like they got in a fight with a preschool.

After painting the letters I saw how gloopy and wet the tempera tube paint was...Gail gave me a great look like maybe I'd been raised on a different planet? Honestly I thought the paint would dry much faster. Aaron helped me wipe off all the excess paint on every frickin letter and it actually looked really nice and subdued and as if we'd planned it that way.

Then everyone started arriving, faculty and attendees. I got some coffee and was finally able to connect my brain to my other body parts and the event got under way.

RETREAT

First up was a one hour talk by Ellice Lee, Hyperion designer, about what she does all day and the kinds of art Hyperion puts in and on their books. (Just a note: Ellice and her editor friend, Namrata, are freaking adorable. Both exude super NY style and were very fun and funny at the dinners. I'm sure they keep Hyperion on its toes.)

Ellice gave a rundown of the award winning covers she's been a part of:
Artemis Fowl,
Day of Tears and
Jimi & Me.

She mentioned lots of her illustrators were from the UK (insert envy knife here.)

Picture books she loves and has worked on:
Big Sister, Little Sister (done with sumi outlines and digitally covered),
The Last Badge (done in collage and a non-female oriented PB which is scarce at Hyperion),
Shhh!,
Mo Willems Edwina Series,
Wow America (by Sideways illustrator),
John, Paul, George & Ben (which I know he got a 600,000 dollar advance for!)
Peggony Po--A Whale of a Tale,
The Bunnies Picnic and
Wolf Wolf illustrated by John Rocco who was an SCBWI discovery

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She then talked about some GREAT stuff I won't put in this blog because you'll have to go to the Retreat next year to find out OR it is only for this year's retreat attendees to know these great hints and tidbits...sorry.
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Ellice did a case study on The Lightning Thief cover. Going from hard cover to paperback the cover went through a HUGE evolution. In the beginning it was very manga and by the end they'd done a complete reversal in their cover vision and they ended up with the current moody illustrative cover done by John Rocco (the SCBWI guy mentioned above.) Actually he did BOTH covers so his ability to change styles is amazing.

The point of this was to showcase the craziness of having umpteen committees decide on a book's cover and the agonizing process of revision one can encounter. That at the heart of cover choice now is marketing and business and sometimes not the heart of the book.

Even though illustration IS art it IS business, too, and Ellice definitely brought up some horror stories. Which was a downer. But I am not dissuaded. Brian Karas comes into play for some uplift but more on that later.

Ellice is one of two designers along with two art directors and some freelance digital people that make up the Hyperion design team. THAT is one small team and I'm impressed at the workload they juggle. I would probably have an ulcer.

The unfortunate thing, I thought, about having Hyperion come for the illustrator attendees is that they don't take unagented or unincorporated illustrators. It is a Disney thing (Hyperion's parent company) and their fear of being sued seems to put a damper on any serendipitous meetings like one may have at a retreat.

So even when Ellice liked somebody (she liked one person for sure), she told them to get an agent. And maybe that isn't so bad, but unless you are John Rocco you are out of luck to be picked up by them for any job at a retreat or conference. I assume becoming incorporated is a pain in the butt, too, and if anyone out there is I'd love to hear about it.

Since there are lots of other publishing houses that don't have this limiting caveat--FSG and Charlesbridge and Henry Holt for example--I'd love to see one of their art directors come next year.

That's just the first hour of the retreat! More soon.

Jaime