Illustrating Wisdom from Adam Rex and Oliver Jeffers

I've been thinking a lot about illustrators and illustration lately and wanted to share a few things here.

The first is a lovely piece by Adam Rex on how he makes a picture book. It provides an interesting look at process in taking a picture book from being purely text to so much more.  Rex writes: " I only have the most rudimentary notion what each page is going to look like, but this is where I usually discover the ideas that will make this my book as opposed to a book that was merely illustrated by me."  It's such a great distinction!  Go over and take a look if you are interested in seeing how this alchemy occurs. 

Here is my favourite bit from what he has to say:  "When I turn in the art I'm worried that it's totally inadequate.  When the book arrives in stores a year later I only see mistakes.  A few months later I love it."

Adam Rex illo for Neil Gaiman's Chu's Day.

I also really liked this little bit from a Today's Parent interview with Oliver Jeffers.

I made a decision when I was doing How to Catch a Star that the books were not going to be set anywhere and the boy was going to be as vague as possible so that anyone could apply themselves to the story. And because he’s vague and because the landscapes are vague, it means that people all over the world think that the boy is one of their friends and that the geography is where they’re from. And that allows people in and to fill in the details with their own personal details. So he’s a little bit of me, a little bit of everyone else who’s reading the story.

You can buy a limited edition print of  the Lost and Found cover here. You know you want to.