Short term plan of action for Garp

After todays garp meeting I've decided that I need to organise myself better in order to not get confused with what I'm researching so the new focal point and plan of action for the next week and a half is...

*Write my introduction as soon as possible in order to get a better understanding of how the essay will take shape and to keep me focused on what it is I want to find out.

*Start to consider the following, What made me want to be an illustrator?How did it start to interest me as a career?Why children's books?What are my influences/where do I draw my ideas from and what is it that I want to say with my work?Alot of illustrators use draw on childhood memories, do I?What children's books did I like as a child?All this is relevant to my research and should be included in my introduction.

*One of the main things I need to research into (that I feel will be important in order to judge the merit of Fanelli's and Child's work) is, what factors makes a good illustrator? e.g.developing style over ability to draw?Discovering a new way of working,taking risks,a vision/flare for playing out a narrative over a sequence of drawings etc.Create a mind map to collate the information I find on this topic.

*Write to publishers asking general questions,e.g what illustrators work excites them at the moment and why?What do they look for when taking on new illustrators?How important is drawing ability in children's book illustration?How much control do they have over the overall look of the book and the illustrations?

*Collect more information on publishing, editing and art direction in children's books.

*Continue to gather information for similarities and differences chart for Child and Fanelli.In particular start to look at what else influences them with particular focus on childhood memories and any other influences that isn't other artists work.

*Start to think of interview questions for Child and Fanelli incase I get to interview them.

*New idea to think about interviewing other children's book illustrators to get a better idea about what they think makes a good children's book illustrator and to gain more information about what influences them as illustrators, etc.

*start to do surveys on Child's and Fanelli's books and which children/students/adults like more and why?Which do I like more and why?

Initial research on the story of pinocchio

Pinocchio was written by an Italian writer, Carlo Collodi and was first published July 7th 1881 in lids magazine,"Giornale per bambini", under the title-"Story of a puppet".It was published in chapters one a week but had to be stopped at chapter 15 when Pinocchio was hung from a branch to die,subject matter thought not suitable for children.However at the time Collodi was writing the story it wasn't intended for children.In 1882 the story returned titled-"The Adventures of Pinocchio",after the charcter blue fairy was introduced to rescue Pinocchio and become a mothering figure in the story, eventually turning him into a real boy.

The story of Pinocchio isn't a typical fairy tala as it contains more serious facts of everyday life e.g. the need for food, shelter and education,making the story unique in it's time being the first to introduce more adult issues into a childrens story and in 19th centuary Italy childrens literacy in general was new making it modern in style and content.

I was suprised when I read "The Adventures of Pinocchio" to find how much of the story is ommited from the children picture book versions that I have read.The story is quite strange in many ways with Pinocchio finding himself in and out of jail and getting himself into many strange and risky situations like almost being mistaken for a fish and fried by a sea monster.So I guess the first thing that strikes me is how illustrators decide which parts of the story to omit.How much of it is their choice and how much is down to the publisher?

Another thing that strikes me about the orginal story is how much of the story is altered for childrens literature for example that Pinocchio actually kills the cricket in the orginal.So another thought is how much of the story could I keep the same without scaring or confusing people?

After reading Carlo Collodi's "Pinocchio" and from the examples of children's picture books that I've looked at so far,what I've found,considering the content of the story, is that the style of illustration is abit too cutsey,especially considering alot of the story is about Pinocchio getting himself in to trouble and dangerous situations.In particular the character of Pinocchio who is a disobidient, cheeky disrespectful rebel comes across too nice and innocent.These are all intial things that I would like to research more.

After doing the reseaqrch to find 10 examples I had the idea that I could maybe take the angle of hand executed illustration techiniques Vs computer aided illustration.In general I think I just need alot of guidence on what angel to research.

Oliver Jeffers uses alot of unusual surfaces to paint on in his work in a way he kind of combines painting and collage techiniques which I find interesting.On his website you can veiw the inside of one of his sketch books which gives you a real feel of how he works.He also creates alot of really beautiful type by hand.In general I just like his work as it embraces hand executed techiniques.

Two images by Kurt Schwitters -I've included these as I think Kurt Schwitters was one of the first artists to use collage heavily in his work.I also think his work is fantastic,I like how he uses found ephemera as collage material and his use of colour is beautiful.

I came accross Sabrina Ward Harrison's work when I was on foundation,what I like about her work is the autographic style of her work its very fluid personal and seemingly spontaneous.The scrap book style of her work is very interesting approach to collage that in my opinion is beautiful.I'd like to look at this way of working as I think its a very unhibited approach to collage that is done without worrying what the outcome may be,which I think is a breath of fresh air.

image from theheartagency.com by Jonny Hannah.I like how Jonny Hannahs work is very pattern based and involves varied mark making techniques aswell as encorperating hand drawn type.All of these techniques are areas I would like to look into.

Another Nina Chikrbarti image,this image is a good example of pattern based illustration.I've included this image as I would quite like to look at how illustration that is more successful because of techinque rather than the idea behind it.

Image by Nina Chakrabarti found on hewww.ninachakrabarti.com. I think this is a perfect example of some really well drawn type,an area I might like to research into.

Lauren Child's work is an example of computer aied collage which I think would be a good example to investigate and compare to other more hand executed forms of collage.I like how Lauren Child's work combines hand drawn and computer techniques.

hannah hoch image found on www.manovich.net/LMN_SITE_NEW/lnm?lnm3/hoch_med.gif.
This is a different typr of collarge and hand drawn type.To me this looks more diagramatical which I think would be interested to research another example of collage.

Sara Fanelli image found on alumni.uvm.edu/vq/spring06/images/biodiesel.
Iv'e chosen this image as Sara Fanelli uses collarge and hand drawn type extremly successfully and in a very sophisticated way.Her work is great as it's accessable to adults aswell as children(although I would argue more for adults due to its sophistication).

image by Edurado Recife from misprintedtype.com. I've chosen this image as I think it's an example of strong collage and mixed media artwork.In particular I think the hand drawn type in this piece is fantastic.I alos think this is a great example of good compostion and pattern.

Possible starting points for 3rd year research project

I think I would like to base my research project on some form of contemprary illustration, In particular illustrators whose work is heavily pattern based and encorperates the use of collarge and hand made type,as my practical work I try to encorperate these elements.However I'm quite lost for a specific focal point/direction that I would take as I'm a still a little unsure on the requiered form of this research project.Maybe what makes mixed media collarge successful,or how illusrtators create blance and composition within their work.I could take the angle on whether computer aided design work is out growning more hand crafted illustration.I think I need some sort of guidence on whether I'm along the right lines here.

The way we craft stories

From this project I have learnt that there are many factors to consider when creating illustrations for a story.The layout of the illustration must be carefully considered so the illustration is both engaging,interesting and successful in telling that particular part of the story.I have also found that its important to balance the tone and pattern to make the illustration convincing.I have learnt how changing from long shots to close ups adds emphasise to important parts of the story and double page spreads are often used to display the main action of the story.

storytelling blog

My project is based on the grimms brothert fairy tale, Hansel and Gretel.my first two illustrations focus on the part of the story where Hansel and Gretel are lost in the woods and find the witches house(in my illustrations the house is an old fashioned sweet shop owned by the child eating old battle axe).My other illustrations show Hansel and Gretel stealing sweets and getting caught by the old lady(who owns the shop).

During this project I looked at the work of Oliver jeffers(in particular his book"The incredible book eating boy")and the way he lays out his illustrations.I looked at alot of Sara Fanelli's work to help with how I created background texture and pattern.I looked at alot of different illustrators work to help with the characterisation of Hansel and Gretel, in particular,Tim Biskupt and hennig Wagenbreth.Throughout the duration of the project I made general refrence to illustrators such as Jonny Hannah and 1960s illustrators/graphic designers.