A spring, a spring, a marvellous thing..

The only thing in my head when thinking about Spring is the song from the Slinky adverts. I’m giving you the link, there, but I cannot endorse clicking on it. It’ll be in your head forever.

Spring is trying to arrive, some days its here and others, today for example, it’s having a go but not quite getting there. Above is a painting I did for Write and Shine (who run online writing programs) on the theme of stepping into Spring.

Once again I have almost nothing at all to write about because I am in the thick of a writing project. The process of writing for drawing remains a knotty, strange one. The ‘description’, that thing that takes up a lot of space in novel-writing, will mainly exist in images; what function does describing a room serve if there’s an image of that room placed next to the text? So what you’re left with (if you’re me) is a word document of almost exclusively interior thought. Which is, pretty exhausting as a reading experience!

I remember going to a lecture by the American bookcover design Chip Kidd, many years ago. Kidd spoke about the relationship between text and image, how if your text says (for example) ‘She had a shiny, red apple’ then you needn’t accompany that text with an image of a shiny, red apple. Instead, with your images, you have to tell the reader/viewer something else. Give them more! What does the apple taste like? What does it feel like to hold? What does she do with the apple? As an illustrator you don’t really want to be repeating the text but opening it up, finding a new way in.

This is, basically, the crux of thinking about text and image together. How can you make sure they’re working together to tell the best story possible? A super descriptive, detailed text might mean that the illustrations can be loose and abstracted. A poetic piece of writing might benefit from being tethered to the earth with very figurative drawing. You’re trying to reach a beautiful balance. (This is, obviously, not always the case. Sometimes you want to confound the reader, muddle them up, or you want to give them very comprehensively factual information. There are exceptions to all the rules. Thankfully.)

So if you’re writing an illustrated book you need to be thinking about how you split your information ALL THE TIME. It’s relentless. Is this text or image? I tend to write first because I find that the drawing induces a kind of frenzy and I get lost in it. I need to make sure I’ve built a solid structure before I start throwing paint at it. So I’m writing but, even close to the end of the story, it feels like I only have half a book. Hopefully the next bit, the very rough sketches, will tell me a bit more about what the thing feels like as a whole. Lets hope what it tells me isn’t ‘this is rubbish’.

Other things

Arrangements in Blue by Amy Key is out in a few days. I was lucky to read a proof last month and I found it moving, generous and very, very tender. Above is a painting that Amy commission from me for her book launch. (if you’re interested in a painted commision, bookish or not, get in touch.)

I went to see the Alice Neel exhibition at the Barbican and was delighted that alongside the beautiful paintings was the very delightful short film- In the Street by Helen Levitt. 12 minutes well spent, I think. (above New York, 1939, Helen Levitt, perhaps one of my favourite photos).

Tessa Hadley talking about writing struggles. Found via Lisa Owens.

Jami Attenberg writes about the read-aloud stage of drafting a novel. I am a firm believer in reading a book out loud and I feel VERY lucky that graphic novels tend to be lighter on text which makes the process quite manageable.

The Orange- by Anna B Savage is the song you need today and all days.

If there’s something you want me to write about or show you next month, please let me know in the comments and I’ll try to deliver. Whilst I’m IN this project I don’t think I have the spare brain space for coming up with post ideas!