Illustrators – serie

An appreciation of the life and art of Tove Jansson, creator of the Moomin books, which are adored by children and adults across the globe. This book provides fresh insights and a deeper appreciation of the life and art of Tove Jansson (1914-2001), one of the most original, influential and perennially enjoyed illustrators of the 20th century. Jansson’s flourishing Moomin books are examined in detail, as are her interpretations of such classics as Lewis Carroll’s Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland and The Hunting of the Snark, and J.R.R. Tolkien’s The Hobbit. Born in Helsinki among the Swedish-speaking Finnish minority, Jansson was brought up with a love for making art and stories in a supportive artistic family. Her first illustrated tales were published when she was fourteen years old. From a year later until 1953, she drew humorous and political cartoons as well as striking front covers for the satirical magazine Garm, responding to the Second World War and its aftermath as she developed from art student to painter and muralist, bohemian and lesbian. This book also explores the emergence of her Moomin world, appearing in her first children’s book in 1945 and then in newspaper strips. These would lead to her being headhunted by the London Evening News, the world’s biggest-selling evening paper, to write and draw a daily Moomin newspaper cartoon. This body of work is one of her great achievements, expanding her stories, settings and cast and invigorating her drawing and writing. Jansson also wrote many novels, documented here along with personal commentaries from her own writings.

In the course of a career spanning more than fifty years, Posy Simmonds has become one of Britain’s best-known satirical cartoonists. She is also as a much-loved author and artist of widely translated children’s books and graphic novels. These include Fred, animated in 1996 into the Oscar-nominated short film Famous Fred, and Gemma Bovery and Tamara Drewe, both adapted into films, increasing her international fame. Simmonds once described her job on a census form as ‘a visual engineer’. Her extraordinary precision of drawing, her powers of observation and her sharp but welltempered wit have made her one the Britain’s most sophisticated innovators, renowned especially for expanding the scope and subtlety of comics. This is the first book to explore Simmonds’s life and work from her early childhood to the present day. In a series of interviews with Paul Gravett she offered insights into her creative process and provided unprecedented access to her ‘workroom’ and archives containing sketchbooks and rare or never-before-seen artworks. A portrait emerges of Posy Simmonds as a chronicler and critic of contemporary British society and a storyteller in words and pictures of rare perception and humanity.

An overview of the life and work of much-loved children’s illustrator and author Judith Kerr, creator of classics such as The Tiger Who Came to Tea, and Mog. A thoughtful and intimate portrait, this book is not only a celebration of Judith Kerr’s classic work, but a record of the hard work, development and serious intent behind it. Referencing Kerr’s biographical novels, Joanna Carey introduces us to the illustrator as she goes about her daily life, showing us into her studio, exploring her materials, her relationship with her publisher and editors, and her reflections over the years. Drawing on a great range of previously unpublished visual material, we see behind the scenes of Kerr’s unforgettable creations.

Raymond Briggs has changed the face of children’s picture books, with his innovations of both form and subject. Stylistically versatile, he has illustrated some sixty books, twenty of them with his own text, and first became a household name in the late 1970s and early 1980s with a handful of books – Father Christmas, Fungus the Bogeyman, The Snowman, When the Wind Blows – that were entertaining and subversive and appealed to both children and adults. The refrains of his work are class, family, love and loss. Nevertheless, his default mode of expression is humour. Briggs is always funny, and the balance between this and melancholy is his defining characteristic, though his style ranges from the romantic to the grotesque, from the fanciful to the direct. Encompassing sixty years of Raymond Briggs’s work, from political picturebooks to children’s classics, this study explores his themes of class, family and loss, and how he demonstrates both emotional power and great technical skill.

Jenny Uglow narrates the story of Walter Crane, an intriguing and most prolific figure not only in illustration, but in political culture more broadly. Uglow expertly weaves a fascinating study of how Crane’s art and politics developed from his childhood love of Pre-Raphaelite painting to the influences of Morris and William Blake on the journals, books, banners, pamphlets and postcards he went on to create as he forged a new style for the international socialist movement. Comprising a staggering range of visual material, Crane’s images became a symbolic code that leapt over linguistic boundaries. This book is a brilliant record of an artist who blended styles and influences like no one before him.

An overview of the life and work of Oliver Jeffers, the Belfast-raised illustrator, bookmaker, painter, designer, campaigner and global superstar of the world of visual communication A phenomenon of 21st-century bookmaking, Oliver Jeffers has carved an extraordinary career that shows no sign of slowing. Still only in his forties, he has published an array of hugely popular books, both as illustrator and author–illustrator. This overview of his life and work – so far – charts his passion for the environment and his quest to understand humanity’s major challenges, and the impact this has had on his creative and intellectual output. The list of Jeffers’s accomplishments is long and glittering: he has held numerous one-man shows, in both the UK and the USA, and was appointed an MBE in 2022 for services to the arts. Most importantly, however, he has tirelessly pushed the boundaries of what a picturebook can be. His regular exploration of existential issues – whether through illustration or other media such as site-specific installation or film – has exerted a major influence on the practice of authorial picturebook-making. This addition to Thames & Hudson’s acclaimed Illustrators series is the first book to focus closely on Oliver Jeffers’s practice as an illustrator, offering an in-depth analysis of his processes, influences, styles and subjects as they have changed over time.

‘For millions of children, Dick Bruna’s books are the first they will encounter. They don’t know how lucky they are’ Michael BondThis latest instalment in The Illustrators on Dutch artist Dick Bruna (1927–2017) takes readers behind the scenes of the creation of some of the world’s most endearing children’s characters. Offering a deeper appreciation of the artistry and skills behind the international icon Miffy, fellow illustrator Bruce Ingman also reveals Bruna’s lesser-known work, including his striking book and poster designs. A glimpse into his studio in Utrecht reveals a man of many media, including drawing, painting, collage and photography. All the elements of Bruna’s extensive body of work, spanning book covers, posters, stamps and merchandise, are given due significance in this illuminating study of his reputation and success. By the time of Bruna’s retirement, Miffy had become an industry in her own right and Bruna an international star far beyond the sphere of children’s books. Ingman shows us how the simple complexity of Bruna’s work appeals to children, artists and designers alike, capturing the imagination across ages and artistic disciplines.