Archives
TIFFANY LEESON
(Art Director at Egmont Books)
Notes on ACWIS talk on Feb 28 th 2004 at Gilmorehill, Glasgow.
36 illustrators and writers squeezed into a tiny meeting room to hear Tiffany’s views about the role of the illustrator in children’s picture books. She started off with a strong waiver that the views were her own opinions and not necessarily held by other individuals doing similar jobs…..
She argued that many books that you might find on the children’s shelves in bookshops are not genuinely targeted at young children, but created to indulge the tastes of the artist/illustrator/publisher. She started collecting picture books when she was a student of graphic art at Glasgow School of Art and admired certain designers and illustrators whose work was admired by her peer group. However, over several years working professionally in publishing, her views have changed about what young children get out of books. Now she admits that many of her own collection represent iconic examples of what she does not now want to see on her desk, even though she might still admire and collect them from a graphic artist’s viewpoint.
Using slides to illustrate her ideas, she showed examples which demonstrated the point e.g. lavishly produced books that might delight an adult, but mystify a child, through use of difficult fonts, capital letters, poor storytelling and morbid, cold or over abstract images. Many of these books would be impossible to read out aloud, and Tiffany knows because she has tried it. She still looks for the engaging feature or character that will encourage children to enjoy and stick with a book. She observed that the Japanese market had successfully created a niche market for illustrated books for adults, and thought the same could apply here and provide a more appropriate outlet for books like this.
She urged us to consider the commercial constraints and financial risks which publishers have to tackle; it is a competitive business in a saturated market yet still has to make money. Artists who illustrate for arts sake, or for their own pleasure, might find themselves isolated unless they can provide work that effectively communicates the ideas put across in a well-conceived narrative.
Questions from the floor revealed plenty of ignorance about how partnerships between writers and illustrators can grow, with suggestions that a future event might explore this in more detail.