Illustration Inspiration

I know ya'll're just itching for the next installment of Illustration Correspondence Course, but let's take a moment and recharge our creative batteries. (Also, I had a busy week & needed a little break from ICC). (Yes, that's what people are calling it now).

So, here's a BRAND NEW segment on Victoria Jamieson Illustration:

Illustration! Inspiration!

Our first batch of inspiration comes from Jane Yolen, who gave a terrific lecture on Monday night. As you can tell from my notes,

- the quotes I'm about to attribute to Jane Yolen are completely, 100% inaccurate. 

Now, I had the great idea (while half-asleep in bed this morning), to accompany Illustration Inspiration quotes with some inspirational photographs. My first thought, of course, was kittens climbing trees. But then I thought that copyrights might be an issue, so I looked through my albums and found my own inspirational photographs. This way, once the calendar people start calling me there will be noooooo copyright violations. Just lawsuits from people I misquote.

So here we go: 

Illustration! Inspiration!

"I love the poem by Emily Dickinson called Tell all the Truth but tell it slant. I lie all the time."

-Jane Yolen

"Truth in art that is boring is not true"

-Jane Yolen, quoting somebody else

Tell all the Truth but tell it slant

Emily Dickinson

Tell all the Truth but tell it slant---
Success in Cirrcuit lies
Too bright for our infirm Delight
The Truth's superb surprise
As Lightening to the Children eased
With explanation kind
The Truth must dazzle gradually
Or every man be blind---

(those are all of my notes. But I love the very inspirational blog of Amy Baskin, 

and her interview the inspirational illustrator Lee White revealed these nuggets):

"Truthfully, the trick (to making an illustration or painting) is showing up at your drawing table and doing the work in a focused way. Turning off Facebook and email, and all the other little distractions is essential to getting the work done. [...] While other people play Farmville, I write or draw."

-Lee White

" I try to block my time in hourly increments and really stick to that. In a typical day I like to have 3 hours to dedicate to writing/sketching for upcoming projects, 3 hours for new paintings, and then 3 hours for business and correspondence. This takes a lot of work, some days I’m better at it than others. It helps if you turn off your TV."

-Lee White

I hope everyone is now inspired. I didn't even plan to pair Lee White's first quote about Farmville with that picture of a goat. Inspiration and divine intervention at work.

I did something else fun this week- I did a book signing and meet-and-greet at the Portland Children's Museum!

Once the kids were properly calmed down and under control by feeding them donuts, I did a little writing and drawing workshop. I had that nice long piece of paper, so together we constructed a story with a beginning, a middle, and an end- all on one sheet.

I started by drawing Bea The Sheep, and asked the kids what kind of animal Bea should have for a best friend in this story. Next, the kids came up with a scenario (jump roping), and an interesting plot twist that might complicate things (Elephant is so big he falls through the floor).
Luckily, the kids were ready with the solution- a fireman comes to pull Elephant out of the hole, and then they all ride bicycles together.

A pretty fine story! Here's the beginning:

the middle...

...and the end!

The kids then made their own books to take home. Two of my favorites include The Donut Story and The Story About A Rock Falling Into a Pond. Thanks, PCM, for having me!