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Meet An Illustrator 13 – Kate Milner

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self-portrait © Kate Milner

After taking a week’s break at Easter, Meet An Illustrator is back with Kate Milner, our 13th guest in the weekend feature. Do visit the backpages  to read the responses from the first dozen guests.

Kate Milner was winner of the 2016 V&A student illustration award for her book My Name Is Not Refugee, which went on to win the Klaus Flugge Prize in 2018. She had previously studied illustration at St Martin’s College and illustrated magazines on Commercial and Housing Law for a while but spent most of her working life as a librarian, developing a passion for children’s books in the process. When cuts to the library service resulted in her losing her job, she applied to do an MA in children’s book illustration at Anglia Ruskin University, which turned out to be life-changing.

She is currently shortlisted for the 2021 Kate Greenaway Medal for her picture book It’s A No-Money Day

and is also represented on the 2021 Carnegie Medal shotlist as the illustrator for Joseph Coelho’s The Girl Who Became A Tree.

She has a new picture book out in June with Tiny Owl — Sorry Mrs Cake

— and is currently working on a new book for Barrington Stoke.

As a child, what were the first illustrations you remember being pleased with? 

When I was about eleven I saw a competition on an ice cream wrapper. It asked for a word to be drawn in a way that illustrated its meaning. I drew “US” with the U as a portly chap down on his knees proposing to a curvy S. I won a couple of albums which surprised me, as I had nothing to play them on.

Who/what inspired you when you were young?

Dr. Suess made a huge impression on me when I was a small child. His images frightened and delighted me—they wormed their way so deep into my brain that I find myself unconsciously reproducing them even fifty years later.

Who inspires you today?

Shaun Tan, Levi Pinfold, Chris Haughton, Bethan Woollvin, Charles Keeping, Laura Carlin, Ronald Searle and Dave McKean.

Did you study art/illustration?

I studied art many many years ago but it was the Masters in Children’s Book Illustration at Anglia Ruskin that really changed my life.

What is your favourite artist tool/product?

I use a mechanical pencil with B leads for nearly everything.

Where do you buy your art supplies?

For me this is an issue. Over the last ten years we have lost so many good art shops as everything goes online but its not the same. You can’t browse and discover new products online, you can’t test a brush or a pencil against your finger tip. For me making images is a very sensual business combining colour, texture and surface. I want to look and feel and touch and smell what I’m buying.

What software/apps do you use?

I am a great fan of Photoshop Elements. It’s a cut down version of professional Photoshop designed originally for amateur photographers. It is an excellent piece of software.

What was your first commission?

I can not honestly remember. I am extremely old.

What are you working on at the moment?

I’m working on another book for Barrington Stoke about a child’s experience of homelessness.

Twitter or Instagram? Twitter

Coffee or tea?  Tea

Cat or dog?  Both—can’t possibly manage without either

Grape or grain? Grape please—red—preferably a Merlot

Sunrise or sunset? Sunrise—now that I’m old definitely sunrise

What do you listen to when you are working?  I expect I’m not the only illustrator who consumes a huge variety of podcasts and audio books while they are working. Current favourites include Lincoln in the Bardo from Audible which is beautifully read, the Pre-History podcast and The Bunker daily podcast. To be able to draw while listening to an amazing new book or a riveting discussion is just about as good as it gets, especially if you throw in a peanut butter sandwich and a glass of red wine. .

Where can we follow you on social media?

@ABagForKatie on Twitter.

This is a regular weekend feature, publishing every Saturday.

 

The Smidgens by David O’Connell ill. Seb Burnett

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ACHUKA Book of the Day 9 Apr 2021
Blackwell’s Children’s Book of the Month April 2021

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Gafferty Sprout is a Smidgen. A Smidgen looks like a human, sounds like a human, and loves chips with curry sauce like a human – if humans were three inches tall. If you took a human and shrunk it in the washing machine on a very hot spin cycle, you might get something like a Smidgen. Generations ago there were lots of them, living in a maze of tunnels beneath the human village of Dundoodle. But then something happened and they just … disappeared. Now Gafferty, her parents and her little brothers Gobkin and Grub are the only ones left, and the tunnels are forbidden territory. And then Gafferty finds an old map. A map that shows a place deep within the maze where Smidgen tribes can go to meet. Smidgen tribes! Gafferty knows that she has to try to find them. But the tunnels are dangerous. And soon Gafferty discovers she’s not the only one looking for the lost tribes, and that three inches of Smidgen hold more power than she ever imagined.

Follow Seb Burnett on Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/bertram_fiddle/

See some of the illustrator’s character sketches:

 

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Beautiful Day!: Petite Poems for All Seasons by Rodoula Pappa ill. Seng Soun Ratanavanh

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ACHUKA Book of the Day 8 Apr 2021

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A picture book of haiku-inspired poems celebrating the four seasons.

In simple, poetic verse, a child observes their world from spring to summer, and autumn through winter, in this gentle ode to the seasons, accompanied by exquisite illustrations [see examples]

Rodoula Pappa is a Greek author and translator.

We love Seng Soun Ratanavanh’s illustrations and strongly recommend you visit the artist’s Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/sengsounratanavanh/

Her first book as author-illustrator, Gaspard Dans La Nuit, was recently awarded the Prix Landerneau 2021 album jeunesse.

 

 

Last Night At The Telegraph Club by Malinda Lo

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“This standout work of historical fiction combines meticulous research with tender romance to create a riveting bildungsroman. San Francisco, “with its steep stairways and sudden glimpses of the bay between tall, narrow buildings,” is almost a character itself. Interspersed flashbacks that detail the personal histories of Lily’s parents and Aunt Judy and timelines of world events further put the 1950s Chinese American experience into context for readers.” HORN BOOK
“Lo’s lovely, realistic, and queer-positive tale is a slow burn, following Lily’s own gradual realization of her sexuality while she learns how to code-switch between being ostensibly heterosexual Chinatown Lily and lesbian Telegraph Bar Lily. In this meticulously researched title, Lo skillfully layers rich details, such as how Lily has to deal with microaggressions from gay and straight women alike and how all of Chinatown has to be careful of the insidious threat of McCarthyism. Actual events, such as Madame Chiang Kai-shek’s 1943 visit to San Francisco, form a backdrop to this story of a journey toward finding one’s authentic self. Beautifully written historical fiction about giddy, queer first love.” KIRKUS
“Smoothly referencing cultural touchstones and places with historic Chinese American significance, Lo conjures 1950s San Francisco adeptly while transcending historicity through a sincere exploration of identity and love. Back matter includes an author’s note explaining Lo’s personal connection to the story.” PUBLISHERS WEEKLY

The award winning author of Ash gives us a very different story of love and duty set in San Francisco’s Chinatown during the 1950s. Seventeen-year-old Lily Hu can’t remember exactly when the question took root, but the answer was in full bloom the moment she and Kathleen Miller walked under the flashing neon sign of a lesbian bar called the Telegraph Club. America in 1954 is not a safe place for two girls to fall in love, especially not in Chinatown. Red-Scare paranoia threatens everyone, including Chinese Americans like Lily. With deportation looming over her father – despite his hard-won citizenship – Lily and Kath risk everything to let their love see the light of day.

Follow the author on Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/malindalo/

The Rock From The Sky by Jon Klassen

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ACHUKA Book Of The Day 6 Apr 2021

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“Throughout, Klassen’s characteristically deadpan humor refuses to patronize readers; he lets them in on the joke, as always, by putting them one step ahead of the protagonists. Smart, funny, and offbeat, this is quintessential Klassen.” HORN BOOK
“Klassen’s animals react to their seemingly absurd—but never tragic—universe with characteristically subtle, humorous postures and eye maneuvers. The weirdness of it all exerts its own attractive force, drawing readers back to it to wonder and ponder. Waiting for Godot imagined for the playground population’s sensibilities.” KIRKUS
“The most gratifying feature of this new offering by Caldecott Medalist Klassen is that there’s so much of it–96 pages of dark, Beckett-caliber comedy.” PUBLISHERS WEEKLY

Turtle really likes standing in his favourite spot. He likes it so much that he asks his friend Armadillo to come over and stand in it, too. But now that Armadillo is standing in that spot, he has a bad feeling about it…

A wryly humorous meditation (in the form of five connected short stories) on the workings of friendship, fate, shared futuristic visions, and that funny feeling you get that there’s something off somewhere, but you just can’t put your finger on it. Merging broad visual suspense with wry wit and existential silliness, celebrated picture-book creator Jon Klassen gives us a wholly original comedy for the ages.

Sato the Rabbit by Yuki Ainoya tr. Michael & Shizuka Blaskowsky

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ACHUKA Book of the Day 5 Apr 2021

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“In lushly painted, highly immersive vignettes, we’re shown that while Sato wears a costume, his sensory nature has been transformed. The taste of watermelon spreads throughout his body. He cracks a walnut and finds rooms inside. He plucks a cloud from a puddle’s reflection and hangs it over his bed, where he ‘sips stories’ from melted multicolored ice containing the emotions of a fully lived and dreamed life.” NEW YORK TIMES
“Sweet, surreal and contemplative.” KIRKUS
“In a set of seven small vignettes that span the seasons, Sato’s daily activities — watering the garden, doing the laundry, splashing in puddles — turn into magic. Cracking open a walnut reveals an inviting miniature world. Eating a watermelon turns into a seafaring adventure. (“Nothing compares to eating watermelon on the sea.”) Observing a meteor shower leads to a star-collection mission. Paintings in a naive style burst with saturated color — watermelon red, night-sky blue, spring chartreuse.” HORN BOOK

“One day, Haneru Sato became a rabbit. He’s been a rabbit ever since.” With these surrealist, yet matter-of-fact opening lines, we are transported to a world very much like our own, yet one that is imbued with an added dimension of wonder and curiosity. In Sato’s world, ordinary objects and everyday routines can lead to magical encounters: a rain puddle, reflecting the sky, becomes a window that can be opened and peered through. A walnut is cracked open to reveal a tiny home, complete with a bathtub and a comfy bed. During a meteor shower, Sato catches stars in a net, illuminating the path home for a family taking an evening walk. This whimsical tale is the first in a trilogy from Japan.

 

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Yuki Ainoya is Japanese and studied  painting at the Tama Art University Faculty of Art and Design. She was the winner of the the Crayon House Children’s Book Grand Prize in 1990 and the 12th Japanese Children’s Book Award in 2007 for the original Japanese edition of this book.

This translated version is published by Enchanted Lion Books, an independent children’s book publisher based in Brooklyn, New York publishing illustrated books from around the world.

A fascinating and richly illustrated discussion with the book’s translating team:
Part One
Part Two

Bone Music by David Almond

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ACHUKA Book of the Day 2 Apr 2021
Times Children’s Book of the Week 27 Mar 2021

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The wonderful cover illustration is by David Litchfield.

Sylvia, brave-hearted and rebellious, moves out of Newcastle into wild, rural Northumberland. She feels alien in this huge, silent, seemingly empty landscape. Then she meets Gabriel, a strange yet familiar boy. They roam the forests and fells together and she sees nature with new eyes, becoming aware that the past is all around her and deep inside herself. From the wing of a dead buzzard, they create a kind of flute that was used in rituals in the distant past.

This is a book that celebrates humanity and explores the deep connections between ourselves and nature. It speaks to young people about what it really is to be a human being alive today.

The Boy Who Made Everyone Laugh by Helen Rutter

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ACHUKA Book of the Day 1 Apr 2021

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A laugh-out-loud, against-all-odds triumph of a story.

Billy Plimpton is an eleven-year-old boy with a big dream. He wants to be a stand-up comedian when he grows up, delivering pinpoint punch-lines and having audiences hang on his every hilarious word. Surely an impossible ambition for a boy with a stammer. How will he find his voice, if his voice won’t let him speak?

The idea for this story came from Helen Rutter’s son, who has a stammer: she wanted to write the book that he would love to read, starring a child like him.

You may also be interested in this recent picture book about a boy with a stammer: I Talk Like A River an ACHUKA Book of the Day in January 2021.

Firekeeper’s Daughter by Angeline Boulley

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ACHUKA Book of the Day 31 Mar 2021

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“The plot weaves, ducks and dives, but always convincingly and always a mixture of the beliefs and customs of the Ojibwe and of white American culture.” BfK 5 STAR review
“A suspenseful tale filled with Ojibwe knowledge, hockey, and the politics of status.” KIRKUS
“This fat, satisfying novel ably conveys a sense of place and nuanced, complex feeling; it’s both an interrogation of racist misogyny and a swift-paced, compelling thriller.” GUARDIAN

Soon to be a Netflix series

Keep the Secret. Live the Lie. Earn your Truth. Eighteen-year-old Daunis’s mixed heritage has always made her feel like an outsider, both in her hometown and on the nearby Ojibwe reservation. When she witnesses a shocking murder, she reluctantly agrees to be part of a covert FBI operation into a series of drug-related deaths. But the deceptions – and deaths – keep piling up and soon the threat strikes too close to home. Now Daunis must decide what it means to be a strong Anishinaabe kwe (Ojibwe woman) and how far she’ll go to protect her community, even if it tears apart the only world she’s ever known.

The fabulous jacket design is by Moses Lunham, an artist from the Anishinabek (Ojibway/Chippewa) Nation.

When Jelly Had a Wobble by Michelle Robinson ill. Tom Knight

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ACHUKA Book of the Day 30 Mar 2021

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A laugh-out-loud picture book that explores our emotions and reassures toddlers that having the wobbles is OK.

Wibble wobble, wibble wobble, Jelly on a plate

When Jelly is entered into the ‘Best Food Competition’, it makes him wobble with worry. Everyone loves chicken nuggets and pizza – but does everyone love jelly? Suddenly he’s filled with self-doubt. But soon Jelly learns that the things that make us different should be celebrated… and that it’s definitely OK to have a wobble every now and then.

From the creators of When Cucumber Lost His Cool and The Day the Banana Went Bad. Knight’s bright and bold illustrations are hugely engaging.

Check out this Meet An Illustrator feature with Tom Knight.