Frances McKay Illustration

The Play’s the Thing or The Problem of What to Draw

I was always told that I should keep a sketchbook; it is a discipline, a resource, a vital tool. Good advice, no doubt, but I have never kept one. I’m not confident, I can’t lose myself enough, to stand and draw on the street corner, or even in the middle of a field. I am rarely motivated to draw the stuff around me and I don’t like drawing in books, it feels restricted and precious. To bang on about it, I don’t even really like the word “sketch”; it suggests a certain way of drawing; a sort of short hand. I do like life-drawing, there’s an intensity to it and I’m happy to draw in a class where everyone is striving to get it right. I like drawing animals too for the challenge of getting that instant recognition of shape and movement.

Stories, poems, words, are what really motivate me to draw. This is about looking inside the stuff of everyday life. I take cues from words and phrases. People ask, “Where do you get your ideas from?” Well, from the text. If I do a character ‘sketch’, (in this sense, of course, the word refers to a brief portrayal of someone,) from a description rather than from a story it tends to be straight on and a bit static. Given the story though, I have the character’s thoughts and predicament; there is already drama; I have his viewpoint or the reader’s view of him. As much influenced by cinema as by painting and drawing, I begin also to form ideas about angles, panoramas, mid-shots or close-ups, movement, lighting and use of space. Somebody once said that all illustrators are frustrated actors. Well, I’m not a performer but there’s something in that; I often strike a pose, pull the face or act the part I’m drawing. (The old lady who lived opposite my London flat thought I was a lunatic.) Understanding the drama, knowing the character’s thoughts and actions, is part of illustrating a story.

I’ve drawn almost every day of my life since I was child; yet I recall myself as a child saying “But I don’t know what to draw!” I need to draw, but I need a narrative; perhaps I need to act too. So what else could I do? Illustration solves the problem of what to draw.

Alan Marks

The Shakespeare book jacket illustrations in this post are by Alan Marks and published by Franklin Watts.

Merry Christmas!

It's that time of year again in case you hadn't noticed, so all of us here at Frances McKay want to wish you a merry Christmas and a happy New Year with a selection of seasonal illustrations.

I’m an Ape-Man

(Click on the images to enlarge the illustrations)

I first met Jane Goodall at Heathrow airport with the publisher Michael Neugebauer. Michael had already published The Chimpanzee Family Book with Jane; had been to The Gombe National Park in Tanzania to photograph the chimps, and was already a supporter of Jane’s charity, the JGI. The possibility of my working with her came up and I was asked if I could draw chimpanzees. I’d never drawn one and perhaps I could have replied, “Yes, but I will need to see them in their natural habitat”. Being freelance, I simply said, “Yes, of course”. Jane and Michael flew off to separate and exotic parts of the world and I drove back home to my drawing board. It isn’t just the freelance thing though; I assume that I can draw anything because drawing is a process of discovery; and a good way to learn about an animal, for example, is to draw it. As well as doing various pieces for the JGI, I have since worked with Jane on With Love a book of true stories about the lives of chimps and Rickie and Henri, again, a true story about the relationship between an orphaned chimp and a dog.

With a Knick-Knack Paddy-Whack…

 

I have sometimes been asked if having children changed the way I thought about illustrating children’s books. Beyond seeing the world from their level, (you spend a lot of time on your knees as a parent of young children), and realising that they can be visually very acute, I don’t think it has had a big impact on my work. I suppose we draw for the child within ourselves. But one of my favourite projects came directly from having young children.

 

The First Snowfall

 
Lilly was dressing up warm. It was the first day of the Christmas Holiday and Jack Frost had been about. He had left no footprints on the new carpet of snow that covered the ground. But each window pane had frosted to his touch, and the wind seemed keen to rush indoors; you can always tell when Jack Frost has been about.

Good Toes Naughty Toes

 
Ballet? What I saw was the dancers’ pain and the unnatural positions of bodies. To move about en pointe seemed slightly daft; tutus too froufrou and the men’s tights, well... So I was perhaps at odds when I was asked by Eaglemoss to illustrate a ballet magazine for young girls. Ever up for a challenge, I did sample illustrations. At this point I did not know that these were to be approved, or otherwise, by the Royal Ballet. The project was then put on hold because although the work was admired, (by Monica Mason herself I was later told), there were thought to be too many inaccuracies in the dancers’ positions, stage sets etc. It was then proposed that the RB would provide reference material and approve rough artwork. As a proper introduction to dance I was also given a privileged invitation to attend rehearsals at the Royal Ballet School in Covent Garden.

Degas would have recognised that rehearsal room; the dancers in their leggings and layered leotards and sweaters; sitting on the floor sewing their shoes; stretching at the bar; repeating small scenes; moving with a serious beauty into their roles. I watched a full rehearsal of Kenneth MacMillan’s

Manon, inches from the dancers, glued to my seat, mesmerised. I recognised an ethos of perfection in the corps de ballet that put all comment about illustration into perspective. I saw too an incredible passion in the faces and movement of the dancers and I was moved by the story-telling. I attended ballet performances at the Royal Opera House too (something likely to become an expensive habit). I did have an “its alright someone will start singing soon” moment, but I was hooked.

The notes on my roughs from the RB (remembering that thing about perfection) would say things like “Ondine’s left foot is badly fished”, by which they meant that I should move the toe down by about a millimetre. This was not a small project; I did more than 120 illustrations over 2 years. Because I was being fed reference, some decisions about composition, set design etc. were taken out of my hands. I wonder too if my line would have been stronger without direct reference, but I learnt more about drawing the human form and, most of all I think, became more confident with watercolour technique in coping with the depiction of various and strange sets and characters.

Alan Marks

Different Times and a Bit of Name Dropping

I stumbled into working in children’s books. This was 1984; I’d done some English Language work with OUP but had mostly been working for magazines: The Literary Review, Time Out, Radio Times and the like, when (as mentioned in a previous blog) a designer at Heinemann saw something I’d done and put me forward for a ghost story for children. Storm by Kevin Crossley-Holland was in the first series of Yellow Bananas Books, the first “readers” now prevalent in children’s publishing, (I think this had a great deal to do with Judith Elliott who was children’s book editor at Heinemann). With that book under my belt, by ‘phoning and arranging to meet with editors I went on to work with several independent publishers, illustrating work by Fiona Waters; Rosemary Sutcliff; Jill PatonWalsh, (including Thomas and the Tinners, above); Joan Aiken… you get the point; it was a good break.

Does this happen now? The small, independent publishing houses did seem more approachable than today’s conglomerated businesses, and I do understand the pressures on modern publishing. Somehow ease of communication has made connecting all the more difficult. I, naively, used to deliver work by hand to editors and was often welcomed, shown work-in-progress etc. It was part of an editor’s job to find and nurture new talent. Starting out was never easy; not everyone wanted to look at what was essentially college work. But I remember, having just left college, talking to Tom Maschler, head of Jonathan Cape, from a ‘phone box; he was helpful and encouraging and gave time to explain how I should approach publishers with my work. I sat in Klaus Flugge’s office, Andersen Press, whilst he read a story that I’d written; in both cases, probably unthinkable now. The story, Nowhere to be Found, (via an introduction from Frances McKay), was later published by Michael Neugebauer, now owner of Minedition and another great publisher, who took a chance with that early picture book. During all this time I don’t think I knew how fortunate I was.

I’m sure that new talent is encouraged today, if it can make itself known. I’m not sure that young illustrators can get away with stumbling any more.

Alan Marks

MarksOnPaper

Alan's Biography, Books and Awards

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Hip-Pocket Papa

Hip-Pocket Papa’ is my latest book to be published by Charlesbridge Publishing in the USA and my fourth for them with Sandra Markle, who writes beautiful, visual narratives about the natural world. It tells the story of a tiny Australian marsupial frog, a male frog no bigger than a thumbnail, which guards his mate’s egg cluster until the tadpoles emerge and then, because of the dry climate, carries the evolving froglets in pockets in his flanks until they are fully developed.

I suppose because there is a narrative my approach to these projects is very similar to a fiction title. Of course, there has to be a measure of accuracy in what I’m depicting, and you have to be wary of anthropomorphism, (love that word), but the work should still appeal to children and I’m looking for the same sense of drama and atmosphere as in a fiction title.

But you couldn’t make this up; this life stranger than fiction and drama on a tiny scale. In research I spent a morning rooting around the woods near my home; almost resisting the urge to be David Attenborough with an Aussie twang. Focusing on the jewel-like life in the leaf mould and zooming out to the more familiar world gave me a frog’s-eye perspective and the discovery that there’s a universe beneath our feet.

Alan Marks

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