Helen Oxenbury

So as it appears I'm a real fool for not knowing who Helen Oxenbury is! Good thing I was so into her husband otherwise who knows when I would have finally managed to look her up. Ha hahhhh... Here are some of her illustrations. Also, I realized that she is the illustrator behind 'Farmer Duck' which is a great book! Another thing learned today!

more about John Burningham...

So I went to look up more about John Burningham and found this bit about him on a pretty cool site which I hadn't really visited before. It is actually an archive of authors & illustrators wouldn't you know it. It's called the Wee Web and here's the link to it. Two interesting things I learned: 1) he worked as a puppet maker for a film company for a while (something I would love to do) 2) he actually designed the model of Chitty Chitty Bang Bang!, 3) he is married to Helen Oxenbury who according to the write up is also a 'highly regarded artist'. 4) I unfortunately don't know her though so I will have to look her up now. Maybe that will be my next post. :)

ps: the above is the image from the Wee Web page about Burningham. Pretty intense looking dude hey?

great Interactive site!

The new DJECO website is sooooo awesome! Just walk around in it for a bit... and of course my favorite man ever Marc Boutavant did a whole bunch of work for it... soooo great! oh, and ... you can get this really cute wallpaper made by him under the 'Goodies' section!

John Burningham

Here are some more images I found online by illustrator John Burningham who illustrated my new found awesome edition of Chitty Chitty Bang Bang. The book 'It's a secret' and 'Aldo' and really all of them look really cool. I wish I had them all right now!!! But currently I am not allowed to buy a lot of new books due to a complete lack of shelving space! Yes, it's true, in my tiny tiny space i have run out of room to store all of my treasured books... what to do...start thinking about moving I guess...

... maybe just one of them though.. omg! his stuff is soooo great! How did I not know about this guy before!? So glad I came across my book in Victoria to set this off!

It's a BOOK! (the trailer)

Here is a pretty funny trailer for 'It's a book' by Lane Smith.

Also funny (once you've watched the trailer) will be that you are WATCHING a book TRAILER... ... you know....(?)

What I found at Renaissance Books in Victoria...

So a little while ago I went to go to Victoria with my good friend Brandy from the R.A.T. and it was pretty great. Some things highly recommended: Going to 'Miniature World' and the BC Museum, but of course I could not go somewhere without checking out all of their... booooooooostores.... So after going to several recommended stores which were all very lovely, I happened to bump into one that was not recommended (and those that you find on your own are of COURSE always the best ones...) They are a fine used bookstore called Renaissance Books and are located at 14 Bastion Square in Victoria, should you ever find yourself on this lovely part of Vancouver Island.

I was in there for a pretty long time admiring all sorts of books, and one of the things that I was struck by immediately was not their Children's book section, which was ok, but their 'Illustration and Illustrated books' section. I have to say I don't think I've (sadly) ever come across a section dedicated to this. Needless to say... I was pretty impressed.

I posted a couple of my purchases above, a copy of 'Punch' a satirical English magazine published around 1915 that featured many many famous illustrator's work. One person I've already written about on this blog who contributed many illustrations to 'Punch' was John Tenniel the illustrator of the original 'Alice in Wonderland.'

My other purchase was 'The Illustration of Books' by David Bland. I have not had the chance to read it yet, but it looks pretty promising.

Last but not least, I found this great copy of one of my beloved illustrated books from my younger days,... 'Chitty Chitty Bang Bang'. Hurray! Look how great the illustrations are! And remember... this is before the days of Photoshop, so that moving car images with the muliple exposure look, is probably exactly that. Illustrated by John Burningham... I will soon have to post some more images by him, because as it turns out... he's amazing! What do you know...

One more Emma Chichester Clark...

This one's pretty good! Plus I love that story!