AIB Illustration & Animation Blog

AIB's Courtney LaForest interviews Illustrator Eleanor Davis

In early June, I had the pleasure of meeting with the lovely Eleanor Davis, an Athens-based illustrator whose work has appeared in the New York Times, Plansponser, Lucky Peach, Businessweek, and more, as well as having written and illustrated numerous comics for children and adult audiences. Known for her beautiful and intimate ink drawings, as well as true gift in the art of sequential storytelling, she was kind enough to invite me to visit her studio and home shared with cartoonist husband, Drew Weing. Originally from Tucson, Arizona and having graduated with a BFA in Sequential Art from the Savannah College of Art and Design (SCAD) in 2005, she is a testament of hard work and following one’s passions.

Caption: Excerpt from Stick and String – MOME 8

Courtney: To start with an icebreaker: If you could have a super power, what would it be?

Eleanor: Oh, I guess invisibility. Don't they have gender studies that guys tend to say flying and women tend to say invisibility or something? I don't know I feel like that'd be useful--definitely for if I ever wanted to snoop around or something. [laughs] That would probably be terrible. I can imagine that totally destroying things. Actually when I think about super powers, it's like anything could have the potential to destroy your life? Like, stopping time would be really cool, but then I feel like you would have a lot of pressure to stop problems before they happened. I think there could be negatives with it. Do you have a super power that you would have?

C: I don't know. Maybe being able to speak any language at any time or something.

E: Without being nervous.

C: Yeah. [laughs] Oh yeah--maybe just being able to speak period without being nervous. [laughs]

E: [laughs] That would count as a super power for me too.

C: So I know that you're from Tucson and that both of your parents are really into comics as well, but what made you want to try illustration?

E: I guess I had the idea that I could actually make money at it. Which is basically true, I mean it's how I make a living at the moment. But it's not exactly how you rake in the big bucks. So it's kind of funny--a major in sequential art and a minor in illustration is not a particularly super sensible combination, you know. [laughs] So I went to school for sequential because I like comics so much. I wound up doing the illustration minor just because I realized that I could. But it’s fun.

C: Did you ever want to be anything else growing up?

E: Yeah, I thought about being a translator because I was really interested in Japanese. * I studied Japanese for a long time. I was actually really into math. I thought about being a math major, but I don’t know what sort of jobs you get in that case. [laughs]

C: Mathematician? Math professor?

E: Go into engineering or something? I don’t know really what that’s useful for. But I guess I don’t really know what a lot of majors are useful for.

C: So what made you choose SCAD, as opposed to other schools?

E: For some reason during my senior year of high school I was feeling really lazy and burnt out. I mean, the only real reason I went to art school was because I thought that I had to go to college and the thought of going to a “real school” was unbearable. [laughs] And I didn’t want to have to write any more papers or anything like that. And I really liked comics; it was basically all I cared about. At the time there were only two programs that offered Sequential Art: the School of Visual Arts (SVA) in New York and SCAD. SVA required that you take a ceramics class and I was like ‘Fuck that!’ And so I went to SCAD; it was the stupidest reason! [laughs]

Caption: The Poor Miller’s Son and the Cat – Twelve Dancing Princesses – Scoutbooks

C: [laughs] I mean, that’s legitimate though.

E: Not really, it’s one class! I had to take a 3D design class anyway it was the same thing. I don’t know how it was for you guys, but I feel like sometimes when you have that big of a life choice, where you’re going to go to school and meet totally different people and your life will be totally different, to a certain extent you just have to not think about it too hard, because it’s nightmarish to think of it as “This is my future”. But it ended up working out.

C: And you ended up meeting Drew there, and you guys are still here in Athens, which is nice.

E: I complain a lot about SCAD, because it’s kind of a problematic school in some ways. But then, you can’t really think, “Oh, I wish I hadn’t made that choice”, because then you wouldn’t meet your friends and I wouldn’t have met my husband and blah blah blah. And it doesn’t hurt to hear all of my friends in New York complain about how much they have to pay in rent. [laughs]

C: And Athens is a really nice town.

E: I really really like it here a lot. I think it’s better for us to live in a small town. Yeah, it worked out.

C: But do you feel there are any particular things that you took with you from SCAD?

E: I had a lot of professors that I really really liked. My problems with the school were more in the structuring and the requirements for students. It felt like they were a little bit easy. But there were good professors. One of the things that I felt was a good lesson for me was that it wasn’t a very hard school—you didn’t have to work very hard. So you had to be self-motivated, which is just really important because when you’re working freelance you just have to do it. So that was good. I don’t know if I would’ve been able to learn that at a school that was more rigid and regimented.

C: What have been some of your greatest influences, not just artistically, but in life or otherwise?

E: My family, my friend, Kate, we’ve been best friends since we were in high school. I feel like I’m naturally kind of obsessive and cowardly and I guess I don’t really do a very good job of living life on my own very well and so I feel like the people I admire most and am closest to and have good influences on me have been folks who are really good at experiencing life and making good choices that they believe in: traveling and meeting new people and being open-hearted, you know, being brave. So those are my big influences. My friend Maggie, my friend Lacey, just ordinary folks who know how to live life well. I think a lot of artists don’t know how to live very well. You’re just too focused on this one thing.

Caption: Kill the Fillibuster – BusinessWeek

C: Post-art school, how did you start finding work, and at what point were you able to do freelance full-time?

E: I’ve only actually been doing freelance full-time for about a year and a half. Right when I got out of school I was doing it full-time, but it didn’t actually count because I wasn’t actually making enough money to live off of. It was kind of a complicated trajectory, it’s pretty boring. I started out mostly being focused on comics and I got a book deal where they pay you a big chunk and being straight out of college I was just like “Oh my gosh, this is so much money! This’ll last forever!” And, of course it didn’t last as long as it took to write the book. So that was very frustrating. And then I got a job at a grocery store co-op. Do you know Daily Groceries?

Adrian: Yeah! Isn’t it just down the street?

E: Yeah yeah I was the produce supervisor there for a few years. I don’t know, something I’ve noticed with artists, especially in illustration, is that we have such an association where if you have a part-time job to make money, it’s like a failure on your part. But, I really liked working at Daily and it just felt like a really positive influence on my life, and not having to feel stressed out about paying the bills. I feel like when I first got out of school I wasn’t really good enough. Like, if you know your own voice, then you can stick to your guns and do the work that you feel good about. But if you’re not sure, then you kind of have to pander. I get quite a lot of questions from students asking ‘How do I focus my portfolio to potential clients?’ and it’s like don’t do that. You can’t make your best work if you’re trying to think of what someone else wants from you. So I feel like having a break gave me a chance to find that voice, and that’s what people respond to most—or at least, art directors. And then the jobs that I get are better too, because if you fill your portfolio with businessmen on treadmills, then you’re going to get jobs like that and you’ll be bored out of you mind. But I have more of a fun portfolio, so the jobs that I do get are stuff that I want to do. So that’s really nice. So long story short, I was working at Daily but also working on my portfolio and I just got really really lucky. Aviva Michaelov from the New York Times just saw my stuff reblogged. That’s another thing with the internet. My stuff can be pretty provocative and goofy and pretty internet-friendly. People like nudity as a general rule [laughs]. And so that stuff gets featured on the Internet and blogs and stuff and art directors see it because it’s being thrown around on Tumblr. So they see a picture I’ve done of a naked person and they’re like “Oh, hey, do this illustration about retirement policies.” You know, and that’s how it is. Yeah, it’s a weird field right now, I feel like. And that’s how I started making jobs and stuff. Right now I’m making just enough money to pay the bills, which is good.

Caption: Pushing Back Retirement – The New York Times

C: What are some of your favorite mediums to use, and do you prefer some for professional work and others for your own personal work?

E: Basically the only thing I feel like I’m really good at is pen and ink. I think that artwork I respond to the most is pretty intuitive and I’m good at pen and ink and it’s simple enough—just black or white. But I can do it very intuitively without any planning. So I’m really pleased with those illustrations as a general rule. But I also do a lot of watercolor and gouache and that’s a little bit more frustrating because I’m just not as good with it yet: I have to plan everything out. I feel pleased with the work mostly, but it doesn’t have the same intuitive quality. I’ve been doing more work on the computer because it’s easier to be more intuitive on the computer. So those are the big three: watercolor and gouache, pen and ink, and computer, which I really like doing but it still lacks a little bit of warmth.

Caption: D&D sketches; Some goblins and trolls “hanging out, watching porn and stuff”

As a pretty control-freaky person, I like being able to have that [on the computer], but I feel like as an illustration that’s what people respond to most, the kind of lack of control. Being forced to say that you think that that was a goof, and you want to change it, but you have to leave it, and it actually makes the piece better. And you look back on it later and feel like it’s an improvement. That’s important. And working with kind of sophisticated color blends, I haven’t figured out a way that I like doing that, so I tend to work super flat with color which is kind of boring.

Caption: Anxiety, My Monster, My Self – The New York Times

C: And you do both illustrating and writing.

E: I feel like I’m not as good at the writing part. It’s definitely not what I was trained to do. I actually went to--this is kind of me bragging a little bit--but Carson Ellis does this thing every year where she invites a bunch of kids’ book illustrators to hang out at this farm in Portland and party and she invited me, which blew my freaking mind because I didn’t even know she knew who I was. And also because I don’t actually consider myself a kids’ book creator. I mean, I’m a cartoonist, but that feels really different. But that was really fun because, I’ve gone to comic conventions and stuff my whole life and I’m used to the whole “Comics need more respect!” etc, but then it was really fun hearing the same thing from the kids book creators. Like, they have kids book manifestos [laughs] that they’ve written up about the importance of children’s literature and it’s like “Ugh, you guys are so cool!” They’re really fun. But it also made me realize how little I know about kids books. I feel like I see a lot of kids book illustrators try to do comics and be like “Aw, yeah, comics, it’s just a lot of illustrations in little boxes” and then they try to do a comic and it’s not very good, it’s hard to read. And I feel the same way. When I try to write for kids and making drafts for kids books, I get part of the way and I’m like “I don’t know how to do this.” It’s so simple; it’s like a haiku or something. Like what makes Goodnight Moon one of the best kids books in the world when it’s just a handful of words? You know? But it is. It’s like magic. [laughs]

Caption: Comic and cover for Cicada Magazine, March/April 2013


C: So you’ve worked in both children’s and adult subject matters; how do you approach each, and are there things that you like or dislike about each? Or do you prefer one of the other?

E: Basically I prefer doing adult stuff. I do a lot of different work—I probably should just focus in on something so I get a lot of work doing it. I do personal work, which tends to be pretty adult, but then it doesn’t technically pay anything, so I’m not sure it counts as “jobs”. But that would be my favorite, because it’s more or less doing whatever I want. The stuff I do for the NYT is for grown-ups, and that tends to not be super creative feeling, but it’s satisfying like a puzzle or something. There’s this puzzle that you want to figure out and there’s a time limit and it feels really good. So I really like doing that. And then kids stuff I feel like I don’t really enjoy doing, just because I take it very seriously. My weaknesses and my failures hurt me a lot worse doing kid’s stuff. Like, if I do an editorial illustration and am like “Well, that’s not the best editorial illustration”, I don’t care as much because it’s like “Well, I’ll get better next time!”. But with kid’s books stuff I have such a passion for kid’s work that if I do something and I don’t think it’s great it makes me really sad. [laughs]

C: But you [and Drew] have taught the [summer comic making] workshops for kids, too. So it definitely shows that you have a passion for showing kids comics.

E: Yeah. I like kids, and I just have really strong memories of childhood. I think the strongest emotional response you can have to a piece of artwork is when you’re a kid. You exist within it more strongly that you can when you’re an adult. So that makes it feel more important to be a responsible creator.

C: Looking back at the work you were making when first coming out of school, like Stinky and Secret Science Alliance, it seems like your work has really evolved in a lot of ways over the years and has become a lot more conceptual as you’ve matured as an artist. In school where you’re pushed all of the time by professors and peers to keep growing and moving forward; how do you continue to push yourself to grow outside of school?

E: Well, I pitched Stinky and the Secret Science Alliance right after coming out of school, and at that point I didn’t like making art very much. It was a huge struggle and super labor-intensive and very controlled. And so I think I tried to make my stuff more intuitive and fun as a self-preservation because I just couldn’t work like that anymore. It’s hard. There’s always the temptation to keep doing something that’s worked, something that people have responded to in the past. I feel like there’s a balance between wanting to stay in my comfort zone and wanting to be true to what I’m really good at. Just trying your best I guess.

Caption: Cover for Regular Show Comics

C: So what’s a typical day like for you? How do you balance time for freelance, personal work, errands, social life, married life, general life, etc.?

E: I’m not very good at it. My typical day is to wake up at 6 and be at work by 7:30, and by at work I mean at my desk. I have a program called Self Control that keeps me out of Twitter and Facebook. [laughs]

C: [laughs] I need to get that!

E: It’s really important to me because I can’t multi-task, so if I get distracted from what I’m working on, then my day is pretty blown. I work pretty well in the morning and then by the afternoon I start to get more and more groggy and out of it and doing worse work and feeling less positive about the work I’m doing. So I try to transition from my most brain-intensive stuff in the morning and then working towards e-mails or coloring in the afternoon. And then I try to do some exercising-I lift weights and do yoga. And I try to go on a bike ride everyday. And be in bed by 10. Or I hope, you know that never really happens. [laughs] You know, there’s always phone calls and desperate stuff that you need to get done and e-mails. I try to take the weekends off. All that stuff is so important. I feel like that’s what most of the illustrators I know do, just because it’s too exhausting. You can really mess yourself up by working all the time. And if you let yourself get into the habit of procrastinating then it can really screw you. [laughs]

C: Especially with such fast turn-arounds on some things!

Caption: Barista Magazine

E: It’s especially important for the long-term projects; you need to schedule and plan. When I have a lot of fast turn-around pieces all at once my schedule tends to go to hell, which is okay, but only temporarily.

C: What’s your process like in coming up with new ideas for work, for both personal and editorial?

E: I guess the difference is when I’m doing sketches for a job or a client, I do my sketching on my Cintiq. I get ten sketches done until the deadline and send off my top 3 or 4. And doing personal work, I’m usually just working in my sketchbook, doing a lot of doodling picking through images. You sketch a lot and find recurring themes and try to figure out what that’s about and what you can learn from them. If it could be expanded into a larger story. You sit on it for a long time: sometimes it dies; sometimes it turns into something bigger.

C: So what are some things you do in your free time? You mentioned yoga and exercising, but what are some other hobbies, passions, or interests you have?

E: I really like talking. A lot. Which is frustrating because I’m also really anxious, so talking makes me really anxious. [laughs] I really like eating; don’t like cooking, but I’ll do it in order to eat. My husband really likes cooking. And I really like biking. Biking and talking and drawing and eating, those are the main things I do. [laughs]

C: What are some of your favorite things to draw and some of your least favorite things to draw?

E: I really like drawing naked people. I don’t quite know why. I suspect it’s because at school they require you to take a lot of life drawing classes, but they don’t really require you to take clothing drawing classes. So I don’t really know how to draw clothing very well. [laughs] I really like drawing plants. And I hate drawing robots. That’s it. [laughs] I really hate drawing robots, and every once in awhile I’ll have to draw a robot for something and I’ll be like, “Come on, Eleanor, you can do this, what’s so hard about drawing robots” and then it ends up “Nooo I hate it! This is so hard it looks terrible!”.

C: They’re so boxy—kind of the opposite of naked people.

E: I always end up just doing some weird organic form with wires sticking out of it, some lights. I can’t make it look cool.

C: What work do you feel the most proud of, or what direction would you like to see your work go in the future?

E: I guess what I feel most proud of at the moment are my personal comics. Short-form comics. I’d like to do more of that. It’s hard because other stuff pushes it out of the way, it doesn’t pay anything, I don’t have time for it, and I’m not super fast. It’s tricky because I feel like that’s why I get jobs: I do personal stuff, and people respond to it, and I get jobs. They’re fun jobs, but it’s not personal stuff exactly. But then that shoves my time for doing personal stuff out of the way—but I get fewer jobs if I don’t have a steady output of personal stuff. Figuring out that balance is tricky. [laughs]

A: Would you even want to make money from your personal work?

E: Yeah-it’s tricky and complicated. Because you don’t want you personal stuff to become compromised, you want it to feel true. I guess it’s just a matter of money equaling time, you know. You have to make however many dollars a day, or a month, or a year. So my philosophy has been: this is what I do for money, and my personal stuff is where I’m not going to think about money at all. But then the bills come and you find yourself doing more and more time on the things you do to make money, and you keep saying you’ll find time later for personal stuff and it’s later and you don’t have as much time as you want. So it’s very frustrating. I don’t know the solution to that one. It’s having the freedom to make work that some people might really respond to, but then a lot of people don’t, but you decide to make it anyway because you enjoy it.

Caption: In Our Eden – Nobrow 7 – Spring 2012

C: But you’re also probably able to spend a lot more time within yourself perfecting that piece, as opposed to something like editorial where you have a much shorter time limit.

E: Yes, but then there’s the risk of never getting it done. With editorial the time constraint is such a big thing, so at least it does get done.

Caption: Happy Valentine’s Day!

C: Favorite food?

E: I’m a little embarrassed about this, but I was a vegetarian for a really long time, and a vegan for awhile in college, and recently my husband and I started eating meat and…now my favorite food is meat. [laughs] I just really missed meat! So we’ve just been eating a lot of meat, grilling a lot of steaks. We try to get mildly responsible meat. And I just feel better since eating meat again. My vegetarian friends hate it, like I’m betraying them. [laughs] I just have more energy now! I lost weight! Everything’s been great since starting to eat meat again!

C: Favorite music, movies, or something playing while working?

E: I need to have music playing, because otherwise I fall asleep. Usually I listen to dance music a lot-it keeps me focused. So a lot of pop music, sometimes classy pop music, but also sometimes Ke$ha. [laughs] My favorite band is The Knife. For fun I watch 30 Rock, Adventure Time, you know, all of the fun stuff. But I also like old movies—I just usually don’t end up watching as much of that stuff as I do watching Adventure Time. [laughs]

C: [laughs] So my last question: What advice would you give to young illustrators coming into the field now?

E: My number one thing is having a really good website. Something that looks professional and something that you’ll update. Social media is what works for me—being on Tumblr, on Twitter, Livejournal when that existed. So that’s what’s worked for me. I’m a big proponent for doing personal work first and foremost, and waiting for people. Your personal work is going to be your strongest work. So just make that as strong as you can and wait for people to respond to that. But you have to be patient, and a lot of people aren’t going to respond to it. I know a lot of other people have much more of a cut-throat steps, and self-promotion and mailers, etc. And that’s awesome, those people make more money than I do, for sure. But for me personally, if the money is your first priority then you shouldn’t be doing it, because it’s not a big money maker. So I guess at a certain point you just have to make sure you’re having fun. Because if you’re not having fun, and you’re not making as much money as you would at another job, then why are you doing it? I guess that’s my big mantra now; I really wasn’t enjoying making art for a long time and it was really stressful, and if you’re not enjoying it you won’t be doing it enough, and if you’re not doing it all of the time you won’t be making your best work. And in order to work all of the time, you have to enjoy it, because it’s horrible to force yourself to do something all of the time that you don’t enjoy. And then you’ll just be doing your best work, I think. 

Thanks so much, again, to Eleanor for making the time to answer my questions! You can find more of her work on her website: www.doing-fine.com, and follow her on Twitter @squinkyelo

Coming Soon: peterOZ: Balance of Power

Adjunct Faculty Peter O Zierlein has been busy getting his paper cut illustrations ready for the big screen. Zierlein, a recent graduate of AIB's MFA in Visual Arts,  is the subject of filmmaker Roberto Mighty's "peterOZ: Balance of Power" a documentry exploreing one man's struggle for balance between art, commerce and family.



Peter O. Zierlein -  "POZ*", is a German paper cut artist and illustrator (New York Times, Boston Globe, Washington Post, Berliner Zeitung) now living in America.

"peterOZ: Balance of Power" highlights his struggle to move from successful Op-Ed illustrator to Fine Artist. Will his dark, massive papercuts be accepted by the international gallery scene? Zierlein's influences include American cartoon artist R. Crumb and 16th century German woodcut artist Albrecht Durer.

This is the first in a series of contemporary artist profiles by filmmaker Roberto Mighty, MFA, artist-in-residence at Harvard Forest in 2012 and currently Adjunct Professor at Emerson College. Each film in the series focuses on a single individual, and features Roberto's unique writing, directing, lighting, camera and editing concepts. To learn more, visit:  www.robertomighty.com

DIG Boston “Oh Cruel World” Internship Questions by Anna Jo Beck

DIG Boston “Oh Cruel World” Internship Questions.
By  Anna Jo Beck – AIB illustration

What did you find to be the most challenging aspect of working in the world of editorial illustration?
Working around both his and my schedule seemed to be the worst of it. It was also challenging to work within such a tiny format.


What was the most rewarding part of working for Dig Boston?
Definitely seeing my own work in print.

What are the three most important things you learned from this internship experience?
Be flexible. You’re working with someone as well as for them. And it’s okay to experiment. And that the Dig is a publication that is pretty liberal, and you can have a lot of fun with your illustrations.


How did your training as an AIB Illustration Major best prepare you for this job?
Thanks to my principles of illustration class with Keith Maclelland, I had already had experience creating thumbnails, roughs, and finishes on a schedule.

As a student how did you balance your internship with your academic responsibilities? 
I am a list maker and a calendar curator. I managed two jobs, 18 credits, and this internship, all possible through the glories of time management (and coffeee).

How did you feel knowing your illustrations were being published and seen by thousands of people in the metro-Boston area?
Sometimes embarrassed. Mostly ecstatic and validated.





7.  What was the strangest Oh Cruel World article you illustrated? and… Did you do illustrations for articles that never went to print?
My second week assignment was an article about underage drinking, and that in itself wasn’t that strange, but the art director picked my thumbnail of a pair of baby’s legs surrounded by empty nips. And it went to print. Lots of things didn’t go to print. I have an entire sketchbook that’s a graveyard of Oh Cruel World thumbnails.

GUTS Community Art Program

Do you have GUTS: Growth, Unity, Tolerance and Strength?

AIB Illustration Alumni Ryan Maguire '98 launched the GUTS Community Art Program to to engage and inspire participants to share their emotions through visual communication and narrative.

A few weeks ago the students from the Broad Rock Elementary School (RI) participated in GUTS Imagination exercises, directed by Robin Wildman.

The Broad Rock Elementary students made art and asked questions!

Why did you make this book?
GUTS was written and illustrated during my first contact period at the University of Hartford, Hartford Art School MFA in Illustration Program. GUTS is an original story about facing the feelings that live inside all of us.   Acknowledging and coping with one’s emotions can be difficult for children and adults.   The GUTS story helps to engage the reader to think about their feelings and the impact they have on their lives and environment. I had recieved a AIB Faculty Grant to independently publish the first edition of books. "GUTS, the story of You" is now avaible as an eBook on iTunes.




Why did you choose these feelings?
Like many people have experienced, my parents went through a divorce.   As a child, it was an extremely difficult time for me to understand the emotions that I was feeling towards my parents and the impact they had on my family.  Anger became a dominant emotion that was difficult to control, often leading to self abuse, negative behavior, fights, and bullying.

Inspired by my own childhood and the difficulties of controlling my emotions, I wanted to tell a story that all ages could read and associate with.  GUTS is the story of a small black dot who encounters various feelings, we all share, for the first time.



Preview the Guts story here


How come the feelings and emotions look the way they do? Why did you choose to draw them that way?
The illustrations made for GUTS were inspired by Paleolithic cave paintings by primitive humans and CDB!, a children’s book written and illustrated by William Steig. 

Primitive cave painting told the stories of early life on earth through mark making on cave walls.  Painted with mineral pigments or scratched directly onto surface, the artists illustrated human figures, animals, and abstract signs.  Through mark-making and cave painting, some of the earliest activities and thoughts of mankind are depicted.

Inspired by primitive techniques, the GUTS character illustrations were explored using ink and spit on paper.  Various value structures and surface textures were achieved by drawing marks with ink and then licking my finger to rub and distort the medium, resulting in a minimal graphic aesthetic that simplifies complex human emotions into bold and unique expressions.





Why didn't you use color in the pictures?
The final illustrations capture the essence of each emotion, in black and white, creating unique characters that are open for personal interpretation and transcend across time, language, and culture.







William Steig’s book CDB! was shown in our children’s book course as a published example by program faculty Dennis Nolan.   CDB! is a illustrated children’s book by Willaim Steig, published in 1968 by Simon & Schuster.  Each illustration in CDB! is accompanied by a cryptic caption that uses individual letters that hint to the reader  what the illustration represents.  The title of the book “CDB!” thus translates to “See (CEE) The (DEE) Bee (BEE)!”

Steig’s creative decision to simplify the picture’s caption to only single letter combinations challenges the reader to use their imagination to figure out what the text and illustration were depicting.  Steig’s contrast between type and image generates a unique reading experience that is entertaining and educational.



Steig’s unorthodox storytelling inspired me to write a narrative that was simple and direct in contrast to characters that were abstract and cryptic.  The GUTS story challenges the reader to interpret abstract illustrations, representing core human emotions we all share and experience, and inspire the reader to imagine what their own feelings may look like.

Why is YOU the smallest character?
I wouldn't say YOU is small, but rather a symbol of strength and balance. YOU illustrates the core inside us all. No matter what life throws at us, balance is a big part of finding peace and making progress. So despite size, YOU can make the biggest impact of them all!

Thanks to the Faculty and Students of the Broad Rock Elementary School for making art and showing their GUTS: Growth, Unity, Tolerance and Strength!

"Like" the GUTS Community Art Program
Follow on Twitter: @GutsArtProgram

DIG Boston “Oh Cruel World” Internship Questions by Coner Corbett

DIG Boston “Oh Cruel World” Internship Questions.
By: Conor Corbett - AIB Illustration

What did you find to be the most challenging aspect of working in the world of editorial illustration?
Definitely scheduling my time around meeting deadlines. Sometimes I would get the next article on Thursday or Friday, but the deadline was always Monday morning. My entire weekends were soon dedicated to working on the Dig, especially when I was given a featured article!

What was the most rewarding part of working for Dig Boston?
Besides picking up the latest copy to see my work in print, as well as establishing a good sense of what a deadline entails, I would have to say the most rewarding part of this internship was how confident I have gotten at drawing digitally. It was a challenging and repetitive workout for my tablet skills!



What are the three most important things you learned from this internship experience?
1) Communication – whenever I felt stuck or crunched on time, I would always shoot Scott an email about my concerns and we would figure them out together. 2) Time Management – really having to set aside time to have a comfortable and efficient working schedule. 3) Research – I can honestly say that I’m not familiar with the markings of the Juggalos’ face paint.

How did your training as an AIB Illustration Major best prepare you for this job?
As an illustration major at AIB, we are always taught and told to express ourselves how we see fit and rid ourselves of all boundaries. I’ve grown to become comfortable enough to voice my own personality in my work, which I believe shines pretty bright in my sketches for the Dig!

As a student how did you balance your internship with your academic responsibilities? 
I was fortunate enough to be working for the Dig over my summer break, so I didn’t have to worry about my school life. I did, however, have to cut some weekend hours from my other job, but that was absolutely fine with me (haha)! 

How did you feel knowing your illustrations were being published and seen by thousands of people in the metro-Boston area?
It really didn’t dawn on me until after I started to notice how often I would catch someone nose-deep in a Dig while riding the T. It was really cool and fulfilling to see my work functioning in the real world!




What was the strangest Oh Cruel World article you illustrated?  and… Did you do illustrations for articles that never went to print?
The strangest article I was given to illustrate was during my fourth week at Dig. It was about a famous homeless Bostonian who was getting pissed off at how often they were photographed without a tip. I totally agree with the guy in saying he was completely justified for the reaction; a fat group of loud and tacky tourists, cradling countless bags of leftovers from dinner, tags still stapled to their neon palm tree shirts (palm trees in Boston?), snapping carefully posed photos and leisurely strolling off without any appreciation for anyone’s time would steam me up! I just couldn’t imagine how a passive aggressive homeless celebrity would look posing for a photo. 

How was it working with the Art Director, Scott Murray?
A super awesome and funny dude with an incredible passion for what he does! His critiques and opinions were only honest and very informative, and he was always available by email. He never allowed me to get away with leaving even the slightest details out!

“Oh Cruel World” Internship Questions by Mike Centeno

DIG Boston “Oh Cruel World” Internship Questions.
By: Mike Centeno - AIB Alumni

What did you find to be the most challenging aspect of working in the world of editorial illustration?
Two things: the dimensions of the column, and working digitally towards something that is to be printed on newsprint paper.

What was the most rewarding part of working for Dig Boston?
As silly as it sounds, it's always great seeing your piece work (or not) on the printed page. Checking the end result after it went to print, was always a great moment.

What are the three most important things you learned from this internship experience?
This particular column has it's very own set of challenges, since it's supposed to represent very specific stories with details that are very relevant to it, which have to be represented in a space of about 1.5x2 inches. So consolidating that amount of visual information into that space was the main thing I learned from.
   Other than that I would say, working within a very short time frame every week and dealing with an art director who was very proactive and invested, where the two other things I took away from the experience.


How did your training as an AIB Illustration Major best prepare you for this job?
The whole experience was made a lot easier and smoother when I worked with many of the principles taught to me at AIB. Once I had shown Scott Murry (Art Director) very clear thumbnails, sketches, and concepts from the get go, the process went very smoothly. The days I tried to circumvent my way around those first steps, it became a corrections back and forth. So the training I received at AIB was very valuable in that respect.

As a student how did you balance your internship with your academic responsibilities? 
It was tough at times, because at the time I was also working as an academic tutor at Lesley University. But overall, if I got the majority of work done during weekends it was an easy task to manage.



How did you feel knowing your illustrations were being published and seen by thousands of people in the metro-Boston area?
Like I mentioned before, it was a really great feeling knowing that, even though at a smaller column, this work was not just for and my friends or family. Even at the time I thought no one paid much attention to the space, recently I've heard a lot of people say that they remember “such and such” illustration from it, which makes it even more worthwile.

What was the strangest Oh Cruel World article you illustrated?  and… Did you do illustrations for articles that never went to print?
Every one of the articles I worked with went to print. The weirdest OCW illustration I had to do was for their sex issue that came out during Valentine's Day week. The writer was using really graphic and verbose ways to describe very nasty imagery. So the way I danced around it, was making all of them into visual metaphors and turned it into a very cute, pink and pastel bunny landscape, with loads and loads of hidden meanings.

How was it working with  Art Director, Scott Murry?
Scott was always very helpful during my time there, even when he wanted a lot of things to change about the piece, he would be really sensible about it and let me try out other stuff as well.

“Oh Cruel World” Internship Questions by Nick Nazzaro

DIG Boston “Oh Cruel World” Internship Questions.
by: Nick Nazzaro - AIB Illustration, class of 2014

What did you find to be the most challenging aspect of working in the world of editorial illustration?
Working on a computer knowing the image would ultimately be 1” x 1.5” with very different colors than you intended was very difficult. I really couldn’t anticipate how well something would turn out in print until I actually saw it.

What was the most rewarding part of working for Dig Boston?
Finally seeing my work in print! Having it look accurate was even more of a bonus, and when they spelled my name right, that was the best.

What are the three most important things you learned from this internship experience?
Work as quickly as possible because if something needs to be changed, or you have a question, you have no control over how quickly your art director responds to you. Establishing relationships via email is not as easy as in person, but you have to be as friendly as possible in case of emergency. Really! Always be prepared to receive and reply to emails, you really can’t afford to be unavailable to people who need your services.

How did your training as an AIB Illustration Major best prepare you for this job?
Very well, there really is an exact formula for how editorial works. You read something, you do thumbnails, you do roughs, and then you finalize. It’s is exactly what we did in multiple classes.

As a student how did you balance your internship with your academic responsibilities?
I cheated and used my final illustrations as homework for my Advanced Computer illustration class. Also, the internship came before homework, always. Missing homework is no big deal to missing illustration that’s supposed to be printed and distributed to thousands of people!

How did you feel knowing your illustrations were being published and seen by thousands of people in the metro-Boston area?
I felt very accomplished, even though I was working for free and the actual images were tiny. I saved a hard copy of every paper and so did my grandma.


What was the strangest Oh Cruel World article you illustrated? and… Did you do illustrations for articles that never went to print?
I have two that are both strange. I broke my hand mid-internship and couldn’t draw at all so I did a sculpture with my left hand and photographed it instead. Itwas a very bizarre result. The next week they never gave me an article to illustrate and the night before my deadline they finally told me to write my own article. So I complained about how I broke my hand and drew myself crying.

How was it to work with Art Director, Scott Murray?
He was very supportive and easy going. I was really hesitant to admit I broke my hand at first, but eventually I felt I had to. He ended up offering to do my drawings for me! I ended up doing them all myself, but he was really willing to help me out.

Scott Murry, DIG Boston - talks “Oh Cruel World” Internship!

Over the next few weeks, we’re going to be highlighting one particularly unique internship opportunity, along with the students who’ve completed it thus far.

Dig Boston, a free weekly alternative newspaper graciously interns one AIB Illustration student per semester. Over the course of a 14 week semester, the student works closely with Art Director, and AIB Illustration Alum, Scott Murry, to complete one illustration for the “Oh Cruel World” column per.

Recently, Murry agreed to answer a few questions for us, here’s what he has to say about AIB’s internship program.

What do you see as a benefit to hiring student interns? Why do you continue to do it?
During my time at AIB, I enjoyed the classroom setting and projects we did, but always yearned for something that felt more official. That "official" experience is what I'm hoping the illustrators get out of this experience. It's always fun to see your own work in print, knowing that it’s reaching thousands of readers. And outside of the academic environment, it's much more comfortable to draw a vomiting dog and be proud of it. I love seeing what students come up with each time when they're given assignments that reach a new audience. And it's awesome for us to have good looking illustrations in the paper, of course!

Have there been any drawbacks?
Nick Nazzaro. Next question. I kid, everyone has been a lot of fun to work with. There have been assignments where both the illustrator and I are facing a hard deadline that can make meeting goals tricky, but that pressure is all part of the job. There have also been weeks where an illustrator wants to go all out with details, and I have to bring up the hinderances of reproduction in newsprint at a smaller size than they're working. Tiny detail lines can get lost very quickly scaled down.

How has your experience been working with the students at AIB?
I quite enjoy it. Seeing new styles and clever solutions from each new student is always enjoyable. From the beginning of an internship to the end, I enjoy watching the work grow and get more daring both in content and skillz. (The "z" shows their exceedingly proficient skills.)

What has the response been from colleagues or customers since this programs inception?
There have been a number of illustrations that catch the attention of readers on our site, twitter, etc. Whenever I hear excitement around a student's illustrations in the office or through social networking, it gets me all worked up. That's an all-around victory.

Yuko Shimizu speaks @ AIB

The AIB Illustration Club invites you Thursday, April 4, at 6pm for an artist talk by Yuko Shimizu. Yuko is a Japanese illustrator living in New York City. Her work, which is awesome, appears in DC Comics, the New York Times, Rolling Stone, New Yorker and she works with clients like the Gap, Pepsi and Visa. Feel free to check out more of her work on her website. The talk is at 601 Newbury, in Room N340. We hope to see you there!

AIB Interview: Angryblue

AIB Illustration student Kristin Musser talks shop with illustrator Justin Kamerer of Angryblue. Don't get angry - It's right here, check it out...

What are your most productive hours of the day? What is a day in the life of "Angryblue" like?
It really depends on the day. I work at home, so the day sort of goes like this: Wake up. Coffee. Attempt some sort of morning practice (very important) - which might end up setting the tone for the day and then figure out what the hell is happening for the day and get going. I may spend the day packing orders, doing emails, creating or at the print shop destroying perfectly innocent pieces of paper.

What was your first art related job and how did it go?
Before I decided to do freelance work as an artist/illustrator/designer/whatever, my day job was doing web design. Before that, it was working at a sign shop. Before that, I learned a lot at a magnet high school and from whatever self-teaching I did after that.



Did you attend a 4 year college? What was your major?
I did a few semesters and then needed to pay my rent/bills, so didn't have the funding to do that. I think the route I've gone with experience has personally done way more for me than what college could offer my attention span. As a result, it's provided me with self drive to really understand the facets of art history and design that resonate with that I really love and then I learn as much as I can from peers.

What inspires you?
Anything. I try to keep myself in a constant state of brainstorming. Movies, music, banter with friends and mere opportunities. My house of full of things I've collected, so I've always got skulls, posters, prints, paintings and knick-knacks in my periphery. Though organized, there's always some sort of visual noise and I think that keeps me going.





The art world is full of highs and lows, what was your best success so far and your worst failure? How did you handle each of them?
The only failures I feel I've had are when my schedule has been too frantic to meet a deadline. Other than that, every single project is an exercise. Sometimes, you're going the motions on what you're comfortable doing and sometimes you're trying something completely new because it's uncomfortable. I've had some of those things not resonate with my current fan-base just because it's not what they're used to seeing from me, but I hope that I'm building a presence to where it's a little bit of a mystery about what I might offer up next. The theme of my 'brand' is how I bounce off of my random inspirations and hopefully my jackassery-fueled humor pops up here and there as well.

Sometimes something just doesn't resonate. With what I do as a print artist, it's a gamble every time I do a gigposter. Either the fans might not care about it, or they might be broke or people might love the art, but not the band ...or don't want a poster for a band they don't know, so they hold out hoping for an art print - and I can't do an art print version of every poster because it'll compete directly with sales. Something might KILL as an art print, but if it doesn't go over well as a poster, I don't have a way of knowing.  Sometimes, a year down the road, a poster or print that didn't resonate when they dropped will randomly blow up and I'll sell out in a week without being able to track down the reason.  Then again, maybe I'm just more optimistic than I come across by the nature of my work. If  I'm completely botching my way through a job, I generally know it before anyone sees it. I've been lucky enough to where I've not had my heart invested and excited about a project and then when it was delivered had a client say "what the hell is this?!" I think the only way i could fail is just by not producing or getting lazy and feeling like I was done learning. That's the ultimate failure for any creative.



Lastly, what is the best advice you would give an artist who is just starting out?
Sponge everything up. Obsessively dive in. Research. If you have a style of art you like, research the crap out of it. If you like art nouveau, figure out what makes it work. Figure out the typography and which faces work together and why - don't just find some typefaces that are sort of cool looking for the style. Pay attention to the colors, line weights and anything else that might be important to the nuance. Though I didn't stick with a formal school of training, research and independent study into the masters and the modern leaders of design and illustration are incredibly important. I feel like every artist needs at least 3 (at least) artists they actively pay attention to that makes them think, "why the hell do I bother" whenever they release a new print. I have that with probably a dozen and it just makes me re-evaluate and think, "OK. It's time to up my game."