Category: Visual art
In this article, Ruth de Vos takes you behind the scenes to share how the illustrations for her new picture book with Danny Parker, Shine, developed from idea to gorgeous finished artwork.
Last year was a great year for Helen Milroy. Her work was shortlisted for the WA Premier’s Book Awards, the Readings Children’s Book Prize and the Speech Pathology Australia Book of the Year Awards, while reviewers called her picture book Backyard Birds vibrant, bright, beautiful, wonderful, colourful and bold. In 2021 the First Nations author […]
Fiona Burrows might have only recently released her debut picture book as both author and illustrator, Violet and Nothing, earlier this year, but she’s been writing and drawing since she was in school.
Moira Court’s stunning new picture book Antarctica helps pre-primary and early primary school readers discover some of the amazing animals and birds that exist on this chilly continent.
Debut author Ian Mutch’s picture book, More and More and More, was published at the beginning of October on World Habitat Day.
Behind every successful creator is a first story, a first line, a first drawing. James Foley’s passion for art started young, with a step-by-step drawing of Bart Simpson and some ‘public murals’ on and underneath the tables of his childhood home. These days, James writes and illustrates for a living, and regularly presents to schoolkids […]
Have you ever wanted to enlarge something to enormous proportions? Now you can* with the latest teaching activity for James Foley’s Dungzilla!
Sally Tinker of S. Tinker Inc. is the world’s foremost inventor under the age of 12 and creator of Brobot: Just as a Brother Should Be (patent pending). Fremantle Press is offering five lucky schools the chance to win two special Brobot gift packs: one for the classroom and one for the person who designs […]
Representation matters, including in picture book illustrations. Perhaps especially in illustrations, because children are fluent in the language of art in a way that most adults are not. There is no aspect of an illustration that escapes the attention of a child, and this means that to create art for children is to speak to an audience more attuned to the nuances of representation than yourself. This is one of the reasons why the misrepresentation of Indigenous peoples in illustration – or the misrepresentation of other diverse peoples, for that matter – should never be dismissed as being ‘only a picture book’.
Dropping In by Geoff Havel is a novel for middle readers aged 10–14 with themes of friendship, bullying, living with disability, ADHD and cerebral palsy.
Before Kyle Hughes-Odgers published Ten Tiny Things with Meg McKinlay, he was a well-known street artist with works in cities around the world. He’s even been asked to paint the Perth airport! To celebrate the release of his new book, On a Small Island, why not take a look around Perth for some of Kyle’s […]
Being excited to contribute to the place you call home is what Kyle Hughes-Odgers’ art is all about. And it’s never too young to start in your own classroom! By helping students to discover their unique talents and their passions, we can support their involvement in the community and their ability to contribute.
Watch Kyle Hughes-Odgers at work on his new book On a Small Island.
Children will enjoy creating their very own How Frogmouth Found Her Home drawings, delighting in the bush creatures and colourful parade of Australian fauna.
Caterpillar and Butterfly is an Indigenous picture book with vibrant colour and delightfully alliterative text. Read the story in class. Using the colouring-in sheet, encourage students to create their very own colourful butterflies.
Chris Nixon is the illustrator of the internationally renowned Jake series and Crocodile Cake but he’s so much more than that. He’s building a CV that includes public art, video direction and commercial illustration. Here are some notes about how he approaches each project and a video of Chris at work.
The final cover is in! Catch the first glimpse of The Last Viking Returns by Norman Jorgensen, in this amazing time lapse video by illustrator James Foley.
Students at Rosalie Primary School teamed up with illustrator Chris Nixon and Emerging Arts Professional Kiri Falls to create a series of book trailers based on Fremantle Press books.
How did you become interested in becoming an illustrator? I was always interested. For as long as I can remember I’ve been into drawing. My mum enrolled me in art classes when I was five or six, and that was it, really. I did oil painting and went sketching outdoors, that kind of thing. When […]