inspiration books
I love books. Not only to read but also to look at. I love art books and illustrated children's books. In second-hand bookshops I look for vintage craft books, children's books, art books and sometimes also cookbooks. If the illustrations make my heart skip a beat, then I have found a gem. It can be about the drawing style, or the use of colour, or the way of presenting or the layout. It can often be different parts of the book or style that make my heart beats faster. But if my heart is racing, I usually buy the book. I feel so happy at home when I read or browse through it. I do try to analyze what it is that I find so great about the book. I do try to put my feelings into words and see if I can use it for my own work.
I will explain what I mean by this. Last vacation I finished my reading book within a week and had to look for a bookshop. I found a very large shop. After I had first looked at the drawing supplies and the notebooks (I know.....I love them too) I went to have a look at the children's department. I pulled one beautiful book after another from the shelf. The first book, Tomber 8 fois se relever 9 by Frederic Marais consists, as I see it, of 4 colours and a mixed colour, blue, pink, black, white and blue-black. I think the limited colours are great. I also immediately wonder if I can do more work with a limited colour palette. That is inspiration 1. In addition, I find the cropping of the pages and the buildings very interesting. For example, the cropping of the nurse or the image of the boxer's legs and the skyline of New York. Little is told and little detail is shown, yet the story is clear at a glance. I am often inclined to show the whole picture, yet a cropping is often much more exciting, so inspiration 2.
The 2nd and 3rd book Le typographe and La lithographe by Gaby Bazin (editions MeMo) are informative books that show children in an illustrative way what a certain profession entails. I really like the drawing style and the colours also appeal to me enormously, but why? When I try to analyse it, the colours are the first to stand out, bright colours, red, yellow and blue. My work mostly has bright and bold colours. That’s just what I love to use. The colours are transparent, which means that if you print them over each other, you get a new, mixed colour. Inspiration 1: the use of transparent, bright colours that, when mixed, give a new colour. This is a style that I already use a lot. inspiration 2: In addition, no drawing lines are used, but the illustrations are coloured. Sometimes part of the illustration disappears into the background. That is also interesting to play with. I also like the layout of the book and the use of texture to make the illustrations 'less' flat. (inspiration 3)
The last book I wanted to show is a little book to explain or learn the Arabic ABC. The book Les Lettres du Jardin by Layla Zarqa and Clothilde Staës shows (abstract) illustrations, again very colorful, but to which one word has been added. And I find that so interesting, by adding a poetic sentence or word, it gives the illustration direction. Or it evokes a certain feeling. It gave me a kind of direction on how I could interpret the illustration and I noticed that for example with the illustration Jardin = garden, I immediately saw a full flower garden and with Paradis = paradise, a beautiful environment with babbling brooks, birdsong and beautiful mountains in front of me. So that one word with the illustration evokes all kinds of images for me. The inspiration of this book is to give a word to my illustrations and or wall hangings, because it gives direction.
I have taken some of these insights or inspirations with me to my latest tapestry. 4 colors, black, white, blue, pink. and I made a cut-out of a larger design and had it printed on fabric for a new tapestry. This will soon be available in my Etsy shop in the size, approximately 60x100 cm.
preview of a new tapestry 60x100 cm, an abstract cutout with little colors
Because I have so many beautiful books, I would also like to show this vintage copy. Blockprint by Piet Marée. I can't find a date, but I'd say the 1970s. Do these books make you as happy as me? Next time I will pick up a few other inspiration books from my collection.
