May 21, 2020 – WebinART #4 with illustrator Sarajo Frieden

Did you miss our WebinART with the brilliant Sarajo Frieden? Lilla and Sarajo chatted about maintaining freshness throughout a career that spans decades, and how Sarajo has preserved her unique voice through gallery work and commercial work alike.
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May 14, 2020 – WebinART #3 with Lilla’s Artists Residency participants: Bambi Ramsey, Erica Root, Kelly Anne Dalton, Kendra Binney, Mara Penny, Katie Vernon

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Our 3rd WebinART in the series was a very special one, featuring 6 artists who are attending Lilla’s Artists Residency this week. The artists are spending the entire week developing brand new picture book ideas, under Lilla’s mentorship. They are using the structure of Lilla’s new class My Kid Book Pitch which launches on Make Art That Sells in October.

You won’t want to miss this one!

May 7, 2020 – WebinART #2 with illustrator Katie Vernon

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Lilla chats with Katie about her stellar career making art in her eccentric style, what she’s working on right now, her favorite illustration project, and her creative process. Katie also reveals how her previous work as a florist influenced her illustration!

Enjoy :)

April 23, 2020 – WebinART #1 with illustrator Mara Penny

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We chatted about Mara’s gorgeous illustration projects for books, cards, fabric collections, magnetic paper dolls, a zodiac embroidery kit, and even a series of wine labels.

Lucky for your FOMO, it was recorded! Watch to learn about Mara’s artmaking process, her thoughts on what makes an art director great to work with, and the fascinating way she does research for a project.

Enjoy!

Today we’d love to share some highlights from Kendra Binney’s portfolio. We’re delighted with how, in such a short period of time, she’s taking off in children’s book illustration and getting loads of card and stationery gigs, among other commissions.

Kendra writes: I’m a nature loving painter, draw-er, pet collecting mess maker. All of my best clothes are covered in dirt, paint, and animal hair.

What’s the strangest work experience you’ve ever had?
I randomly met a woman one time who had tattoos of my artwork completely covering both her arms. There are probably odder experiences, but that one stands out. It was pretty flattering.

What question would you most like to be asked?
“Kendra, can I please clean your house everyday, forever?”

Contact us to assign or license. We’re happy to help!

Animation by Natasha Dewitz

World map commissioned by Oopsy Daisy
Buy it here

This piece was created for my Illustrating Children’s Books course for the double page spread assignment. The text for the course was “A Girl Who Said NO!”, a story about Greta Thunberg written by co-teacher Zoë Tucker.

Kendra submitted this piece for our Global Talent Search and it sealed the deal for representation with us (along with her incredible body of work).

Kendra illustrated this lovely piece for Poses week for my
Illustrating Children’s Book course.

Kendra created this magical and moody piece for Folktale Week.

Various products for Roger LaBorde
Buy them here

Calypso Cards
Buy it here

Original wall art

A beautiful editorial piece by Kendra Binney

Join me! CLASS STARTS MONDAY, OCTOBER 28TH. In this four-week live course, you’ll find out how to get work in this cool and lucrative market, whether you have previous experience or not; what to show on your website or Instagram to get magazine work; how to come up with concepts in your own style; and much more.

Recently, we were super-curious to find out what art supplies are the faves of our artists. Here’s what they said! (And check out Katie Vernon’s jellyfish!) Read on.

Contact us to assign or license–we’re happy to help!

Anke Rega

Anke says, “I think you can guess…my favorite all time go to is blue watercolor! I just love indigo. You can use it dark and light (I rarely use black, mostly just for the pupils and sometimes hair) and cobalt is another favorite blue. I think these two go so well with a lot of other colours like pink, reds and so much more.”

Jennifer M Potter

From Jennifer: “My favorite of my art supplies is my sketch kit. I keep it small and minimal so that I can easily stuff it in my backpack when I travel. I use a small 4×4 inch watercolor sketchbook by Field Artist, and a tiny watercolor palette filled with Daniel Smith watercolors, which I made out of a business card holder. In a pinch, I can get by with just that and a waterbrush, but I also like to bring a Blue Q pencil case stocked with different size travel brushes, a small mechanical pencil, an eraser, a binder clip, and a few colored pencils like this set of Faber Castell Polychromos I picked up in Germany earlier this year.”

Sarajo Frieden

Examples of a favorite art material, gouache, on paper, for a personal piece.

Procreate using the IPad Pro and Apple Pencil for the cover of Oncology Nursing Magazine

Mara Penny

Mara says, “My favorites are Micron pens and plain ol’ printer paper.”

Katie Vernon

Katie writes, “I couldn’t pick just one art supply, so here are my faves that I use almost daily:

Sarah Papworth

Sarah says, “Currently…the humble pencil, although I like to mix my media, so perhaps I’d add coloured pencils, fine line pen and acrylic paint as little friendly team. With Photoshop as administrator.”

Kelly Anne Dalton

Kelly Anne writes, “My iPad Pro has been my favorite art supply (obsession) for the last three years, but I’m slowly getting back to working with more of my traditional favorites: colored pencil on wood and gouache, and finding ways to implement them into my digital work.

“This is an illustration I made for MATS Bootcamp of what my current work bag looks like and what I carry in it. Minus a few bobby pins and odd receipts. :)”