Network News South East: Volunteering and Storytelling with Quentin Blake and Friends

Lorraine Cooke

@MottisfontNT

I’ve been a volunteer at my local National Trust property, Mottisfont Abbey in Hampshire, since March 2013 and the art gallery there puts on a number of excellent and popular exhibitions each year. This summer – from 19 July to 14 September - there’s a fantastic opportunity to see the work of some of the best children’s contemporary illustrators, including Quentin Blake, Helen Oxenbury and John Burningham in a new exhibition.

 Quentin Blake – Chocolate Celebration

Visitors to the exhibition will be able to see for the first time 21 new drawings made by Quentin for the hit West End production of Charlie and the Chocolate Factory, full of his usual wit and sharp-eyed observations.

“We are so excited to be showing Quentin’s work this summer,” says Louise Govier, Visitor Experience Manager at Mottisfont and curator of its gallery. “So many of us have wonderful memories of discovering his books and of course of how he brought Roald Dahl’s stories to life. His new work is just as fresh and funny – his drawings of people lusting for chocolate are hilarious. He pokes fun at all sorts of things in modern life, but we find ourselves smiling even as we sometimes recognise ourselves.”

Quentin Blake – Mortimer and the home-made ice cream

The original drawings and watercolours in the show have all been lent by the Chris Beetles Gallery in London, and all of these unique works are for sale. The gallery is also lending stunning watercolour illustrations by artists including Michael Foreman, Emma Chichester Clark, John Burningham, Helen Oxenbury, Rebecca Cobb and Oliver Jeffers which are also for sale. The stories illustrated range from classics such as Treasure Island, Alice in Wonderland and classic fairy tales to works by Terry Jones and Michael Morpurgo.

Helen Oxenbury – Everything was still growing

Visitors can take inspiration from the exhibition and set off on an epic imaginative story adventure around the house and grounds, creating their own illustrated books as they go.

There are also special event weekends in August with lots of additional hands-on activities, including helping to make the biggest picture book ever! You might even get some tips from Quentin Blake himself, and meet some of the other authors. Special event weekends are on 2/3, 16/17, and 30/31 August, and feature storytelling, performance, and on the final weekend, storytellers from the Roald Dahl Museum.

The last owner of Mottisfont, Maud Russell, was a great patron of the arts and artists and I’m sure she would have approved of the way arts have been brought to the top floor gallery and the grounds of her home. Long before I became a volunteer there, I considered the elegant house, which began life as a Medieval Priory, a very special place. When I received a request to read some of Quentin Blake’s stories at one of the special event weekends, I immediately said yes and am booked in for the afternoon of August 3rd. I can’t wait.

Me practising my reading.

John Burningham – Allow us to tell you what we’re thinking

Mottisfont is open every day, from 10am to 5pm. For more information, visit the Mottisfont website www.nationaltrust.org.uk/mottisfont

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@WritesAsRaine

Lorraine has been a SCBWI member since 2011. She writes MG and YA fiction. Her day job often involves nitpicking the spelling and grammar of people under 12 and she takes her red pen everywhere. 

Quentin who? One illustrator’s late-in-life discovery of the great Quentin Blake

From Charlie and the Chocolate Factory

Can you imagine going through life and not knowing who Quentin Blake or Roald Dahl is? SCBWI BI member Heather Chapman recalls her discovery of illustrator Quentin Blake at the ripe age of 32 and shares what she’s learned from studying Blake’s work.






“Quentin Blake”
   
“Who?”
   
“Q-u-e-n-t-i-n B-l-a-k-e . . . He illustrates all of Roald Dahl’s books.”
   
“Who’s Roald Dahl?”

It was at that point the person I was speaking with rolled their eyes, walked over to their bookcase, and came back with Matilda.

“Oooooooh I love that film! I didn’t know it was a kid’s book.”

Shame on me, I know. I confess the horror of the situation.

How could an aspiring children’s illustrator not know the work, or even the name of Quentin Blake! It’s not that my mother deprived me of books growing up. She didn’t. Growing up in America, my room was littered with well-worn editions of Dr. Seuss, Babar the Elephant, The Berenstein Bears, Curious George and many more. It was a brilliant selection by anyone’s standards but, sadly, Dahl and Blake never made the cut.

Quentin Blake returned me to a child-like excitement - an “ecstasy of being”

I began flipping through Matilda and other works by Blake and I admit I was confused. Colours strayed outside the line, characters were scratchy ‘things’ thrown across the page and scenes resembled a nasty accident with several bottles of ink. How is this the work of such a great children’s illustrator? I can only blame the art student in me - trapped in anatomical proportions and sophisticated scenery.

Matilda written by Roald Dahl

Not to be overly dismissive, I took a closer look. And another, and another, and another…

Ah. I see.

Movement, action, expression, colour, voice, and style… the list was endless and I fell in love with the playful colours, individual characters and imaginative scenes. Quentin Blake returned me to a child-like excitement  - an “ecstasy of being”.

A scene from Patrick by Quentin Blake

 After this initial discovery of Quentin Blake’s illustrations I began to study his work as a student studies the work of masters, and to see him not as a god in the world of children’s books (which he is) but as an illustrator plain and simple. One who started illustrating for Punch magazine then spent the next 50+ years learning, adapting, succeeding, doubting, discovering. As we all do.

Words and Pictures ©2013 cover by Quentin Blake

Last week I purchased Blake’s Words and Pictures and of all the reference books I have lying about my house, this is the best. Filled with anecdotes, experiences and words of advice perfectly wrapped within a single cover, it describes perfectly how us illustrators should approach our work – heck, our life.

What have I learned from discovering Quentin Blake? Relax and be yourself - this is fun. I’ve changed my style by closing my eyes and taking a pen to the page. Honest. And it was some of the best work

I leave you with my favourite quotes of wisdom from Words and Pictures :

So that’s how it’s done: “…that mime element which is an important part of illustration, as I understand it – of telling the story by acting it.”

On illustrating for its own sake: “…curiously enough, if you are more relaxed you can concentrate better, you are able to focus your mind on exactly what is happening in front of you, the scene you are imagining in your mind and living through the pen you are holding in your hands.”

Figure drawing classes are good: “Extending my range made me all the more conscious of my lack of experience of life drawing – I just didn’t have the knowledge to draw the things I needed to draw.”

Painting in oil from the 1950’s (taken from Words and Pictures)

Even Quentin Blake self-doubts: “…nothing seems right [and] you wonder if you have finally lost whatever grasp you had of drawing ability.”

On selection of scene:

“…the accuracy and idiosyncrasy of gesture and posture… noting and savouring what is not said in the words.”

“…less a collection of verses to be illustrated than a collection of activities looking for words.”

“The writer and the artist are not always trying to do exactly the same thing.”

Finding your style is down to: “…who you are and how you see things.”

All images © Quentin Blake
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Heather Chapman is an emerging illustrator and SCBWI member.
See her work at chapman-illustration.co.uk
Twitter: @HAC_illustrated