Learning From Others

One way I practice my drawing is by copying work from my favorite illustrator: Gyo Fujikawa. It helps me see things differently and to try to imagine things as she saw them. I particularly love her pen and ink drawings and flip through them when I'm looking for inspiration for my practice.

Here's a few I did a while back. The acorns and ice cream cone are replicas of her ink work and the sundae is a pen and pencil rendering of one of her painted illustrations. All three of the originals are found in Gyo Fujikawa's A to Z Picture Book.

My Very Favorite Illustrator

Before March gives way to April, I have to share some about Gyo Fujikawa, my very favorite illustrator. In honor of Women's History Month, I'd like to share some brief highlights from her life that are an inspiration to me.

Fujikawa achieved great success as an artist despite the barriers she faced as a Japanese-American woman in the 1930s. While she was able to continue her work as an artist in New York during WW2, her family was interred in Arkansas.

She published her first two children's books (as both writer and illustrator) in 1963 and they became quick bestsellers. In the next 20 years she produced 40 different titles. Her work has been translated into many languages. She was one of the first children's authors to command author's royalties instead of a flat fee and she was among the first to include racial diversity in her illustrations of children.

All of this talent, achievement, beauty, and progressive art from an unmarried, Japanese-American woman during decades that were especially un-friendly to someone like herself.

This spread is from "Our Best Friends" (1977) and it's my earliest childhood memory of her work. This is the spread that made me fall so much in love with her art. Only later did I learn of her strength and brilliance. 💛
 

(Bio info from "The Great Unknown: Japanese American Sketches" by Greg Robinson)