Society of Illustrators 2019 Best Illustration Show

The 2019 Society for Illustrators Best Illustration Show was inspiring this year (as always). I am including a small selection of the pieces, but it was truly one hit after another. The Shaun Tan cicada painting was gorgeous! And haunting…

I was quite taken with the illustrations by Leuyen Pham for The Bear Came Along–they stuck with me. I think it is because they look like old fashioned, out of scale maps, the kind that you might get if you were at a famous tourist destination and picked up the map at the guest center that has little drawings of all the sights you should see. I loved those as a child–they seemed dollhouse like, like playmats, where I could wander with my finger and imagine all that I could see and do.

Sue Seitner (who knows more about children’s books and illustration than almost anyone I know!) and I saw the exhibit together, and afterwards went upstairs to the glamorous and old fashioned bar for a drinks and snacks. On the way up, we saw this Montgomery Flagg illustration-painting on the stairs: check out those beautifully painted hands, the painterly bar stools, the knowing look of the bartender in the center of the painting. And the young woman–she doesn’t believe anything he is saying…