My first Children's Picture Book!

After illustrating several books I recently made my first children's picture book:
'Baas van iets groots'

I'm very happy with this, because it was high on my wishlist! I wrote the story and made the illustrations.

It is published by De Eenhoorn (February 2018) It's one of my favorite publishers. The book is written in Dutch. I hope it will be translated one day ....

It's about a little Mouse, who wants to become a boss of something big ...

I also did the design of the book. It was a nice challenge. I really hope to make more of them. Because it is what I love the most!

There are some reviews written about it. (in Dutch) You can read it here and here.

Winner Worldwide Picturebook Illustration Competition!

Good news! I am one of the three Dutch winners of the Worldwide Picturebook Illustration Competition! I am happily surprised by it! You can read more about this competition here

I've send in three illustrations that goes along with a selfmade story calling: No time!

And they were chosen! In Octiober there will be a travelling exhibition including work of the in total 12 winners; 3 from Germany, 3 from the United Kingdom, 3 from South Africa and 3 from the Netherlands.

The exhibition starts in my hometown Rotterdam the 4th of October and travels then to the Bilderbuch Museum in Troisdorf  in Germany and The Hive in Worcester in the United Kingdom. And maybe even to Shanghai!

They also will print a catalogue, which will be shown on the Frankfurter Buchmesse and the Bologna Childrens's Bookfair.

I have a reason to have red cheeks right now, don't you think? ;-)

inspiration: 100 great Children's Picture Books

Sometimes I give myself a present :-) This time it is this inspiring book:

If you like picture books, it really is a 'must have'. A collection of 100 books
from 1922 - 2011. Collected by Martin Salisbury.
I am very happy with it, maybe it's something for you too....

Happy weekend!

Animal characters 002 - 004

My new illustration project is four days old now...

On Instagram I post a new animal character each day for 100 days. I love to draw animals and this is a good stimulans to broaden my portfolio for the children book market. I would love to make a picture book once. And you have to start somewhere, isn't it ;-)

Character 004: Boris Boxer

I'm not the only one who is doing the 100 days challenge. When I posted the first character: 'Christopher Cat' on my blog, I got a reaction of one of my favorite illustrators Manon Gauthier. She wants to join me and will post her characters on her blog. They are SO adorable. She will start today. I'm honored she wants to join and looking forward to see her new animal characters!

Character 003: Polly Pig

Character 002: Mike Monkey

Besides broaden my portfolio another  reason I joined this challenge, was because another favorite illustrator of me Claudi Kessels was joining the 100 days project. She makes her own 100 days of naturals. You can check it out on Instagram: clauditekent Very delicate and original!

Animal characters illustration project

Today I started a new illustration project: I join the 100 days challenge. I'm not sure where the idea started, but I saw it on Facebook and I decided to challenge myself to draw one animal character a day for the coming 100 days. Here's the first:

You can followmy challenge on Instagram if you wish.
I'm curious which characters will appear... :-))

Have a nice weekend!