vacances

this song,
this book.

hide

and seek.

the view from here

quiet morning desk.
the light in november, fleeting and precious.
there is a book i made last year, about a castle, which my Nina loves to flip open. there are many pictures on my desk from the past months. watercolours and crayons and pencil rubbed out.  They wait to see the light of day, to be turned into books, and put onto shelves.
How did i end up here, doing what i do? i could've never imagined.
i find it difficult, to use this space, after so many years. but then it's nice to come back, and look, and remember.

here is a song by two wonderful people i had the pleasure to meet this summer. such a great album.

bouquets

a couple of bouquets I made for nina's daycare teachers, the loveliest of people! also some images from the last couple of months. lots of road trips and shelling of peas and, finally, the migration of crayons from mouth to paper, and the organizing of toy space with wooden cubes.

sketchbook lately plus a little interview

have been quite busy lately, and happily so. i recently started two new picturebooks, and have been quite swamped with editorial work. sometimes i feel like my body is taking the shape of the chair, if it weren't for the little monkey's regular and pleasant interruptions.

on a personal note, i was recently interviewed by the lovely ladies over at museradio (an online podcast series about creatives and their work). here is the interview (hoping i won't bore the heck out of you with my life story)! photo below by Kat Tan.

coming home

here is a big tree illustration i made for my sister when she got married a couple of years ago, which i never photographed.

just got back from two months in australia. we went to melbourne to do a stop motion animation workshop for the state library of victoria (the kids were amazing!)

actually, australia is amazing, and i often wonder why i ever left.
among the general merryment and gallavanting around perth beaches parks and rivers, i also managed to finish a book project and start another, while nina turned one and started walking. great achievements all round.

*

a little trip to great grandmother's town.

felt balls

finally got around to making this little mobile for nina's room.
now she can finally sleep though the night.

 got the felt balls here.

september

i haven't forgotten this space, but it's been hard to make time for it. over the summer i finished (almost) a book for walker books, and started another one for usborne, finished the hundreds of drawings for a documentary about the jewish ghetto of venice, went to the little beach town of peschici for a few days (which was subsequently flooded), watched my daughter start crawling everywhere (and become an aussie! hello passport photo), moved my studio to the living room,
spent time with dear friend emma from melbourne, bought some tickets to go back to australia for christmas.
these are very exciting times!

on desk and walls

the space i work in is a hybrid studio / future baby's room. i tread though playmats and toys and scanner and bits of paper and think this working with baby business is going to get a lot harder once she starts to realise the fun to be had with opening drawers full of drawings and potentially hazardous art supplies. but one thing at a time. i've finally put some pictures on the wall. the first is a print by barbara berrada, the second a little illustration for my daughter. prints can be found here.

some images of desk and walls at the moment. I have a little too much on my plate I think, but am grateful for it.

finally, 1. my recipes were featured in anthology magazine recently. 2. a beautiful maker series on this space i recently discovered. this is especially wonderful. 3. what nina wants to listen to all the time.