Illustrator Research: Laura Carlin

• I have selected Laura Carlin to research due mainly to seeing her illustrations in Ted Hughes' The Iron Man. When I first saw it in Waterstones i absolutely fell in love with it. Her images bring the story to life and i was really intrigued by the various paper engineering techniques she uses and how interactive she had made this book. 
• I would describe her style as being quite soft and expressive. Laura uses layered textures alongside bold shapes to create playful and energetic illustrations. 
  

• I would say that, predominantly, Laura Carlin operates within the publishing industry, creating children's books, illustrating novels, advertising and also editorial illustrations. 
• Her target audience for most of her work seems to be children but her commercial work reaches across most age groups. 
• Some (and i mean some as there are loads!) of Laura's best clients include: the New York Times, Phaidon, Folio Society, Walker Books, Scholastic and British Airways. 
• Looking at her portfolio i would most liked to have worked on her painted plates! I have never really thought about applying my illustrations to crockery and domestic items but her hand painted plates are really nice!
• Laura promotes her work mainly through her acency's website and i suppose that the best way to promote yourself is to do commercial work and receive the recognition for it which she does. 
• Laura belongs to Heart Agency which is a London based collective agency that maintains a selective and focused archive of artists.
• She works on a range of commercial briefs, including work for The New York Times, The Guardian, The New Yorker and some advertising material for British Airways. 
  
  • In terms of self initiated work, this is mainly the children's books that Laura has illustrated. 
  • Although Laura probably doesn't need to supplement her practice with other work, she practices ceramics in her spare time (mainly for fun) and she also holds an advisory role for the development of the House of Illustration, working alongside Quentin Blake (!) She also travels to different universities teaching. 
  • Researching Laura Carlin's illustrative practice has encouraged me to think about my projects, in particular my picturebook, and how i can make it different. I think i will keep the 32 page format as i want the experience of working to that format but i will look into ways of making it more than just a picturebook. Her application of illustrative designs onto different 3D surfaces has also made me think about how i can set my work apart from others simply by choosing something alternative to print it on.