A spread from my one and only foray into children's book illustration; a sing-along version of Mary Had a Little Lamb. The original idea was for Mary to be a border collie and all the other characters to be animals as well, and since I love doing animals, I took the commission. After I was well into the sketches for the book, the publisher called and said that a focus group felt that a dog as the lead character might frighten the children who are the target audience for these books. Mary and all the other characters had to be human children (of specific ages and ethnicities). I was more than a little disappointed and lobbied for the border collie version, but in the end the brilliant focus group prevailed over the idiot artist. That's why I now stick to doing books for mature audiences; no focus group has ever overruled my artwork (yet!).
Click here for a larger version.
Airbrushed acrylics on illustration board.
14 comments:
Funny! Great illo!
I think it's wonderful! Love the lamby! I wonder why people thought kids would be afraid of a boder collie. Focus groups are dumb!
focus group!!! yeeeesh! Well it is a beautiful illustration, regardless. Is it digital or traditional medium, or both?
what would they know Hmph!!
this is a great illo and for some reason i first thought of a little girl washing her lamb as my clean theme but changed it at the end and went another way.
A dog would scare children??? It would have to be more like Cujo and then I could see it. Great illo - such talent!
so sweet and soft! I would have liked to your version, though... forget them- but great illo anyway!
That lamb is absolutely adorable! I love its little hooves and sweet little grin. I think the collie would have been awesome...it's really too bad everything is so calculated these days. Even though this isn't your desired version, it is a wonderful piece of work. Everything is just so beautifully rendered, right down to the last detail.
So cute! I love it!
Rick, nice job AND I can relate to the sometimes idiocy of focus groups. Heck, of humans in general at times. :-)
Keep drawing!
great job. i love the lamby!
This is really wonderful, Rick. But you know what, I would have LOVED to see Mary as a Border Collie. It just makes so much more sense.
Nice artwork. It is a pity you cannot pronounce the word 'Drawing' correctly!
Happy Halloween Mr. Lovell!!
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