Italian comic book creator, Hugo Eugenio Pratt, is widely considered to be one of the greatest graphic novelists of all time. Pratt is often praised for his extensive research and factual visual details. Among his catalogue of achievement is the globetrotting adventurer Corto Maltese.

Pratt was born June 15, 1927, in Rimini, Italy, but he spent his childhood in Venice, growing up in a cosmopolitan family environment. His father, a soldier in the Italian army, was transferred to the Italian colony in Abyssinia (Ethiopia), Africa. In 1937, Pratt, with his mother, followed his father to Abyssinia.

Pratt, forced by his father, joined the colonial police when he was 14 years old. This experience gave him the opportunity to acquaint with soldiers from the Italian, British, Abyssinian, Senegalese and French army. During this period, he developed an interest in adventure novels and comic strips, discovering Terry and the Pirates by Milton Caniff. Caniff’s work was the inspiration that helped Pratt decide to become a cartoonist.

In 1941 Pratt’s father was captured by British troops. By late 1942, he died from disease as a prisoner of war. In the same year, Pratt and his mother were interned in a prison camp, where he would buy comics from guards. In 1943 he returned to Italy and attended the military college in Città di Castello.

After meeting Italian comic book artist Mario Faustinelli In 1945, Pratt helped create the magazine Asso di Picche (Ace of Spades).  This marked the official beginning of his career as cartoonist. Pratt worked on several comics for the magazine including the title comic, Ray e Roy, Silver-Pan, Indian River and April e il Fantasma. The magazine and his character, Asso di Picche, was a success, especially in Argentina.

He became part of what some refer to as the Venice group; a collective of writers and artists that including Alberto Ongaro, Paolo Campani, Mario Faustinelli, Dino Battaglia, Fernando Carcupino, and Damiano Damiani.

Pratt struggled to find opportunities as a comic artist in post-war Italy. After an invitation by the publisher Cesar Civita, of Editorial Abril, he moved to Argentina. There, he illustrated many comic strips. In 1953, he created the character of Sgt. Kirk based on the script by Héctor Oesterheld. At the same time, Pratt taught drawing at the Esquela Panamericana de Arte and among his students were Walter Fahrer and José Muñoz.

In 1962, after a brief stint in London, Pratt decided to move back to Italy. From 1962 to 1967, he worked for Italian children’s magazine Il Corriere dei Piccoli, where he adapted several classics including Sinbad’s adventures, Ulysses’ adventures and Treasure Island.

In 1967, Pratt and Florenzo Ivaldi created a comics magazine named after his character, Il Sergente Kirk; the hero first written by Oesterheld. Pratt illustrated several stories for the first edition of the magazine, among them was Una ballata del mare salato (A Ballad of the Salt Sea). Which introduced the world to his best-known character, Corto Maltese.

Corto Maltese would not reappear again until 1970, starting with The Secret of Tristan Bantam, published in Pif. The French magazine had a great circulation and would be the turning point of Pratt’s career. He moved to France agreeing with Pif to producing a series of short 20-page Corto Maltese stories.

Corto Maltese’s success in France spread to many other countries. In 1974 Pratt created the full-length story, Corte sconta detta arcana, which was first serialised in the Italian comics magazine Linus. He continued to produce new stories up until 1988 with the story, Mù, which was serialised the Corto Maltese magazine, finally ending in June 1989.

At the beginning of 1995, Pratt created his last story, Morgan. He died at his home in Switzerland on 20th August 1995.

A series of books have been published featuring Pratt’s sketches and drawings; Périples imaginaires (2005), Périples secrets (2009) and Périples éblouis (2013). These books are absolutely gorgeous and I cannot recommend them enough. I constantly pull them off the shelf for inspiration.

In 2015, IDW’s EuroComics imprint launched an English-language edition of Corto Maltese, with new translations made from Pratt’s original Italian scripts. Three volumes are available now with a fourth due for release in September.

To find out more about Hugo Pratt head over the Cong and Corto Maltese websites. And, as one final treat for you, check out Hugo Pratt and Jean Giraud (Moebius) on Tac au tac.

Comic book artist and freelance illustrator Jordi Lafebre works for both Spanish and Franco-Belgian comics audiences.  His comics deal with a spectrum of issues and his detailed environments provide a vivid stage to play out the emotions of the characters.

Lafebre  was born in 1979 in Barcelona, Spain.  He studied comic art at the Joso School of Barcelona and the fine arts at the University of Barcelona. Freelancing since 1998, he made the transition into comics in 2001. Drawing for several Spanish magazines, including erotic magazine Penthouse Comix and Wet Comix, before publishing the series El Mundo de Judy (Judy’s World), scripted by Toni Font.

After contributing to  Spirou magazine, Lafebre meet Zidrou, the writer of L’Élève Ducobu. After completing a couple short stories, the two began work on their first album, Lydia. Co-written by Lafebre, Lydia was published in French by Dargaud in 2010.

Riding the momentum of Lydia’s success, Lafebre and Zidrou released two volumes of La Mondaine in 2014 and 2015, two volumes of Les Beaux étés (Fine summers) in 2015 and 2016. Unfortunately, Lafebre’s albums are only available in French and Spanish, with no signs of English edition. Fortunately, Lafebre’s illustrations are so expressive, his albums are easy to follow without words.

“The emotion is the most important thing, characters are the second thing in the list. The characters are just ‘there’, my job is to catch them.”
— Jordi Lafebre

You can catch more of  Jordi Lafebre’s work on his website, blog, Facebook and Twitter.

Chris Schweizer in an American author and artist of all-ages comics and graphic novels. Schweizer is the creator of the Eisner-nominated historical fiction series The Crogan Adventures and the humorous mystery horror series The Creeps.

Schweizer was born in Tucson, Arizona in 1980, presumably sporting a thick mustache and stumble. Born to musical parents, Schweizer’s penchant was for drawing. During college, he illustrated a comic strip for the newspaper and was paid $25 a week. He went on to study Graphic Design and English at Murray State University in Kentucky, receiving a BFA in 2004.

The newly graduated Schweizer set his sights on drawing a newspaper strip. However, after his submission was rejected he decided to shift his focus to graphic novels. Schweizer researched graduate programs and decided on Savannah College of Art and Design (SCAD) in Atlanta. He received his MFA in Sequential Art and landed a job to boot, teaching comics at SCAD for five years.

Fascinated by the “terrible, terrible past,” Crogan’s Adventures lets Schweizer stretch his retrophiliac imagination. Spanning 300 years of world history, the action-packed tales follow different members of the fictitious Crogan family. The format cleverly gives Schweizer the opportunity to try something different with each new project. To date, Schweizer has completed 3 Crogan’s Adventure featuring: the buccaneering struggles of a mariner after his ship is waylaid by pirates in Crogan’s Vengeance (2008); the raffish escapades of French legionnaire confronting the end of his military contract in Crogan’s March (2010); and the brewing conflict of two brothers on opposite sides during the Revolution War in Crogan’s Loyalty (2012). He has said he is working on a new Crogan Adventure set in 1920s warlord era China.

In 2015, Oni Press published coloured versions of Crogan’s Vengeance (renamed Catfoot’s Vengeance) and Crogan’s March (renamed Last of the Legion).

For 3 years now, Schweizer has put up verbose videos of his comic-making process and thinking. They are informative and charming, and you certainly should subscribe to his channel right now.

I will leave you with some great advice for aspiring comic artist:

Don’t try to find a style. Your style finds you. If you try to pick it you’ll be fighting against your own natural development and it will take you way longer to get good than it otherwise might. Just draw, how you draw.
— Chris Schweizer

You can find more of Chris Schweizer’s work on his blog, Tumblr, Instagram and Twitter. I highly recommend picking up his sketchbooks, they are jampacked with characters and entirely hand-lettered!

Cam Kendell is an illustrator and comic artist based in Orem, Utah. A digital and traditional artist, he became a freelancer after three years of painting miniatures. His absurd fantasy comics fulfil a personal fondness for drawing video game jokes, tentacles, gnomes and long Scraggly beards.

Kendell studied illustration and fine art at Utah Valley University. He served as Art Director and Trainer for the world renowned miniature wargaming painting studio Blue Table Painting.

In 2014, he made the leap to freelance and released an ongoing webcomic, The Legend of Percival Pundragon. It started as an outlet for all the things that tickled made him but quickly developed into a fully realised world. Now, two years, three issues and sixty pages later, Kendell is imbued with the characters and their world and is hard at work on the next three issues.

In 2015, Kendell coloured ‘The Inventor’, a short story written and illustrated by Jake Parker, featured in issue three of Mouse Guard: Legends of the Guard. Kendell is currently colouring Jake Parker’s fantasy adventure graphic novel SkyHeart.

For the past two years, Kendell has been sharing his knowledge (and awkwardness) on YouTube. He talks about his process and career, all while fighting a frog in his throat. There is only a handful of videos currently, but they are well worth watching.

To see more of Cam Kendell’s work head over to his website, Tumblr, Instagram, Twitter and Facebook. You can also support him on Patreon and pick up some of comics or original art from his shop.

Tero Briganti is an illustrator and graphic artist based in Buenos Aires, Argentina. Working with graphite, each one of Briganti’s illustrations is a self-contained universe, complete with symbolic imagery and intrigue.

His characters feel like actors appearing on stage. They posture in an air of silence, inviting the viewer to laugh, look closer or gasp. Briganti’s use of graphite brings life and motion to otherwise sedate scenes.

Briganti is currently developing three personal projects, including a graphic novel, ready to show next year. For now, you can find more of Tero Briganti’s work on his website, Behance, Instagram and Twitter.

Eva Vilhelmiina Eskelinen is an Illustrator and visual artist for animation from Helsinki, Finland. She studied graphic design at Aalto University in Helsinki and has freelanced for BOOM! Studios, Titmouse and Lumaworks.

Since 2013, Eskelinen has worked as a production artist for video game developer Rovio. There she created assets for animation, as well as graphics for marketing. She has worked on many of their animation projects including Angry Birds Toons, Angry Birds Stella and Piggy Tales. At the beginning of this year, she became a visual development artist for Rovio Animation.

Much of Eskelinen’s illustrations are painted with gouache. But she works traditionally and digitally regularly shifting between style and technique. Her lines wave and wobble giving her work an energetic feel which are exaggerated further with very spirited hatching.

To see more of Eva Vilhelmiina Eskelinen’s work check out her Tumblr, Instagram and Behance.

Mingjue Helen Chen is an Art Director and Visual Development Artist, based in Los Angeles. Currently working at Walt Disney Animation Studios, she has contributed to notable films Big Hero 6 (2014), Paperman (2012), Wreck-It Ralph (2012).

Chen was born in Beijing, China, however, moved to the USA when she was very young, growing up in Minnesota. She left Minnesota, accompanied by her twin sister, Yingjue Chen, to attend the Academy of Art University in San Francisco.

In 2010, at a CTN expo, her student portfolio caught the attention of Andy Nicholson and Troy Nethercott. She was hired on the spot as a visual development artist for Tim Burton’s Frankenweenie.

Chen had the rather daunting task of relocating to Los Angeles alone. She had just two weeks to move, find a car and accommodation, before starting her new job. As a recent graduate, she was given a surprising amount of trust by her art director. For four months, she worked in a small tight-knit team, designing sets, painting key moments and learning.

She went on to work for Jim Henson Company, Cinderbiter and Paramount Animation. Chen is currently working as the environments art director on the Untitled Wreck-It Ralph Sequel, set to be released in 2018.

Alongside her animation work, Chen dedicates a considerable amount of time to comic books. She has contributed to titles including Marvel’s Silk, DC’s Gotham Academy and Batgirl. Chen works mostly as a cover artist but has illustrated interior artwork for Gotham Academy #6, #7, #11 and #15, among a few others.

You can find more of Mingjue Helen Chen’s artwork on her website, Tumblr, Instagram and Twitter. You can also find her older work here, and see her process here.

Douglas Holgate is a freelance illustrator and comic artist based in Melbourne, Australia. Predominately illustrating children’s fiction, he is best known for his work on several series including Brian Anderson’s The Adventures of Commander Zack Proton (2006 – 2007), Steve Cotler’s Cheesie Mack (2012 – 2014) and The Last Kids On Earth (2015 – 2016), writen by The New York Times bestselling author, Max Brallier. In 2012, Holgate won an Illustrator Australia Award for ‘Best Unpublished Series’ and in 2016 recieved a Bronze Ledger Award for his self-published comic Maralinga (2015).

Holgate studied Illustration at The University of Newcastle, Australia. For over a decade, he has illustrated books for international publisher including HarperCollins, Random House, Penguin, Hachette and Simon And Schuster. In addition to the series mentioned above, Holgate has illustrated Jeffrey Scott Savage’s Case File 13 (2012 – 2014), Tim Carvell’s Planet Tad (2012, 2014) and three Dr Karl Kruszelnicki books.

On top of his illustrated book, Holgate has an impressive list of comic work. He contributed to the Kazu Kibuishi’s Flight and Explorer anthologies. He penciled for The Amazing Joy Buzzards (Image Comics), Red Sonja (Dynamite Comics) and The Regular Show (BOOM! Comics)

Since 2014, Holgate has frequently collaborated with critically acclaimed comics writer, Jen Breach. Starting with Maralinga, a post-apocalyptic tale of one girl’s desperate journey to find sanctuary and a mythical inland sea. The comic won a 2014 Australian Society of Authors’ Children’s Picture Book Illustrators’ Initiative grant and a 2014 Arts Victoria project grant. The duo followed this with When is a Door Not a Door?, a short story for Explorer: The Hidden Doors, and in 2015 released the picture book Something’s Amiss at the Zoo. Holgate and Breach are currently working on an all-ages graphic novel, Clem Hetherington and the Ironwood Race. It is the first book in a series, due out from Scholastic Graphix in 2017.

Holgate is also the artist for Wires and Nerve, the debut graphic novel by New York Times and USA Today bestselling author, Marissa Meyer. It will extend the world of the ‘Lunar Chronicles’ and is due out from Feiwel & Friends in January 2017.

To see more of Douglas Holgate’s work, head over to his website, DeviantArt, Instagram and Twitter.

Darren Rawlings is a Canadian illustrator and creative director of Thinkmore studios. He has worked on storyboards, concept art and animations for clients including Discovery Channel, HBO, Sony, BBC and Scholastic.

Rawlings studied animation at Sheridan College, Toronto, and graduated in 2001. My introduction to Rawlings came via Blogger, late 2000s, while the blogging platform was still a popular choice for illustrators. ‘Rawls’, as I knew him then, was an avid member of the Blogger community. His recognisable robot-detective avatar could always be found in the comments section, spreading positivity and support.

In 2009, he created Thinkmore studios, a one-man studio that utilises Rawlings full creative range. In 2014, he and comic writer, AJ Lieberman, launched Doppelgänger Publishing. To date, the publishing house has released 6 titles, including The Silver Six. Written by Lieberman and illustrated by Rawlings, The Silver Six is an all-ages sci-fi adventure which follows a group of orphans in a daring escape from their orphanage to an uninhabited moon.

Rawlings’ love of drawing fan art, and penchant for making everything cute, produces some wonderful and unique illustrations. You can see this in his Little Heroes and Little Friend collections.

You can find more of Darren Rawlings’s work on Tumblr, DeviantArt, ArtStation and Instagram. To see some of his older work, head to his Blogger, but don’t forget to leave him some positive comments.

Yuko Shimizu is an award-winning Japanese illustrator based in New York City. Her stylish and surreal ink drawings blend traditional Japanese ukiyo-e art with American comic art. They have appeared in numerous magazines, advertisements, book and comic covers.

Shimizu was born in Tokyo, Japan, and grew up in Kanagawa Prefecture dreaming of becoming an artist. Yet, she put her passion to one side and decided to take the more practical path; studying advertising and marketing Waseda University’s School of Commerce. She graduated in 1988 and took a corporate PR position in one of Tokyo’s largest sogo shoshas.

In 1999, after 11 years in PR, prompted by two horrible bosses and the onset of an early midlife crisis, she resigned and moved to New York City to pursue her childhood dream. For the first time in years, she was drawing again. She decided to study art and was accepted into the MFA Illustration as Visual Essay program at the School of Visual Arts (SVA).

Shimizu graduated in May 2003, and soon after began receiving editorial illustration commission. Working in her midtown Manhattan studio, she built her clientele up, from the occasional assignments from the Village Voice and the New York Times, to regular collaborations with The New Yorker and Financial Times. Her client list can now boast that it includes Adobe, MTV, Nike, Pentagram, Pepsi, Rolling Stone, Sagmeister & Welsh, Target and The Gap.

In 2009, when she started creating cover art for the ongoing Vertigo comic book series The Unwritten, by Mike Carey (writer) and Peter Gross (interior art). Shimizu created a cover every month, sometimes two a month, for seven years; a total of 71 covers. The Eisner Awards recognised her hard work, nominating The Unwritten for Best Cover Artist in 2011 and 2012.

In 2011, Gestalten published her first self-titled monograph. It spans ten years of her career and has now become a collector item. Earlier this year, Roads Publishing released a second, smaller, monograph called  ‘Living with Yuko Shimizu‘.

In addition to Shimizu’s ongoing client work, she shares her infectious enthusiasm for illustration by teaching at SVA and giving lectures and workshops around the world. She has an incredible Skillshare course called Ink Drawing Techniques: Brush, Nib, and Pen Style, which if you are interested in inking you should definitely check out.

For me, the digital part is just “work.” I don’t enjoy it but it is a necessity. Ink drawing is the fun part I enjoy. So, it is not the matter of what is faster, etc. Illustration is hard work, so at least let me enjoy the part I love. Drawing is what keeps me going.
— Yuko Shimizu

For more of Yuko Shimizu’s work head over to her website, (the FAQ page is especially useful for aspiring illustrators), Instagram, Facebook and Twitter.

Bill Bragg is a British artist and illustrator. He has worked with The Folio Society, The Guardian and The New York Times. He is a co-founder and member of the art collect, Le Gun. As such, he regularly exhbits internationally and features in the group’s self-titled annual magazine.

Bragg was working for many years as a freelance illustrator before he decided to apply to the Royal College of Art in 2003. During his two years at the RCA, he began experimenting with and developing sequential narratives. After a visit to East Berlin, he came up with a story of a man unable to turn left from his front door for three decades. This idea developed into a wordless graphical novel called ‘Journey of a Stranger’ which was shortlisted for the Arts Foundation Graphic Novelist Awards.

In 2004, while at the RCA, Bragg helped establish Le Gun alongside Chris Bianchi, Neal Fox, Robert Rubbish, Steph von Reiswitz, Alex Wright and Matt Appleton. Originally, Le Gun was a magazine where the group could publish their works and other exciting artists. The magazine is now an established art annual and the group is internationally renowned for their art projects and shows.

Bragg graduated from the RCA in 2005 and has since worked with many publications in the UK and the USA. He has illustrated four of Franz Kafka’s works for The Folio Society; Amerika, The Trial, The Castle and my personal favourite, Metamorphosis.

Bragg’s work for The Guardian article ‘But Today I am Afraid’ won the this year’s V&A Editorial Illustration Award. The article, written by Masuma Rahim, expresses the author’s fear of a backlash against innocent Muslims. Bragg perfectly captures the isolation and uncertainty. The V&A praised Bragg’s work for:

His choice of the imperilled lone figure in a headscarf employs the use of outsized shadows, a well-known device adapted from film-noir cinematography. Here it is applied with brilliant effect, creating a striking composition that at once captures the author’s sense of persecution while drawing our focus towards the defenceless figure in the centre of the circle.

This heightened understanding of loneliness and foreboding is prevalent in much of Bragg’s work. He regularly exaggerates shadows, often rendering them pure black, to create a burgeoning sense of unease. In addition, his use of traditional pencils, digital colours and screen printed effects, enhances the gritty imagery.

You can find more of Bill Bragg’s work on his website and Instagram.

Frederik Peeters is an award-winning Swiss comic book artist. He has published over 30 graphic novels but is best known for the highly acclaimed Pilules Bleues (Blue Pills: a Positive Love Story). He has received five nominations in the ‘Best Book’ category at the prestigious Angoulême International Comics Festival.

Born in Geneva, Switzerland, Peeters studied visual communication at the École Supérieure d’Arts Appliqués (ESAA). He worked as a baggage handler for Swissair for three years, which gave him the opportunity to travel and draw. After which, he devoted himself entirely to comics. He began contributing to several comic magazines, including Le Drozophile, Bile Noire, Lapin and Spirou. In 1997, he founded the Swiss indie-publisher Atrabile, through which he released his first comic Fromage Confiture (Cheese and Jam).

In 2001, Peeters released the autobiographical graphic novel Blue Pills. It tells the story of his relationship with Cati who, along with her young son, tests positive for HIV. It received the Polish Jury Prize at the Angoulême International Comics Festival, where it was nominated for Best Book, it won the Geneva Töppfer prize and the Premios La Cárcel de Papel in Spain for Best Foreign Comic. Blue Pills was Peeters’s first work translated into English, which was published by Jonathan Cape. A TV movie adaptation, directed by Jean-Philippe Amar, was broadcast on Arte in 2014. Blue Pills is a captivating story, which beautifully captures nuances that can only come from life. I cannot recommend it enough.

In 2003, Peeters changed directions delving into science fiction graphic novels. The first of which, Lupus, is an experimental planet-hopping tale set in the not too distant future. Lupus was released in four volumes, ending in 2006. Atrabile has since published a collected version. American publishing company, Top Shelf have announced they will be translating and publishing Lupus soon. Between 2003 and 2010 Peeters worked with writer Pierre Wazem on the series Koma. Published by Les Humanoïdes Associés, Koma was his first work in colour. He worked with documentary film-maker Pierre Oscar Lévy on the strange dream-like tale Pachyderme, followed by the unsettling science fiction, Château de sable (Sandcastle). SelfMadeHero has translated and published both comics for the English market.

Between 2011 and 2014, Peeters wrote and illustrated the four-part science fiction series Aâma. The story follows an amnesiac in search of his past. In 2013, Aâma won the award for best ongoing series at 2013’s Angoulême festival. Discussing his writing process, Peeters is most comfortable working in science fiction due to the freedom it offers, he explained:

I have to preface something. I don’t write scripts. I don’t write scenarios before working. I don’t separate the two things. So I write at the same time as I draw. When you have that in mind, science fiction is the best way for me to work because it allows a lot of strange images and experiments.
— Frederik Peeters, The Quietus

Peeters most recent work is L’Odeur des garçons affamés (The Smell of Hungry Boys), written by French author Loo Hui Phang. It’s an atypical western set in Texas, 1872, where history, mystery and emotion all converge. The artwork is outstanding with sweeping cinematic landscapes and strong atmospheric colours. The graphic novel picked up Prix Saint-Michel and Prix Landerneau awards.

You can find more of Frederik Peeters on his website and Tumblr.

Mathieu Reynès is a French comic book writer and artist. Since 2002, he has worked with many of Europes’ top comic publishers including Ankama, Dupuis, Paquet and Spirou. He illustrated the successful Alter ego series, wrote Water Memory, and is currently writing and drawing the supernatural Harmony.

Born in 1977 in the western suburbs of Paris, France, Reynès spent much of his childhood near the Basque coast. Initially studying science in Bordeaux, he decided to change course and pursue cartoons and 3D animation at the CNBDI in Angoulême. He released his first album, Banana Fight in 2002, in collaboration with writer Frédéric Brrémaud. The duo went on to create two volumes of Sexy Gun and three volumes of Lola Bogota.

Reynès worked predominately in the field of humour, until 2011, where he embarked on the conspiracy series Alter Ego. Reynès used a more realistic style to tell the complex intertwined story. Written by Denis Lapière and Pierre-Paul Renders, the series spread across 11 albums. This series won the 2011 Saint Michael Award for Best Story.

In 2012, Reynès wrote the two-part story La mémoire de l’eau (Water Memory), which was undoubtedly inspired by his childhood memories of the Basque coast. Beautifully drawn by Valérie Vernay the story balances reality and mystery and is just as good for a pre-teen as for an adult.

Harmony is a project which Reynès has been exploring since 2006. Inspired by Stephen King and Katsuhiro Otomo, he wrote several different plotlines around themes of adolescence, identity and genetic experiments before finally merging into one story. Volume 1, Memento was published by Dupuis in January 2016, with the second volume, Indigo, released in September 2016. Reynès is working on the third instalment; you can keep updated on its process on the official Harmony Facebook page.

You can find more of Mathieu Reynès’ work on Tumblr, Instagram, Facebook and Twitter. You can check out his older work on Blogger. You can also find some of his work in Comix Buro’s Sketchbook Reynès.

Garen Ewing is a comic creator, illustrator and designer based in West Sussex, England. He is best known for writing and illustrating the critically acclaimed Adventures of Julius Chancer: The Rainbow Orchid, winner of a 2013 Young People’s Comic Award.

Ewing was born in Redhill, England in 1969. As a child, up until six-years-old, he spent a lot of time in the hospital. His mum kept him occupied by providing plenty of comics to read, and pencils and paper to draw with. Naturally, he began making his own comic. He continued to spend most of his spare time lying on the floor drawing.

Ewing began his artistic career in the late 1980s, self-publishing several fanzines. Ewing acquired a £40 a week allowance from a government scheme and launched King Rat Press. Its first publication was Cosmorama, a black and white anthology, which included contributors such as Steve Pugh, David Wyatt, Warren Ellis, Paul H. Birch and Sara Russell.

In the 1990s, he adapted Shakespeare’s The Tempest into comic. He self-published it in 1994 to critical acclaim. The comic is now out of print but a copy is housed at the Shakespeare Library, Stratford-upon-Avon.

In 1997, a three-page preview of The Rainbow Orchid appeared in Cherokee Comics’ Imagineers magazine. However, it was not until five years later, in 2002, that the series really got going in BAM! Adventures of Julius Chancer: The Rainbow Orchid is a mystery adventure story set in the 1920s, where a group of explorers set off to find the mystical Rainbow Orchid. The comic’s style is inspired by Ewing’s childhood favourites, Asterix and Tintin, and uses ligne claire. In 2003, he self-published a black and white collected edition of the strips. They quickly sold out and soon after The Rainbow Orchid began receiving interest from publishers and was picked up by Egmont in 2008. It has since been translated into Dutch, French, Spanish, German and Danish. The series was listed as ‘One of The Observer’s Best Graphic Novels’ ‘One of Lovereading4kids.co.uk Books of the Year’, nominated for a National Comic Award, and won the 2013 Young People’s Comic Award (part of the British Comic Awards).

Ewing was one of the early contributors to The DFC (David Fickling Comic). A weekly British children’s anthology comic, published by David Fickling Books, which launched in 2008. He worked with Philip Pullman to develop John Blake and wrote and drew Charlie Jefferson and the Tomb of Nazaleod. He illustrated two Ben Haggarty stories, The Legend of the Golden Feather and The Bald Boy and the Dervish for The DFC’s successor, The Phoenix. Ewing also released a weekly Julius Chancer adventure in The Phoenix called The Secret of the Samurai.

He was commissioned by JCDecaux to create a comic strip about a little red bird called Arni. Throughout November 2015, daily episodes of Arni’s Epic Adventures were broadcast on huge digital screens in 5 or 6 second bursts. It was the first comic strip to appear on public digital screens, reaching an estimated audience of 30-40 million people. Ewing said this of his work,

I’m very proud to have created the first comic strip designed for digital screens and as an artist this is a powerful platform for my work. I think Arni is a universal story of endurance and triumph over the odds, which will particularly resonate with the travelling and shopping public during the festive period.

You can find more of Garen Ewing’s work on his website and follow him on Twitter. You should also check out these podcasts to hear more about his creative process and career: Make It Then Tell Everybody and Imagination to Print.

Giulia Sagramola is an Italian illustrator, cartoonist, and designer currently based in Barcelona. In a shared studio, she focuses on freelance assignments while working on personal book projects as well as a regular autobiographical comic diary. Mixing watercolor, ink, crayons, and digital, she creates comical and nuanced illustrations.

Sagramola was born in Fabriano, Italy. During high school, she attended the Scuola Internazionale of Comics. Later she studied Visual Communication at ISIA Urbino and Illustration at Escola Massana. After a six month stint working for BilBOlBul Comic Festival, she transitioned to freelancing full-time.

In 2010 she established Teiera (Teapot), a self-publishing label with Cristina Spanò, and Sarah Mazzetti. Teiera has published more than 20 issues between books and zines featuring artists from all over the world. Sagramola works as Teiera’s art-director, graphic designer, and curator as well as a contributor.

In 2015, she completed an art residency at the Maison des Auters in Angoulême, where she produced her graphic novel Incendi Estivi (Bao Publishing). Some of her previously published comic work includes Milk and Mint, a collection of stories from her blog (PROGLO Edizioni, 2008) and Bacio a cinque, a childhood autobiography (Topipittori, 2011).

Sagramola has illustrated for the New Yorker, New York Times, Vice magazine, Ferragamo, and Rizzoli, among many others. Her work has been recognised and exhibited by Bologna Children Bookfair, American Illustration, 3×3 Picture Book Show, and Society of Illustrators. Her picture book Sonno Gigante Sonno Piccino (Topipittori, 2014), written by Giusi Quarenghi, won a merit award at 3×3 Annual Picture Book.

You can find more of Giulia Sagramola’s work on her website, Instagram, Tumblr, Facebook, Twitter and support her on Patreon.

Freelance illustrator, Cleonique Hilsaca’s work exudes a sense of calm created by washing the canvas with pastel colours. Viewers can’t help but be disarmed by her joyful, round characters yet Cleonique is not afraid to employ these same techniques to address deeper emotions and social issues. This juxtaposition between style and tone is used to great effect. Cleonique shares her drawing process and some of her favourite projects with Illustrator’s Lounge.

I was born in Tegucigalpa, Honduras, where I lived until I went to college in the United States. Since then I’ve been US-based and now reside in Savannah, GA. I have lived in the mountains my whole life and a small town, as beautiful as this one, seems like the best place to be.

I grew up enjoying different artistic hobbies such as piano, poetry, drawing, painting and singing but after attending a college career fair, I realised I could also study art for a living. The college that visited was the Savannah College of Art & Design (SCAD) and it was my dream to attend it. After receiving the Presidential Scholarship I attended SCAD and graduated with a B.F.A. in Illustration and a minor in Graphic Design, a few years later. And now I am pursuing a freelance illustration career.

Right after I graduated, I was fortunate to have been picked up by the Illozoo Illustration Agency. I also had an internship that summer with Wild Apple Licensing which also became my agent for art licensing afterwards. Some of my favourite clients I’ve been fortunate to work with this year have been the Italian newspaper Il Corriere della Sera, who always pushes me to try my hardest at idea creation, and Amazon Rapids, who lets me explore different styles with their children’s short stories. But my most notable project is having created the inside cover for one of the chapters in the comic book Spera: Ascension of the Starless Vol. 2 by Josh Tierney and published by Archaia. I’ve been reading the Spera series from the start and it was a dream to be a part of it. Some of my favourite personal pieces have been the ones I’ve created for Light Grey Art Lab and their group shows, as well as personal mini endeavours such as Inktober and 30 Days of Type.

I used to work traditionally in watercolour and ink, but I currently work digitally. I start my process in my drawing sketchbook with idea creation, and move forward to my Wacom Cintiq. I work purely in Adobe Photoshop, using Kyle’s watercolour brushes to recreate watercolour digitally. In my free time away from client and personal work, I draw constantly in my sketchbooks where I use ink and watercolour to help inform my digital work. I hope to work traditionally more often this year. What is most important to me about my work is learning and enjoying myself while doing it, and so far I’m having a grand time!

You can find more of Cleonique Hilsaca’s on her website, Facebook, Twitter and Instagram.

Box Brown is a comic book writer, illustrator and publisher from Philadelphia. His breakthrough graphic novel, Andre the Giant: Life and Legend, spent three weeks on the New York Times Graphic Novel Best Sellers List. Brown’s small press achievements were recognised by Ignatz Award, winning an Outstanding Series Award for his self-published book Everything Dies. Brown launched the comics publishing house Retrofit Comics, completely funded by Kickstarter donations.

As a child, Brown was a prolific reader of comics but it was only after graduating college, in his 20s, that he decided to draw them. In an interview with Illustration Concentration, Brown said: “I didn’t r-e-a-a-a-l-ly study art formally, at all. I just started drawing comics one day in my 20s and slowly got more and more interested until finally one day I decided to pursue it in earnest.” Feeling as though he were far behind everybody else and compelled to tell the many stories he had dreamt up, he started to draw at least one comic page a day. A discipline which he has continued.

Brown first started releasing his stories through the webcomic Bellen! the story of Ben and Ellen. Later, he began the web and print comic series, Everything Dies. A collection of non-fiction and autobiographical stories. You can still buy individual volumes and collected printed versions of Everything Dies, but Brown has also released a pay-what-you-want 400+ pages digital version on Gumroad.

In 2011, in parallel to Everything Dies gaining popularity and acclaim, Brown started a Kickstarter campaign to create a new comic book publisher called Retrofit Comics. His goal was to publish 16 alternative comic books over 16 months. Since completing this goal, Retrofit Comics has dedicated itself to publishing and distributing a new floppy alt-comics every month or two.

First Second released Andre the Giant: Life and Legend, a biographical graphic novel about one of the twentieth century’s most recognisable figures, Andre Roussimoff in 2014. Brown drew from historical records about Andre’s life as well as a wealth of anecdotes from his colleagues in the wrestling world and his film co-stars. The graphic novel debuted ninth on the New York Times Bestseller List for Paperback Graphic Books in addition to garnering praise from wrestling aficionados, comic fans, and critics alike.

Brown’s follow-up graphic novel, Tetris: The Games People Play, tells the true story of the world’s most popular video game. It follows the game’s creator Alexey Pajitnov, the games instant popularity, and the bidding war it sparked. Tetris: The Games People Play was Eisner Award-nominated for Shelf Awareness Best Books of the Year.

Most recently, First Second published Is This Guy For Real?: The Unbelievable Andy Kaufman. Brown tells a complete and hilarious portrait of comedian and performer Andy Kaufman. Released February this year, the book has already been commended for it’s well-researched, nuance and elegant approach.

You can learn more about Box Brown in this podcast with Study Group Comics, and interview with Kevin Cortez. You can find more of his work on his website, Twitter, Instagram, and support Brown’s comic-creating efforts of Patreon.

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Bill Bragg is a British artist and illustrator. He has worked with The Folio Society, The Guardian and The New York Times. He is a co-founder and member of the art collect, Le Gun. As such, he regularly exhibits internationally and features in the group’s self-titled annual magazine.

Bragg was working for many years as a freelance illustrator before he decided to apply to the Royal College of Art in 2003. During his two years at the RCA, he began experimenting with and developing sequential narratives. After a visit to East Berlin, he came up with a story of a man unable to turn left from his front door for three decades. This idea developed into a wordless graphical novel called ‘Journey of a Stranger’ which was shortlisted for the Arts Foundation Graphic Novelist Awards.

In 2004, while at the RCA, Bragg helped establish Le Gun alongside Chris Bianchi, Neal Fox, Robert Rubbish, Steph von Reiswitz, Alex Wright and Matt Appleton. Originally, Le Gun was a magazine where the group could publish their works and other exciting artists. The magazine is now an established art annual and the group is internationally renowned for their art projects and shows.

Bragg graduated from the RCA in 2005 and has since worked with many publications in the UK and the USA. He has illustrated four of Franz Kafka’s works for The Folio Society; Amerika, The Trial, The Castle and my personal favourite, Metamorphosis.

Bragg’s work for The Guardian article ‘But Today I am Afraid’ won the this year’s V&A Editorial Illustration Award. The article, written by Masuma Rahim, expresses the author’s fear of a backlash against innocent Muslims. Bragg perfectly captures the isolation and uncertainty. The V&A praised Bragg’s work for:

His choice of the imperilled lone figure in a headscarf employs the use of outsized shadows, a well-known device adapted from film-noir cinematography. Here it is applied with brilliant effect, creating a striking composition that at once captures the author’s sense of persecution while drawing our focus towards the defenceless figure in the centre of the circle.

This heightened understanding of loneliness and foreboding is prevalent in much of Bragg’s work. He regularly exaggerates shadows, often rendering them pure black, to create a burgeoning sense of unease. In addition, his use of traditional pencils, digital colours and screen printed effects, enhances the gritty imagery.

You can find more of Bill Bragg’s work on his website and Instagram.

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Frederik Peeters is an award-winning Swiss comic book artist. He has published over 30 graphic novels but is best known for the highly acclaimed Pilules Bleues (Blue Pills: a Positive Love Story). He has received five nominations in the ‘Best Book’ category at the prestigious Angoulême International Comics Festival.

Born in Geneva, Switzerland, Peeters studied visual communication at the École Supérieure d’Arts Appliqués (ESAA). He worked as a baggage handler for Swissair for three years, which gave him the opportunity to travel and draw. After which, he devoted himself entirely to comics. He began contributing to several comic magazines, including Le Drozophile, Bile Noire, Lapin and Spirou. In 1997, he founded the Swiss indie-publisher Atrabile, through which he released his first comic Fromage Confiture (Cheese and Jam).

In 2001, Peeters released the autobiographical graphic novel Blue Pills. It tells the story of his relationship with Cati who, along with her young son, tests positive for HIV. It received the Polish Jury Prize at the Angoulême International Comics Festival, where it was nominated for Best Book, it won the Geneva Töppfer prize and the Premios La Cárcel de Papel in Spain for Best Foreign Comic. Blue Pills was Peeters’s first work translated into English, which was published by Jonathan Cape. A TV movie adaptation, directed by Jean-Philippe Amar, was broadcast on Arte in 2014. Blue Pills is a captivating story, which beautifully captures nuances that can only come from life. I cannot recommend it enough.

In 2003, Peeters changed directions delving into science fiction graphic novels. The first of which, Lupus, is an experimental planet-hopping tale set in the not too distant future. Lupus was released in four volumes, ending in 2006. Atrabile has since published a collected version. American publishing company, Top Shelf have announced they will be translating and publishing Lupus soon. Between 2003 and 2010 Peeters worked with writer Pierre Wazem on the series Koma. Published by Les Humanoïdes Associés, Koma was his first work in colour. He worked with documentary film-maker Pierre Oscar Lévy on the strange dream-like tale Pachyderme, followed by the unsettling science fiction, Château de sable (Sandcastle). SelfMadeHero has translated and published both comics for the English market.

Between 2011 and 2014, Peeters wrote and illustrated the four-part science fiction series Aâma. The story follows an amnesiac in search of his past. In 2013, Aâma won the award for best ongoing series at 2013’s Angoulême festival. Discussing his writing process, Peeters is most comfortable working in science fiction due to the freedom it offers, he explained:

I have to preface something. I don’t write scripts. I don’t write scenarios before working. I don’t separate the two things. So I write at the same time as I draw. When you have that in mind, science fiction is the best way for me to work because it allows a lot of strange images and experiments.
— Frederik Peeters, The Quietus

Peeters most recent work is L’Odeur des garçons affamés (The Smell of Hungry Boys), written by French author Loo Hui Phang. It’s an atypical western set in Texas, 1872, where history, mystery and emotion all converge. The artwork is outstanding with sweeping cinematic landscapes and strong atmospheric colours. The graphic novel picked up Prix Saint-Michel and Prix Landerneau awards.

You can find more of Frederik Peeters on his website and Tumblr.

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Mathieu Reynès is a French comic book writer and artist. Since 2002, he has worked with many of Europes’ top comic publishers including Ankama, Dupuis, Paquet and Spirou. He illustrated the successful Alter ego series, wrote Water Memory, and is currently writing and drawing the supernatural Harmony.

Born in 1977 in the western suburbs of Paris, France, Reynès spent much of his childhood near the Basque coast. Initially studying science in Bordeaux, he decided to change course and pursue cartoons and 3D animation at the CNBDI in Angoulême. He released his first album, Banana Fight in 2002, in collaboration with writer Frédéric Brrémaud. The duo went on to create two volumes of Sexy Gun and three volumes of Lola Bogota.

Reynès worked predominately in the field of humour, until 2011, where he embarked on the conspiracy series Alter Ego. Reynès used a more realistic style to tell the complex intertwined story. Written by Denis Lapière and Pierre-Paul Renders, the series spread across 11 albums. This series won the 2011 Saint Michael Award for Best Story.

In 2012, Reynès wrote the two-part story La mémoire de l’eau (Water Memory), which was undoubtedly inspired by his childhood memories of the Basque coast. Beautifully drawn by Valérie Vernay the story balances reality and mystery and is just as good for a pre-teen as for an adult.

Harmony is a project which Reynès has been exploring since 2006. Inspired by Stephen King and Katsuhiro Otomo, he wrote several different plotlines around themes of adolescence, identity and genetic experiments before finally merging into one story. Volume 1, Memento was published by Dupuis in January 2016, with the second volume, Indigo, released in September 2016. Reynès is working on the third instalment; you can keep updated on its process on the official Harmony Facebook page.

You can find more of Mathieu Reynès’ work on Tumblr, Instagram, Facebook and Twitter. You can check out his older work on Blogger. You can also find some of his work in Comix Buro’s Sketchbook Reynès.

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