About the Exhibit

"The ART of Illustration" brings commercial art out of the wild and into a gallery setting. This environment provides visitors an opportunity to truly appreciate the strong conceptual imagery, outstanding craftsmanship, and unique visual language exercised by these contemporary illustrators. 

 

 (view slide show in Flickr)

 

For "The ART of Illustration," guest curator Liza Wynette selected 10 contemporary U.S. illustrators known for their innovative work, personal style, and varying methods of creating their originals from paintbrush and gouache through digital manipulation. The exhibition will also feature books, packaging, and animation.

"In our visually saturated environment, illustrators must create work that communicates efficiently and effectively," Wynette said. "However, the creativity and fine craftsmanship of their art is often overlooked as we go about our hectic lives. The goal of "The ART of Illustration" is to bring the best commercial art out of the wild and into a gallery setting where the audience will have the time and space to truly appreciate the work.

These artists were selected for their strong conceptual imagery, outstanding craftsmanship, and unique visual language. They are ambassadors representing the current state of contemporary illustration. Their works have been published throughout the world on such varied media as book jackets, children's books, classic novels, magazines, and newspapers including The New Yorker, The New York Times, National Geographic, Time, Rolling Stone, GQ, Sports Illustrated, The Village Voice, and the Wall Street Journal.

Commercial clients for these illustrators have included the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame, Sundance Film Festival, Dream Works, Cartoon Network, Macy's, Sony, Facebook, United Airlines, Delta Airlines, MGM Resorts, Budweiser, Mattel, Hasbro, Levi's, Wild Turkey, Neiman Marcus, Fiat, Japan Airlines, Asahi, Fluevog, Jose Cuervo, IBM, and the US Postal Service.


Curator's Statement

Liza Wynette (curator)Illustration is all around us. It illuminates our books, billboards, graphic novels, movie posters, video games, and product packaging. It's found almost everywhere in our environment; taped to storefront windows, crammed on store shelves, framed in our living room, flashing in the corner of a browser window, or simply thrown in the recycling bin. Sometimes we connect strongly with an illustration, such as a page from our favorite children's book. But the majority of illustrations tend to go unnoticed, drowned out in our visually saturated world where the creativity and fine craftsmanship of their art is often overlooked. It is in this environment that illustrators must create work that communicates efficiently and effectively.

The goal of "the ART of Illustration" is to bring the best commercial art out of the wild and into a gallery setting where the audience will have the time and space to truly appreciate the work. Artists were selected for their strong conceptual imagery, outstanding craftsmanship, and unique visual language. They are ambassadors from around the world, representing the current state of contemporary illustration.

—Liza Wynette

Liza Wynette is a practicing illustrator and owner of Esoterra Studio. She currently teaches illustration and graphic design classes at Parkland College. Her goal in curating the exhibit was to give visitors a glimpse into the wide range of styles, techniques, mediums, and formats illustrators work in today.


Note: All images are the copyrighted property of their respective owners.