http://aaronbeckerillustration.tumblr.com/

An exciting week at my studio. My very first intern. This...

Sun, 02 Jun 2013 21:16:43 -0400

An exciting week at my studio. My very first intern. This seems like a seminal moment for any illustrator; when the hard working veteran can finally outsource the mundane tasks of running errands to the art store, doing research online, or picking up a book at the library to a young, eager busy-body. Of course, as you’ll notice in this photo, I think mine has already taken over. It’s one thing to be helpful, another thing altogether to SPEND ALL DAY SITTING AT MY DESK. To make matters worse, she demands that I raise and lower her in the fancy art chair, as well as “spin her”, get her milk on demand, and “play chase with me.”

It may be time to reconsider this whole affair.

Journey at Candlewick Press’s booth at this week’s...

Thu, 30 May 2013 21:27:35 -0400

Journey at Candlewick Press’s booth at this week’s BEA conference in NYC. If you stop by the booth (C1575) ask for a free poster!

We bought this flying dragon boat for our daughter’s room...

Sat, 25 May 2013 20:11:32 -0400

We bought this flying dragon boat for our daughter’s room before she was even born. As excited parents-to-be it was a bit of a splurge, found in a Brooklyn boutiquey children’s shop. Recently, she didn’t want it hanging up anymore, so we got to take it into our own bedroom. One of the best things about having a kid is you get to buy stuff that you really want but would otherwise not!

How about that?! I’m on the cover of Candlewick...

Thu, 02 May 2013 22:40:00 -0400

How about that?! I’m on the cover of Candlewick Press’s fall catalog. Incredibly honored and humbled. This is a publisher that I have always greatly admired and am thrilled to be working with them. Journey, my first book, hits the shelves this August.

For most of life, big moments come when you least expect them. ...

Thu, 28 Feb 2013 21:35:47 -0500

For most of life, big moments come when you least expect them. We spend countless hours trying to control our way down this stream, and waves just pop up out of nowhere, knocking us down, propelling us forward, or changing our direction all together. But occasionally, we can feel big moments coming and have time to reflect, wonder, and savor the ride, having done our share of rowing, steering, and getting soaked: graduation, a honey-moon, the ride home from the hospital with your first child. I’m in one of those fleeting episodes right now and I figured in a few years, it will be handy to look back and read what the hell I was thinking before life took its turn.

My first children’s book, Journey, from Candlewick Press comes out in about six months. It’s been nearly a 3 year process from inception to publication, most of which I’ve spent having no idea what to expect from it all. But things are starting to look promising. Things I can’t share at the moment, but let’s just say the book is getting noticed and will most likely get enough critical reception and publicity to launch a new career for me. There are no guarantees, but I’d be lying if I didn’t tell you I was giddy with excitement. Writing and illustrating books is something I’ve always wanted to do. It gives us creative types the ability to be a complete auteur in our creation; the stories are our own and the way we tell them visually comes straight from our own ideas and style. Comparing this approach to jobs where the story isn’t mine, the art style isn’t mine, and the decisions of what I should be doing with my talent aren’t mine, it makes this new career path feel more like art than commerce. And at the end of the day, kids are going to read what I do. Maybe a handful of them will be moved. And maybe for one kid, it will change her life.

This could all be for naught, of course. Children’s books are part of the shrinking, risky business of publishing. Even when the industry was thriving, hundreds of picture books would be published every year, only to disappear from shelves before potential readers had the chance to discover them. But something tells me, that at the very least this book of mine will do well enough that a year from now, when people ask me what I do for a living, I won’t hesitate to tell them I’m a children’s book author. For the past three years, I’ve been an out-of-work-freelance-in-transition-film-designer-illustrator-new-dad-who-has-no-idea-where-his-career-is-headed kind of guy. For someone who has always relied on other people’s projects (i.e. advertising, film, and illustration work) to make ends meet, it’s more than thrilling to know that I very well may be transitioning into a life where I spend my days creating work that is solely mine. Wow.

Wish me luck.

I had an almost existential experience tonight reading through a...

Tue, 12 Feb 2013 21:07:59 -0500

I had an almost existential experience tonight reading through a children’s book. It’s our daughter’s 3rd birthday today, and our baby sitter brought her a favorite from her childhood: Amelia Bedelia, which has just been reissued by Harper Collins in a 50th anniversary edition. I had not seen this book at all since I was a very young child, and something strange happened to me while leafing through the pages.

The first thing I noticed was the color green. It’s the book’s only color. But this was no ordinary green. It was a very specific green, painted with subtle texture and weight by the book’s illustrator, Fritz Siebel, to show dust, lemon meringue pie, drapes, and bath towels. And with each page turn, a strange sensation would come over me - it was the muscle memory stored inside of me of how this book, this green book, felt for my three or four year old self. Words even popped off the page with visceral memories and recognition: towels, dusting powder, drapes, lights, bulbs. Words I was just beginning to understand and place in the drawers of my brain’s filing folders. Words that became locked in their association with a certain splash of color or form.

As my adult self began to take in this story for the first time since those impressionable childhood moments, something wondrous and then terrifying happened. Wondrous because I was able to, for a brief moment, remember what it felt like to be able to associate colors with smells, words with feelings, visual shapes with tactile “realness”. Terrifying because these very real and pre-language feelings were almost instantaneously replaced by the ordering habits of the grown-up mind. The ephemeral, tasty experience of reading this book as a child came back to me for a moment and was then swept away by my cognitive understanding of the actual story, the actual meaning, the actual construction of a book and its intended story line. Certainly, the experience of a good children’s book is far more interesting for kids than for adults who quickly assign meaning, judgment, and structure. As kids, it can all just float and mingle.

It was a real surprise to feel this again, and all it took was a certain color of green.

First time for everything...

Sun, 03 Feb 2013 19:28:54 -0500

First time for everything...:

I sold my first print today. An exciting moment. A small moment, but an exciting one just the same.

Candlewick asked for a photo for publicity materials. So here...

Thu, 24 Jan 2013 23:01:41 -0500

Candlewick asked for a photo for publicity materials. So here it is - my very first head shot, photographed by my lovely wife against the blue of my new studio space.

Our Jack-O-Lanterns! It makes a big difference if the folks...

Sat, 27 Oct 2012 19:00:40 -0400

Our Jack-O-Lanterns! It makes a big difference if the folks selling you the pumpkins don’t cut the stems off so much. The best part is the curl!

My daughter explains a bit about the intersection of picture...

Sat, 06 Oct 2012 20:00:08 -0400

My daughter explains a bit about the intersection of picture book illustrations and fine art for KidLitCon 2012

Here I am at the Eric Carle Museum of Picture Book Art, trying...

Fri, 28 Sep 2012 09:22:00 -0400

Here I am at the Eric Carle Museum of Picture Book Art, trying to say something useful for a video I was producing for KidLitCon 2012, run by Betsy Bird and others in NYC this weekend. It was a learning experience to say the least. Using cameras and microphones is hard work! And getting used to seeing myself speak is even harder!

A sculpture/painting of mine is up for bid at a charity auction...

Fri, 14 Sep 2012 13:18:59 -0400

A sculpture/painting of mine is up for bid at a charity auction through the Reach Out and Read program. It was a project started by a young boy in Boston; many children’s book illustrators participated - there’s some good stuff to see! Check it out!

"The last days of summer give us a glimpse of the end. I find myself soaking up memories as if..."

Fri, 24 Aug 2012 22:25:19 -0400

“The last days of summer give us a glimpse of the end. I find myself soaking up memories as if they’re my last, chasing my child through freshly cut grass before dusk settles.”

- Me

What can I say, birdhouses, lanterns… I dig ‘em....

Sun, 12 Aug 2012 12:36:00 -0400

What can I say, birdhouses, lanterns… I dig ‘em. This is our latest acquisition, a little solar LED lantern for the garden. I need to find one that has a warm glow next time, but this one is fun and I think the forest creatures like it. Can you spot the lightning bugs?

Candlewick Press, the publisher of my upcoming children’s...

Mon, 16 Jul 2012 14:59:21 -0400

Candlewick Press, the publisher of my upcoming children’s book, is celebrating their 20th anniversary soon. They’ve put together a little trailer for an upcoming video series about the importance of children’s books - and I’m in it! Check it out!

Back from Providence, RI, home to ICON7, the illustration conference.

Sun, 17 Jun 2012 22:51:09 -0400

The funny thing about a conference of image-makers talking about image-making is that in the end, there’s not much to say. That said, I did learn a few things:

- Editorial illustration is brutal and only advisable if it’s your absolute passion.

- I’m glad I left Art Center after two terms and avoided getting sucked into the stylistic vortex of my day.

- I’m lousy at the conference-thing.

- You can get great deep dish Pizza at Sicilia’s Pizza in Providence’s Federal Hill neighborhood.

- Dorothy was right. There’s no place like home. Especially on Father’s Day.

A birdhouse in our front yard that I got off Etsy last year....

Wed, 06 Jun 2012 10:52:14 -0400

A birdhouse in our front yard that I got off Etsy last year. One day I had this idea to get one, and spent some time searching the craft website for a favorite - and this was the winner. There was a family of birds in it within a week!

Candlewick Press

Mon, 28 May 2012 14:11:22 -0400

Heading to Candlewick tomorrow for an exciting day. Some new pitches and hopefully the beginning stages of my next book! Does it get better than this?

Almost home...

Mon, 21 May 2012 19:38:50 -0400

After a four month stay with family in North Carolina, we are one day away from coming back to our good ‘ol place in Amherst. Went to a tiny zoo today on our stop in southern New Jersey where all the animals seemed schizophrenic. You can’t really blame them, with the yapping peacocks and all. Can’t wait to get back to my art supplies, the summer landscape, and our great figure drawing sessions at Jim Lumley’s barn.

Photo

Thu, 10 May 2012 17:24:20 -0400