{"id":5379,"date":"2021-07-15T10:08:44","date_gmt":"2021-07-15T16:08:44","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/blaine.org\/sevenimpossiblethings\/?p=5379"},"modified":"2021-07-15T10:08:44","modified_gmt":"2021-07-15T16:08:44","slug":"on-rainbows-and-icebergs-with-grant-snider","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/blaine.org\/sevenimpossiblethings\/?p=5379","title":{"rendered":"On Rainbows and Icebergs with Grant Snider"},"content":{"rendered":"


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\nPictured above is a sketch author-illustrator and comics artist Grant Snider<\/a><\/strong> made during last year’s pandemic lockdown. Today, he visits to talk about what came out of that experience \u2014 his illustrations for Theresa Trinder\u2019s<\/a><\/strong> There Is a Rainbow<\/a><\/strong><\/em> (Chronicle, January 2021), a bright \u2014 in more ways than one \u2014 book that captures with compassion what the last year was like for many socially isolated children. <\/p>\n

Grant also discusses his process for illustrating Travis Jonker’s<\/a><\/strong> Blue Floats Away<\/a><\/em><\/strong> (Abrams), released a couple months after Trinder’s book. This book tells the story of a small iceberg. Blue, just as the title tells you, floats away from his family \u2014 unintentionally, that is. On his journey across the ocean, he transforms in many ways. It’s an entertaining tale, with an endearing protagonist at its helm, about the water cycle but also the ways in which climate change is altering our planet. <\/p>\n

I thank Grant for visiting to talk about what he did with colored pencils and cut paper last year. …<\/p>\n

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Grant<\/font><\/strong>: Every new story suggests a new style of art. A new way of thinking. <\/p>\n

I knew I needed a technicolor palette for Theresa Trinder\u2019s<\/a><\/strong> poetic, hopeful There Is a Rainbow<\/em>. My previous books for Chronicle \u2014 What Color Is Night?<\/a><\/em><\/strong> and What Sound Is Morning?<\/a><\/em><\/strong> \u2014 were drawn in marker and colored digitally. This time I wanted to avoid the computer as much as possible.
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\nAfter experimenting with a few techniques, I settled on colored pencil. I used a lot<\/em> of them.
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\nI was at home from my day job as an orthodontist for two months during lockdown. During this time, I kept three notebooks: a written pandemic diary, my regular comic process sketchbook, and a life-drawing sketchbook. I wrote about the mundane aspects of my days at home, explored a range new thoughts and feelings in the form of webcomics, and sketched my children as they explored the outdoors.
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\nGradually, with lots of help from my editor and art director, my sketches started to suggest a story. Two friends are separated and staying at home during the pandemic but still make connections with their communities, family, and each other. We included some of the common sights during 2020: Zoom classes, messages of social justice, and rainbows in windows.
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Early sketch<\/em>
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Early sketch<\/em>
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Early sketch<\/em>
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Early sketch<\/em>
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\nIt was fun for me to sneak rainbows into the art in every possible way: sidewalk chalk art, pigeon feathers, sunlight through a garden hose. The illustrations were created by layering a rainbow of colors to create contrasts. My arm was tired after each session of drawing! <\/p>\n

The best part of the making this book was channeling a huge range of feelings during an uncertain and unprecedented time into art.
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A final spread (sans text): “A story has a beginning and an end.”<\/em>
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A final spread (sans text): “… there is a school.”<\/em>
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A final spread (sans text): “On the other side of a window …”<\/em>
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A final spread (sans text): “… there is a neighbor.”<\/em>
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A final spread (sans text): “… there is help.”<\/em>
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A final spread (sans text): “On the other side of today …”<\/em>
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\nAs for Blue Floats Away<\/em>, Travis Jonker and I had followed each other\u2019s work on the internet for years and had met briefly in person. I suggested a possible collaboration after seeing one of his drawings on Instagram. Later, he reached out after I posted a comic called \u201cOn the Beach.\u201d Travis thought the cut-and-torn-paper collage art style would be a good fit for his story about an iceberg. I agreed, of course.
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\nAn early discovery: In a stack of art supplies, I found a color-coated paper with a white layer underneath. When torn, it looked like ocean waves. I read Travis\u2019s text and made a couple art samples that we each showed to our literary agents.
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“Calder lived near the North Pole with his parents.”<\/em>
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\nAnother discovery: Tracing paper layered over blue construction paper gave the effect of an underwater iceberg.
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“It was cold. They were close. (In fact, they were attached at the hip.)”<\/em>
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\nI made the art on my home studio drafting table, standing up while ripping and cutting paper, jamming to loud music all along. I\u2019m sure I looked crazy to anyone walking past the window. After a session of making, my desk and floor were a mess of paper scraps. I stole most of the art supplies from my children, who are elementary school-age and younger. Some of my favorite art is made with humble materials and experimentation.
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\nMy initial \u201csketches\u201d were quick exercises in composition with torn paper. This is the first project where I didn\u2019t pencil for the book dummy.
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\nThe final art was made with every variety of construction paper, tracing paper, a bit of blue colored pencil, and white-out for some of the snow and waves. The biggest challenges of the final art: scanning my huge collages on a small scanner, piecing them together in Photoshop, and attempting to fold a six-pointed snowflake.
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A final spread (sans text): “One day\u2014CRACK\u2014Blue was suddenly on his own, floating away. Blue was surprised. Blue’s parents were surprised. No one was prepared for this.”<\/em>
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A final spread (sans text): “Beautiful things.”<\/em>
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A final spread (sans text): “Blue learned things from his new friends. About wind and ocean currents. Things that could help him get home. Blue planned his return.”<\/em>
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A final spread (sans text): “Until …”<\/em>
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\nThe cover was the final step. I used pencil and pen for the thumbnail sketches and then went back to my scraps of paper. Usually, the jacket is the most stressful piece of art to make for me. But this time, I just wanted to keep making new cover options. They were so much fun to explore.
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Final cover<\/em>
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* * * * * * *<\/center><\/p>\n

BLUE FLOATS AWAY. Text copyright \u00a9 2021 Travis Jonker. Illustrations copyright \u00a9 2021 Grant Snider. Published by Abrams Books for Young Readers, New York.<\/p>\n

THERE IS A RAINBOW. Text copyright \u00a9 2021 by Theresa Trinder. Illustrations copyright \u00a9 2021 by Grant Snider. Published by Chronicle Books, San Francisco.<\/p>\n

All images here reproduced by permission of Grant Snider.<\/em> <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

  Pictured above is a sketch author-illustrator and comics artist Grant Snider made during last year’s pandemic lockdown. Today, he visits to talk about what came out of that experience \u2014 his illustrations for Theresa Trinder\u2019s There Is a Rainbow (Chronicle, January 2021), a bright \u2014 in more ways than one \u2014 book that captures […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":4,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[12,2],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-5379","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-blogger-interviews","category-picture-books"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/blaine.org\/sevenimpossiblethings\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5379","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/blaine.org\/sevenimpossiblethings\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/blaine.org\/sevenimpossiblethings\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/blaine.org\/sevenimpossiblethings\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/4"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/blaine.org\/sevenimpossiblethings\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=5379"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"http:\/\/blaine.org\/sevenimpossiblethings\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5379\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/blaine.org\/sevenimpossiblethings\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=5379"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/blaine.org\/sevenimpossiblethings\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=5379"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/blaine.org\/sevenimpossiblethings\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=5379"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}