Acclaimed illustrator, Jackie Morris, on entering a room full of keen artists bearing clipboards and sketchbooks and armed with pencils, seemed somewhat surprised at the larger-than-expected audience. Although the fans had been promised an “intimate illustration masterclass”, there were just too many of them for such “intimacy” so the “masterclass” morphed into a talk which did not disappoint.
The artist was surprisingly happy to be openly passionate about her work and in doing so, warmly made her fans feel like friends. From the age of 6 Jackie had known that she wanted to be an artist and despite doubts that she would ever succeed from her peers and superiors, she has proved them wrong and shown that a little determination can go a long way. Although never intending to get involved with childrens’ books, Jackie has now found herself not only primarily illustrating books for children but also writing them.
In shyly displaying her beautifully detailed drawings and paintings from an archive stretching back to her school days, and inviting everyone up to the stage to view them, Jackie revealed one of her secrets of illustration – every detail counts.
Her talk was hugely inspiring to the whole audience, both young and old and an excellent substitute for a hands on masterclass. She seemed to be full of words of wisdom but personally, the words that stuck most were those on her view of learning to draw. “Everyone can draw.” she said “Drawing is learning to see, it is learning a language”
