tailoring the imagery to best express each different project.”
With such a range of styles and forms that he works across, it’s hard not to wonder whether he has a preferred media. “Not really, they tend to talk to each other and influence and offer solutions to each other. Working with actors in film has influenced the way I stage dialogue in comics, playing with photography has influenced how I’d light a scene in a drawing. The improvisational open mode way of developing narrative in the theatre work I’ve done with Bill Mitchell has influenced everything.”
An advantage to working across so many fields is being able to recharge by spending time on a project that is very different. Illustration holds a special place in Dave’s heart, and he has developed a clear understanding as to how this can be most effective. “Illustration has to earn
its place, not just be an accompanying pretty picture showing you what’s in the text already. It can evoke atmosphere very quickly and deeply, it can embed themes and feelings. Imagery can function like music, connecting immediately on the turn of a page with an emotional response.
“Some of the books I’ve illustrated have run parallel visual narratives alongside the text, they have changed the timing of the delivery of the words across a spread.” Dave’s aim is always that his illustrations add something new to the overall reading experience.
One of Dave’s frequent collaborators is the author SF Said. The pair have worked together on Varjak Paw, The Outlaw Varjak Paw and Phoenix. He enjoys the longer-term working relationship, saying: “You develop a close connection with your partner’s sensibilities and preferences, a
kind of shorthand. It means we can find solutions quickly and feel comfortable talking honestly with each other about the work. I’ve had suggestions and reservations about elements in the books in the past that I’ve been able to raise, SF has asked me to change parts of the imagery, it’s a comfortable give and take.”
Taking shape This brings us to Tyger, the pair’s latest collaboration. Dave kept in touch with SF as he worked through the many drafts and the novel began to take its shape and form.
“We talked about certain kinds of imagery, the wordless, expressionist stories of Lynd Ward and Frans Masereel and about patterning from nature and Islamic art, representations of the universe and ways of visualising a realm beyond our own.”
Following completion of the final draft, Dave began sketching ideas for around 50 interior illustrations that progressed from enclosed city streets to expansive full bleeds which occur towards the end of the book. The book is set in a curious, alternative London where the empire is still active. In both the writing and illustration there’s a sense of unfamiliarity with its colonial and industrial presence, but the city still has a discernible sense of its geography. “I tried to find a balance between the old 19th century photos of London and a world that has progressed for another hundred years, but not escaped the belching chimney stacks and warehouses of Victorian England. A city where the influences of empire have started to affect the architecture of the city.”
There’s an incredible sense of synergy in how the illustrations help to carry elements of the story alongside the written elements, where ‘the words and images work with each other, touch each other, play off, flow through, tickle and respond to each other. It should feel like a complete whole. There’s nothing more boring than a textbook with a completely standalone separate isolated illustration doing nothing that the reader isn’t already doing by reading the text and creating the images in their own minds.”
Exploring territory
The level of thought and detail both in the illustrations and how they are used through the book is impressive. There’s a tiger’s eye motif for the page numbers, paw prints leading into the story and maps as the endpapers. There’s no danger that this could ever be seen as akin to a boring textbook.
40 PEN&INC. Spring-Summer 2023
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