All the way from Cameroon (Africa), came these pictures taken in a local school where a dummy of this poetry book was presented to the children who made the poems inspired by and in the style of  the surrealistic evergreen  ‘J’ai rêvé’ (of French Claude Haller). I illustrated just 2 of them as a little day & night composition. The project of Alain Serge Dzotap was equally supported by other illustrators like fellow Belgian Philippe de Kemmeter & German Wolf Erlbruch (who also took care of the book’s lay-out).

As announced in December, the German version of ‘l’ABC de Tom’ is available from this month February of. The editor commissioned a little trailer to launch the book. It looks really nice (Konzept und Animation by Plankton Entertainment) and can be found at the Hanser website or on YouTube.

This winter, we had to wait very long. I anticipated the snowfall already in December on this birth announcement. It was actually grey & wet when this little boy was born. Here’s what was given as a present to visitors of the newborn.

It’s already February! That happens to be the month I’ve been illustrating in this year’s calendar from Sarmede, a pleasant Italian town near Venice that gave its name to  a (traveling) group exhibition of children’s book illustrations from all over the world.

The show includes some images I made for ‘Noël blanc, Noël noir’, a book  that no longer exists in French (Albin Michel 2005), but that has gained new life in Italian (Jaca Book, 2009). Apart from my contribution, there’s also nice work to see of fellow-flemish-illustrator Kaatje Vermeire, French Aurélia Fronty, Canadian Jon Klassen and many more…

Last week we received some new boxes from Philips Biscuits -an excellent artisanal bakery at the center of Antwerp- and one of them was even filled with fresh cookies! The paint wasn’t that fresh anymore, since I created this dog already in 2004 (but he finally  found his way to the lid of a beautiful black box).

The trouble with images can sometimes be that the visual is better then the content, but in this case -I can assure you- it’s the other way around (unless you’re on a diet). Either way, the image lasts longer.

Cleaning up my archives (to prepare the new gallery on this site, soon to come!) I bumped upon the images I made for the occasion. Here’s the invitation (not valid anymore, but still from the heart).

I’m saving you the menu & name cards, but in between the glasses & plates also stood  these table cards with names of places that have/had importance in her life (and some in mine as well)

Looking back at these overnight-compositions brought back sweet memories.  I guess I’m getting older too.

All the way from Hungary to Brussels this week, came not only rumors  about a hyperactive prime minister, but also a literature-magazine paying attention to the newly translated ‘Otto  a Hoban’(didn’t find the right accents on my keyboard).

At the inside, the magazine almost looked like a special issue focusing on  middle-aged, male children’s books  illustrators from Flanders (Belgium). Of course, I don’t understand a word of it, but apart from a picture from my childhood and an interview about my earliest Xmas memories, there were also souvenirs (and cute pictures!) of the very young Klaas Verplancke & Carll Cneut.

Who is who, by the way? (tip : when was the Kodachrome invented?)

Here’s one I made (as a volunteer) for the school our sons attend. I recycled some winter-stuff I had in store after my Japanese adventures and from a postcard I didn’t use. I also added a winter-version of the logo I made for the school in September. Inside all the pupils born during that month, pose with their birthday-numbers and my contribution is limited to these 12 bird-month-numbers I was working on for a counting-book I made in November-December.

(mark the changes in the colors of the sky, although it seemed to be eternally grey and rainy here lately)

The spheres became big balls hanging in a huge Christmas tree with Santa shuttling through the nightly sky between them, throwing presents… a very Happy New Year 2012, indeed.

The editor even added some publicity for the author and his Otto-character. Ganz toll! (I gave this copy to my father, whose German is far better than mine)