Five Minutes with... Rebecca Cobb

Rebecca Cobb was the winner of the Picture Books category of the 2013 Waterstones Children's Book Prize for her second solo book Lunchtime. We chatted to her about her picture books and what it's like working with the likes of Julia Donaldson and Richard Curtis

Tell us about Lunchtime - where did the idea for the book come from?

The idea for Lunchtime came from a frequent memory of my own childhood; sitting at the table and not eating my meals. I feel sorry for all the trouble I used to cause my mum. She tried everything to get me to eat but it must have been very difficult because it was not always that I didn’t like the taste of the food; sometimes I would refuse to eat even my favourite meals. My mum thinks that I saw mealtimes as an annoying interruption to playtime. I had a very powerful imagination, which often involved things such as a lion hiding in my bedroom. I can see why eating might not feel like a priority when you have something as exciting as a wild animal lurking in the house.

You've written and illustrated your own picture books like Lunchtime and Missing Mummy, but have also illustrated other authors' texts. What are the differences between illustrating your own stories and illustrating someone else's - and which do you prefer?

That is a very difficult question because I love both for different reasons and I really like the variety that it brings to my work, so I don’t think I can say I prefer one or the other. I enjoy writing my own stories because of the freedom to choose any subject and to illustrate anything that I like. The words and pictures often appear in my head together and I can play with the relationship between them and deciding how much of the story is told through each. But when I get to illustrate someone else’s text there is always a special moment when I read the text for the first time, before it exists as a picture book and I can start imagining how it might look visually. Working with authors gives me the opportunity to illustrate wonderful stories that I would never think of myself. I love collaborating with people and getting the chance to add my own voice to a book through the pictures.

What was it like illustrating Julia Donaldson's The Paper Dolls?
 
It was so exciting to work with Julia Donaldson but also incredibly daunting because she writes such brilliant stories and some of the best known children's books and also works with some of my favourite illustrators. I used my usual technique of not thinking about who the author is while I am working on a project otherwise it can be too overwhelming and I need to concentrate on the story itself. It is only after a project is finished that I let myself think about what I have just done and start panicking!

I think The Paper Dolls is a very special story and I really enjoyed illustrating it. I used to make paper dolls with my mum when I was little and because of my vivid imagination I remember how anything that I was playing always felt very real. I realised that I could show this in the book by illustrating it from two viewpoints; firstly showing the little girl playing with her paper dolls and then when you turn over the page the paper dolls and the toys have come to life because this is how she sees them in her imagination. Another reason that I found this project so enjoyable is because there is a lot of emotion in it and I think the story is slightly unexpected. I always like books that allow you to read them however you want to and I think that The Paper Dolls can be read as being about life and memories as well as being about childhood and imagination.

How did you end up illustrating film director Richard Curtis's first picture book, The Empty Stocking?
 
I am not sure, a lot of luck I think! The Empty Stocking is a very funny book but it also has a few tearful moments. Richard and the publishers had seen a copy of Missing Mummy and I think that they thought I would be able to convey the different emotions that are in the story. I really enjoyed this project and had a lot of fun with it because Richard wanted me to bring my own humour into the pictures to go alongside the comedy in the text. It was an incredible experience and it is only Iooking back that I can appreciate how incredible, at the time I could not think about it because I wouldn’t have been able to draw anything out of sheer terror. Because The Empty Stocking is a Christmas book I was legitimately allowed to get even more excited than usual about Christmas and I even got to pretend that it was Christmas during the summer, as that was when I was illustrating it due to the publishing deadlines, which was great!

Tell us about how you create your lovely artwork

I use a lightbox to trace my rough pencil sketches onto my best paper using a sharp stick dipped in ink. I tried drawing with different dip pens but I prefer using a stick, or the end of a paintbrush, because the line feels freer and much closer to drawing with a pencil. I then colour in the drawing using watercolours, inks and coloured pencils because these all make different types of marks and I can choose whether something needs to be coloured in a way that is soft or scratchy, neat or messy.

Who are your favourite children's illustrators? Are there any other picture book creators you think have particularly influenced your work?

I have so many favourite illustrators that I don’t think I can list them all here. I do especially love the work of Brian Wildsmith and John Burningham because it is utterly beautiful and a pure celebration of colour, drawing and mark making. I think I am most inspired by illustrations where you can almost imagine the illustrator’s hands creating them because you can see the lines of the pencil and the marks of the brush on the paper.

What advice would you give to any aspiring picture book illustrators out there?

I would say to do lots and lots of drawing and to illustrate what you love and really enjoy; I think my work always looks better when I have had fun with a project. Listen to and take on board any advice or constructive criticism that you can get and don’t take it personally, but at the same time don’t follow advice you strongly disagree with; everyone has different opinions but it is your work, so you need to be happy with it. Very importantly don’t give up. It took me a long time to get any work as a picture book illustrator and I almost gave up at one point but I am so glad that I didn’t!

Can you tell us about any new projects you're working on at the moment?

I recently finished writing and illustrating Aunt Amelia which is my next picture book with Macmillan Children’s Books and is published this summer. Currently I am about to start on a second collaboration with Richard Curtis and I am also storyboarding a new book idea with Macmillan.

 View a gallery of Rebecca's illustrations