What is Illustration? Part 2: Audience

Here are five illustrators whose work has been generated for a certain audience or culture:

Luke Pearson

The Hilda books by Luke Pearson are aimed at children which is evident by the design of the characters and the colours he uses etc. These books are also accessible to adults to with more satirical humour within. Pearson uses expert awareness of space to compliment his work resulting in them never feeling too cluttered despite such detail.

Jock

Several issues of DC's Detective Comics were collected into a Graphic Novel illustrated by Jock to create Batman: The Black Mirror. The illustrations suggest that the books are designed to appeal to older children, possibly teenagers and adults. This is evident in Jock's quite distinctively angular drawing style which usually relies on manipulating black space.

Quentin Blake

An Illustrator with a long career - Quentin Blake's work has generally been targeted towards children. To fit this target audience his work employs bright colours as is the standard, however he also draws characters with happy features whilst his colouring often overlaps his line work much like a child's effort. His line work too is jagged and haphazard like he is scribbling in imitation of a younger hand.

Stephen Collins

Stephen Collins book The Gigantic Beard That Was Evil is considered to employ many storytelling tropes that Roald Dahl used. However unlike Quentin Blake (frequent collaborator with Dahl), Collins method of illustration is quite different. The book, which could be considered to have an audience from young children to adults, features heavily detailed illustration. However the work lacks colour and is presented in black and white which is interesting, as this would suggest that a younger audience isn't the main target after all but perhaps an older area is.

Art Spiegelman

Despite its graphic style (which consists of animals in place of humans) the work of Art Spiegelman in Maus is not aimed at children. He uses dark imagery to portray the horrors witnessed by his father, and keeps the page in just black and white. This is not a children's story and is designed to be read by adults who can attempt to understand the evil displayed within.