The SAA are very pleased to be supporting the World Illustration Awards by sponsoring The SAA Agents Award for New Talent.
WIA Awards 
The Association of Illustrators, in partnership with the Directory of Illustration have just announced the World Illustration Awards 2024 longlisted projects chosen by the judges from over 5,000 entries that were submitted. 500 projects have been selected across all 10 categories - VIEW THE LONGLIST
The SAA run a new talent award every year in association with the AOI’s World Illustration Awards. Carole Bouvier was our winner in 2022 for her piece titled: On a Spring Day.
Carole’s entry really stood out and we were all very impressed with her strong compositions, use of colour and her visual storytelling – On a Spring Day is a fresh approach at picture book illustration. Carole’s imagery has personality and she shows a sensitivity to the subject matter. We believe her work has a broad commercial appeal that could be applied to all manner of creative solutions. She’s a worthy winner!
The prize is 6 months mentoring with one of our member agents who is selected very carefully to fit with the winner. Carole chose The Artworks and started the mentorship earlier this year so we’ll check back on her soon to find out how it all went.
Carole is a French illustrator based in Cambridge, UK. Before completing a Children's Book Illustration MA at ARU, her initial career was in independent film distribution, an occupation that developed and nourished her passion for storytelling and her taste for strong compositions.
The illustrations were part of Carole's Masters Stage project for the MA, a picturebook called On A Spring Day, told in images and haikus - a Japanese form of poetry.
Submitted in the Design Product & Packaging category, Ben Tallon's work for Lynx & Axe makes it through the first round of the prestigious awards.
Huge congratulations to Natalia Zaratiegui for being longlisted in the Commercial Publishing category of the World Illustration Awards 2022.The Man Who Knew Too Much and Other Storiesby G. K. Chesterton, features cover and inside illustrations by Natalia, using a limited colour palette to create a series of strong contrast images, beautifully capturing the spirit of the book.
Congratulations to Rachael Saunders, who’s panoramic illustration of Krka National Park has been long listed in the WIA Awards 2022. We featured Rachael’s incredible illustration previously here, when it won the Wacom Cintiq 16 challenge.
“My epic patterned panoramic pays homage to Krka National Park, Croatia. Its sheer scale and level of detail pushed my skills to the limit, but also allowed me great freedom as I pursued to achieve an image that was truly immersive and playfully explored the flora and fauna of the park.”
We are very pleased to announce that we have a winner for this year's SAA Agents Award for New Talent: Grace Park for Silk Road Wonders -She is currently based in Canada and has a BFA in Illustration from Art Center College of Design, where she learned to focus on creating stories and evoking empathy. She enjoys making images that are relatable to others, and likes to incorporate small details that enhance the piece. As a freelance illustrator, she strives to tell stories that console people and bring warmth into their lives.
A big thank you to all the judges - Christine Isteed from Artist Partners, Trina Wymandski from Phosphor Art and Jon Cockley from Handsome Frank. Grace was a firm favourite with all of the judges... as you can see from the quotes below,
Trina: "Judging the New Talent was a challenging but very enjoyable task. Fortunately we all agreed on the winner - Grace Park. I loved the detail and sense of design, plus the beautiful colour palette, and it was great to see illustration work used in an interesting way printed onto silk. The standard was very high but Grace’s talent stood out so she is a very deserving winner!"
Christine: "Impressive work submitted to us for judging on the AOI/WIA - SAA New Talent Award. Between us we comfortably made our selection of the winner, and the talented shortlisted selection of artists. Beautifully presented ideas and cleverly conceptualised, it was an enjoyable task! Our winning entry by Grace Park was a popular and outright favourite, the beautiful palette and detail and the original idea which was printed on silk was totally unique.”
Grace's prize will be six month’s trial representation including mentoring and career development by one of the SAA’s member agents.
Phosphor's Iris de Luz won the Directory of Illustration Award at this year's World Illustration Awards! Out of over 5,000 entries, Iris' work shone through, and she winsa a single page marketing package in the Directory of Illustration, a 100-image professional portfolio on directoryofillustration.com and a consultation with the DoI team.
What a week it’s been for Startworks artist Greg McIndoe (AKA Headless Greg)! Greg was invited to chat on the latest Creative Boom Podcast , where he discusses starting his own business, social media, and the importance of recognising and reconciling struggle. It’s a really candid and thoughtful interview and definitely something we would recommend listening to whether you’re a recent graduate or established in your creative career.
On top of that, Greg has been long-listed in the World Illustration Awards in the new talent section of the alternative publishing category for his book he worked on his final year of university, Wilson Strange; a fantastic exploration of mental health through the eyes of the titular character.
With all this happening, we can’t wait to see where Greg will go next and how his talent will continue to flourish and be recognised. Congratulations Greg!
Greg McIndoe is represented by The Artworks
The Bright Agency is celebrating five artists making the World Illustration Awards 2021 Longlist. Cathrin Peterslund, Howard Gray, Hannah Tolson, Jocelyn Kao and Oliver Averill were nominated in the Children’s Publishing and Exploration categories, showcasing an amazing range of illustrative styles and subjects.
