Episode #117: What is your favorite part of illustrating a book? -with Julia Kuo

Welcome! Today on Kids Ask Authors, we are joined by Julia Kuo and she will be answering a great kid question, “What is your favorite part of illustrating a book?”

TRANSCRIPTS:

Grace Lin: Hello, I'm Grace Lin, children's book author and illustrator of many books, including the middle grade novel, When The Sea Turned To Silver and the picture book, A Big Moon Cake For Little Star. Today, I'm here with Julia Kuo, the illustrator of many picture books, including The Sound of Silence written by Katrina Goldsaito, and I Dream of Popo, written and by Livia Blackburne. The art from I Dream of Popo is also featured in the picture book exhibit Asians Every Day, which you can see now online. Hi, Julia.

Julia Kuo: Hello.

Grace Lin: Thank you for joining me today.

Julia Kuo: Oh, thank you so much for having me.

Grace Lin: All right. So are you ready for today's kid question?

Julia Kuo: Let's go.

Grace Lin: All right. Today's question is from a kid named Frank, and Frank asks ...

Frank: What is your favorite part of illustrating a book?

Grace Lin: What is your favorite part of illustrating a book?

Julia Kuo: Frank, that's a really good question. So I think that the favorite part for me is being done and looking at all the spreads that I'm really, really proud of. With drawing and illustrating, there's always a little bit of the process that feels just slightly out of my control. So this is something that's gotten better with time, but I think with art, it's always hard to avoid a little bit of unpredictability. There will always be something that turns out a little different than I expected. So at the very end, it's really cool to see what spreads I expected to turn out well, as well as spreads that didn't, and also to see what spreads surprised me.

Grace Lin: So what spread surprised you the most in I Dream of Popo?

Julia Kuo: Maybe the very last one when the granddaughter and Popo are sitting surrounded by the sea of gui hua flowers. It's my favorite because I like more graphic solutions to images. So it's kind of just a very simple idea where the characters are just kind of set against a backdrop of a very flat execution of flowers and leaves.

Grace Lin: So what was surprising about it?

Julia Kuo: I think it was surprising that it was graphic, because the rest of the book is a little bit more realistically done. It's definitely not super realistic with the space. Some spaces are more flattened out and I like that because it's a slightly more Asian execution of the images, but this one is more akin to what you might see on a poster or maybe even some package design. And I think that it works because it's a departure from the rest of the book. It should look different because in this last spread they're kind of, the book has shifted and this is in her imagination and kind of in her mind. But I didn't know that I would use that as a solution to show the difference between all of the rest of the book and this page.

Grace Lin: Nice. Well, I was thinking when you said that your favorite part of illustrating book is finishing and I had to laugh because that is my favorite part too.

Julia Kuo: Oh yeah.

Grace Lin: When you know it's all done.

Julia Kuo: Oh my goodness. Yeah. It's so, it's just that sense of accomplishment and it's all behind you.

Grace Lin: Yeah. And it takes, because at least for me, it takes so long. I mean, I just recently finished a book and I have a big pin up board and I pin up all the paintings as I get them done. And it just feels so good when you pin up the last one and you're like, that's it, I'm done.

Julia Kuo: Right. And these are such big, a book is such a big project. I also do editorial stuff for newspapers and magazines and that's just one picture and then it's done and then you put it away, you move on. But this one, for me, it takes maybe six months on average to illustrate someone else's writing.

Grace Lin: Wow.

Julia Kuo: I don't know if yours is, well, because you write and you illustrate your own, right? So you're on a different timeline.

Grace Lin: Yeah. But I'm also on a much different timeline in terms of illustrating, like I said, I was just talking about this last book. Well, part of it's the pandemic, but it took me, I would say, two and a half, three years. So I'm looking at it and I'm like, that's three years of my life.

Julia Kuo: I mean, but you're also painting by hand, right? So that's a very different process.

Grace Lin: Yeah. It is different process, but it's still part, it's like those are the hours of your life still, regardless of whether you do by hand or on the computer, like these are the hours of our lives in the artwork. It's kind of interesting when you think about that, that art encapsulates your life.

Julia Kuo: Yeah. I like how it marks time. I can look at a book and think about where I was, what I was thinking about at that time, and with the art, what I was inspired with, or looking at, that influenced the way that this book turned out.

Grace Lin: Yeah. And I think that's why like actually painting or for me is my second part of illustrating the book where I sit down and I've already worked out like the drawing. I've already worked out where the type is going to go. I've already worked out all the kind of technical stuff. And now all I get to do is put the color and make it come to life. And that's why that's my second favorite part of this. What would you say your second favorite part is?

Julia Kuo: I like the moment earlier on when I kind of realize what I'm doing. So I think I always go into a book with a plan, some big notion of what I'm aiming for, maybe this kind of goes together with what the editor and the art director are kind of requesting to see, but it's always like kind of a big unknown and a hodgepodge of different elements until they start to come together on the paper or in my case, on the digital screen. So that will usually happen on the first, second, sometimes the fourth, the fifth spread that I work on. And it usually, I need to get to a spread that works. In my mind, I just realized that this is the right thing. This is what I'm aiming for. It feels right. I guess it's very intuitive. And then I can go back to what I was working on before, fix those up and head forward with this like much more informed sense of purpose for the remaining spread. So I love understanding the plan.

Grace Lin: So it's kind of like the sketch revision phase that you like.

Julia Kuo: Well, I think it's, the sketches, I think that there's always going to be a pretty big difference between working on sketches and even revisions versus the finals for me. I don't know what it is, but I think that things are still always up in the air until I'm actually working on the final, final images. Yeah. Are sketches is a lot more finite for you? Like the sketch is indicative of how the finals going to look?

Grace Lin: Yeah. I like to have the sketches pretty tight, and so that way I can, though, not that I don't change things in the finals, I often do that too, but I usually like to have it pretty tight. So that way, in some ways I can just kind of zen out.

Julia Kuo: Mm yeah. Yeah. I can see how then, in that case, the execution would be so relaxing because there's no more thinking anymore. Less thinking.

Grace Lin: Yeah. Well, it's a different kind of thinking, because all of a sudden it becomes all about what you were saying, it comes about almost instinctive and your gut kind of takes over and that's kind of really a nice feeling.

Julia Kuo: Yeah, absolutely. I kind of mark the different phases of my work by what I do with the rest of my mind. So in the beginning there's so much thinking, I can only listen to music that isn't too distracting. And as I move along in the process and more decisions have been made and things have been ironed out, like my mind starts to free up. And I realize that if I don't fill that space with something, I'll get distracted. So then I start listening to podcasts. And then by the very end, when I'm doing like pure execution, kind of like what you're talking about, where I'm just going with the plan and doing everything the way that it's been laid out, then I have to listen and kind of watch something at the same time.

Grace Lin: Oh, interesting.

Julia Kuo: Yeah. Do you put stuff on the background at all?

Grace Lin: Usually it's kind of at the end phases, like you were saying, I'll listen to an audio book or podcast, but it's very similar in the very beginning, what you were saying like, I can't listen to anything other than music or have complete silence, but I have never had it where I watch and listen, I think that's very interesting. Like you actually like watch a TV show or something, is that correct?

Julia Kuo: Right. Well, it can't have too much of a visual tie in. So for example, the Simpsons, their gags are very visual. I found that if you only purely listen to the Simpsons, you'll miss like half the jokes. So it has to be a show where the visual part is maybe only 20% of the understanding, but I still kind of need that extra level of engagement or else I'll kind of just start like losing a little bit and I'll like wander away from my desk.

Grace Lin: So what show do you listen to? Give me an example of a show.

Julia Kuo: I really like intense action documentaries.

Grace Lin: Oh wow.

Julia Kuo: Like extreme sports. I know that sounds super bizarre, but everything from climbing to surfing to racing to BMX.

Grace Lin: Really? I'm surprised that you don't have to watch that though. That's what I was trying to think about, like stories. I guess when I was asking the shows, I was like, oh, what shows do you not have to watch? And I was thinking, you were going to say something like Masterpiece Theater, where it's all talking.

Julia Kuo: For these physical execution sports, it's usually just one moment where it matters, right? There's all this lead up. There's character development, you learn about behind the scenes and that's all listening, and then there's the moment of performance. And then, so then I'll watch that and then go back to listening.

Grace Lin: Oh.

Julia Kuo: So it actually works out very well.

Grace Lin: Oh interesting. Oh, well that's awesome.

Julia Kuo: I know, I know. It's weird.

Grace Lin: No, I don't think so at all. I think it's great.

Julia Kuo: Do you have, oh, go ahead.

Grace Lin: Oh no, go ahead.

Julia Kuo: I was going to say, do you have like a fallback thing that you like to listen to while you're working?

Grace Lin: I tend to listen to a lot of podcasts. Honestly like a lot of nonfiction, one thing that I often listen to is like NPR's Life Kit, things like that. Maybe more towards the self help kind of thing, which now I wonder what that says about me.

Julia Kuo: I love that. You're into continuous self-improvement.

Grace Lin: Yes.

Julia Kuo: Such a positive trait.

Grace Lin: Yeah. Or I like to listen to audio books. Sometimes I'll listen to audio books like nonfiction audio books about books that I'm hoping to write about someday. Like write now I'm hoping to write a book about Chinese food. So I've been listening to these nonfiction books that people have written about Chinese restaurants and things like that, which have been very, very dry and not particularly enjoyable in all senses, but it makes me feel very useful to be able to doing like I'm researching for one book while I'm working on another.

Julia Kuo: Yeah. You're really just being twice as productive and efficient by multitasking.

Grace Lin: That's what I tell myself.

Julia Kuo: It's true.

Grace Lin: But anyway, well thank you so much, Julia, for answering Frank's question and thank you Frank, for asking such a great question.

Julia Kuo: Well, it was my pleasure, Frank. Thank you for asking your question.

Grace Lin: Bye.

Julia Kuo: Bye.

Today’s KID BOOK REVIEW comes from Zaynab! Zaynab is reviewing “I Am An American: The Wong Kim Ark Story” by Martha Brockenbrough with Grace Lin and illustrated by Julia Kuo.

The book I would like to talk about is “I Am An American”  by Martha BrockenBrough. I Am An American is a true story set in Chinatown ,San Francisco in 1885. This book is about Wong Kim Ark, who was born in America but his parents are Chinese immigrants. He fought for his American citizenship even though he was born in the U. S.. 

He had many challenges and his case went all the way to the supreme court. This book shows Kim Ark's determination and teaches us to never give up. Read the book to find out all of the challenges Wong Kim Ark faced and if he succeeded in getting his citizenship.

Thank you Zaynab!

More about today’s authors:

Julia Kuo is the author and illustrator of Let’s Do Everything and Nothing and the illustrator of several picture and specialty books including the New York Times bestselling book RISE. She has created editorial illustrations for publications such as the Wall Street Journal, The Economist, and Vox Media. Julia has taught illustration courses at Columbia College Chicago and at her alma mater, Washington University in St. Louis. She has been an artist-in-residence twice at the Banff Centre for the Arts and was a 2019-2021 fellow with the Gray Center for Arts and Inquiry at the University of Chicago. She currently lives in Seattle, WA.

Grace Lin, a NY Times bestselling author/ illustrator, won the Newbery Honor for Where the Mountain Meets the Moon and her picture book, A Big Mooncake for Little Star, was awarded the Caldecott Honor. Grace is an occasional commentator for New England Public Radio , a video essayist for PBS NewsHour (here & here), and the speaker of the popular TEDx talk, The Windows and Mirrors of Your Child’s Bookshelf. She is the co-host of the podcast Book Friends Forever, a kidlit podcast about friendship and publishing (geared for adults). Find her facebook, instagram , twitter ( @pacylin) or sign up for her author newsletter HERE.

Please visit the Asians, Everyday  exhibit found online at the Carle Museum featuring Julia Kuo!

“Award-winning children’s book author and illustrator Grace Lin curated this online exhibition, launched May 2021 in honor of Asian American Pacific Islander Heritage Month. Asians, Everyday showcases positive Asian American representation. The selected artworks and books, featuring contemporary characters and stories, celebrate our common humanity by depicting Asian Americans living their everyday lives.”

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