Hand in Hand for Creativity: Adventures of the Imagination

Chang Ching-wen　/　photos Lin Min-hsuan　/　tr. by Darryl Sterk

June 2017

中文

In recent children’s literature from Taiwan the pictures are no longer playing a supporting role, but have become the main means by which the story is told.

When reading a picture storybook for children, do you first read the words, or look at the pictures?

In a world controlled by logic and language, most people read the words before checking out the illustrations. But in recent children’s literature from Taiwan the pictures are no longer playing a supporting role, but have become the main means by which the story is told.

“When we saw the illustrations in an online exhibition,” explains Hsiao Ching-lien, editor at Papa Publishing House, “we felt the artist had a good sense of light and line, that the art displayed great delicacy. So we invited ‘Sixty-Nine’ to come over for a visit. But when a big, tall figure appeared in the doorway we cried: it’s a boy! We had assumed that, with that style, he must be a girl.”

Ms. Hsiao strives to discover local talent like Sixty-Nine: artists with fresh, distinctive styles.

Founded six years ago in Taiwan’s small, diversified, cost-conscious children’s book market, Papa has gone its own way by investing time and energy to build a stage for Taiwan’s illustrators. Because of Papa, illustrators are now telling the stories, not just embellishing the texts.

Hsiao Ching-lien is the one who finds and develops local talent to publish one beautiful, finely made illustrated book after another.

Papa Publishing House:

Hsiao Ching-lien is the one who finds and develops local talent to publish one beautiful, finely made illustrated book after another.

No longer second fiddle

“The visuals are central, because they set the mood for the entire book,” Hsiao explains.

“A good illustrator is also a thoughtful, sensitive reader.” In seeking out new talent, Papa doesn’t factor educational background or technical mastery as highly as the ability to tell a story, and to tell a story you have to be a good reader. “You need to have a feel for literature, to intuit the feelings that remained implicit in the text. Actually, the visual and the verbal are simply two approaches to storytelling.”

Many illustrators are diamonds in the rough that an editor has to have the discernment to recognize and the skill to polish until they shine.

Lee Yiting’s Let Me Play a Bit Longer had been in the works for three years before publication this year. It started out as the story of a bear cub that doesn’t want to go to sleep, even when it comes time to hibernate. The sleepy Momma Bear has had enough. She goes online to find out why bears need to hibernate, but by the time she’s discovered the answer the cub has drifted off.

Hsiao liked the premise, but felt there were too many books about sleep aversion. Lee was willing to revise, but pretty soon they both got stuck in the revision process. One day Hsiao asked Lee to put the visuals aside and focus on the story. Lee agreed, and the story they ended up writing was about a cub that didn’t want to put away its toys.

“Reading the draft we were both anxious, but also excited: we felt we’d finally gotten everything just right—the story, the pacing, and the visual design.” Hsiao’s face fairly glows as she recounts the magic moment when the revision came together.

Hsiao never asks artists to imitate. When they deliver something different from the original design, she won’t immediately reject it or tell the artist what to do next. The first question is always: “Why’d you do it this way?”

Papa is all about helping the illustrator find the core creative idea.

Papa refuses to do translations. Every book is crafted from scratch. Editor-in-chief Barkley Kuo has hoped since Papa’s founding not just to create good books but to offer local illustrators a stage, a platform. “It’s not easy to do it all yourself, but it’s necessary if you want to take Taiwan’s editorial game to the next level.”

Insisting on doing its own books from scratch, Papa Publishing House has become a stage for Taiwan’s illustrators to shine on.

Grimm Press:

Brain Asteroid is the first creative platform in Taiwan built exclusively for children’s book illustrators. From the premise to the words to the illustrations, the illustrators handle everything. Illustrators follow a distinct creative path. For Chen Peihsiu, that path began with the desire to draw something with a different touch, and it led to Sleeping All Day Long. For Lee Jo-shin, it began with a picture she did of an owl, and it led to a story told by an owl, called Benjamin.

An international stage

While Papa Publishing House discovers sharp young illustrators, Grimm Press aims to increase the international visibility of Taiwan’s children’s literature.

Hao Kuang-tsai, the publisher at Grimm, thinks that given the size of the children’s book market and the talent pool in Taiwan, the only way forward for Grimm is to go international.

Indeed, over half of Grimm’s annual profits come from the sale of international rights in the United States, Britain, Japan, France, Germany, and other countries. With outstanding artistic design and marketing savvy, Grimm has made a name for itself in the international market, winning the Best Children’s Publisher of the Year award at the Bologna Children’s Book Fair in 2014.

Given the universality of the language of art, the nationality of the artist isn’t the main consideration for Grimm. Publisher Hao stresses that quality is the top priority, not where they’re from. Hao has worked with almost 400 illustrators from 32 countries around the world, illustrators like the internationally renowned Italian Giuliano Ferri, whose first book, One Penny, One Pizza, was a Grimm collaboration.

In addition to a distinctive style, a good illustrator has what Hao calls “structure.” He’s thinking of illustrators like Eva Wang and Jimmy Liao, for whose works Grimm has sold the most foreign rights.

Hao is thinking about setting up an art school for illustrators from Asia. “I want to make some ‘soil’ for Taiwan’s illustrators to grow in, to give them a place to go to get a professional training.” Twenty-four years after its founding, Grimm is not only a window on Taiwan for the world but also an aspiring educator. Hao is doing all he can to improve the environment for illustrators.

With a spare, clean style, The Giant and the Spring was the first book Grimm published, and the first sale of foreign rights for the illustrator Eva Wang. Among the Taiwanese illustrators’ works published by Grimm, it’s one of those for which the most foreign rights have been sold.

Creative division of labor

The illustrator 25Degrees is 25 years old. Last year he did his first batch of work for the “Mystery Library Detective” series of Commonwealth Education Media & Publishing. The matchmaker for this collaboration was Archi Lin, an agent for illustrators at Foxybug. With their fruitful collaboration now in its second year, 25Degrees leaves the business side of things up to Lin, so he can focus on being creative.

Lin has been an agent for over a year. In addition to talking business and doing deals, he provides administrative support, including space rental, fee collection, and handouts, for classes that illustrators like 25Degrees are teaching.

Last year, Lin and 25Degrees took a number of works by Taiwanese illustrators to the Illustration Arts Fest 2016 in Singapore, put on annually by the local illustrators’ association. Back in Taiwan, Lin brought the illustrators he represents up to speed on international trends and brought back encouraging news: the very positive reception illustrated works from Taiwan got at the IAF.

Lin likes to draw, but never became a professional illustrator. Instead, he became a “nanny” to other illustrators. As their agent, Lin hopes to find a wider audience for their works, creating a better environment for them to create in.

In sum, to raise the profile of illustrated books from Taiwan, talented illustrators need the help of editors, publishers, and agents, the people who build bridges between Taiwan and the world.