Book By Its Cover

Book By Its Cover is showing some of my sketchbook drawings,
like this one below. Thanks to Julia Rothman for hosting my little drawings!

here's the link:
http://www.book-by-its-cover.com/sketchbooks/sketchbook-series-renata-liwska

Thanks also to Jaqueline for suggesting me for the sketchbook series.

Get a Hat

It is the time of the year for annual rodeo event here in Calgary. I had to draw a hat. The whole town has gone Cowboy Crazy, even the bears.

Eh, Canada!

I missed the goose-lets growing up this spring.
Have a Happy Canada Day!

Book Design

This was a bit of Little Panda news.

Houghton Mifflin Harcourt's Book Designs Receive Special Recognition at the 2009 New England Book Show

BOSTON--(Business Wire)--
Global education leader Houghton Mifflin Harcourt recently received high honors for the design, quality of materials and workmanship of several of its books at the 52nd New England Book Show. The annual juried show recognizes the year's most successful work by New England publishers, printers and graphic designers.

Little Panda was included in the category, General Trade Illustrated Book.
The designer I work with at Houghton Mifflin Harcourt is Cara Llewellyn.
She is fabulous to work with, great design and creative cover ideas!

I am quietly waiting for the color proofs of the next book I illustrated for Houghton Mifflin Harcourt, which will be out next May!

Correct Change!

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We (Michael and me) will finally be starting up an online store next week. It will be found at the url: www.uwaga.ca
Uwaga means 'attention' or 'caution' in Polish.
(Mike really likes the word)

We will be offering some prints of our work and books.
To start with I will be featuring "Kiddies & Kitties" a little book of my sketches. I will post when the site is up and running.

Presentation Part 4

These last few posts from the presentation show some of my sketchbook process including rough work and finished.

Presentation Part 3

My work often incorporates memories from my childhood. An example is in Nikolai The Only Bear written by Barbara Joosse. I included a scene where the children are in a circle playing a game of pass the hanky. When I was in school the teachers would have us play games like this during recess, probably to keep us from running around and getting out of control.

Presentation Part 2

The first slide shows a photo of my old art high school where I learned to draw. The two paintings are from Art College where I learned what to do with the drawing skills I had developed in high school, tell stories and illustrate. The second slide is a sketch from one of my older sketchbooks, I went to an illustration conference in Santa Fe and was greatly inspired by a folk art toy museum. In the last slide I remember as a kid I loved candy, when my mom went out I went looking for hidden goodies.

Presentation, part 1

This is some of the slides from a presentation last week. Thanks to Brad from United Library Services, John from the Calgary Roman Catholic Separate School District No. 1 and all the librarians who listened to my talk - I really enjoyed the opportunity!

Sorry some of the first slides are repeats, the third and fourth show some of the things that influenced as a kid and now.
In particular I loved a cartoon called Coralgol in Poland (I believe it was titled Jeremy in North America and Barnaby in the UK). However I must not have liked bugs because I scribbled them out in a favorite childhood picture book (titled Pierwsza Cyztanka in Poland).

First Time in Print

I am putting together a presentation about my books for a Librarian Conference this week. The first picture is my first time in print, at age four, printed in a Danish newspaper. The second is for a drawing contest. Looking at it now, I realize I subconsciously used the cosmonaut as inspiration for my Shatner Show piece.