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Illustrator Profile - Hadley Hooper: "Editorial is still my first love"

By Robert Newman   Thursday November 19, 2015

Hadley Hooper is an illustrator and fine artist who lives and works in Denver. In addition to a successful gallery career and wide experience with editorial illustration, Hooper has illustrated a series of picture books, created packaging for food products, and co-manages an exhibit space at Ironton Studios, her workspace in the River North neighborhood of Denver.

Hooper uses a classic mix of ink, paint, and printmaking to create her artwork. Her work is simple and restrained, but very graphic and smart, with an edge that reflects her longtime work with alternative weekly newspapers. Hooper’s illustrations grace the pages of last year's children’s book, The Iridescence of Birds: A Book About Henri Matisse. It features beautiful and elegant childlike drawings that evoke classic picture book illustrations of the 1950s. [The illustration which appears with this interview is taken from this book.]

MY LIFE:
I was born in Denver. I left long enough to get a BFA from the Kansas City Art Institute and moved right back. In the late 80s, Denver was in a recession due to the oil bust and the downtown was empty aside from a few great bars and a thriving art community. And there was Westword, the local arts weekly, which I really wanted to work for. My first professional assignment was for them—I did a little B&W spot and got a kill fee of $30—and I beat a hasty retreat from illustration for several years.

I threw myself into the local art scene and joined an alternative co-op gallery. I made great friends, experimented with materials and subjects, painted like crazy, and started to understand my strengths and weaknesses.

For money I cobbled together odd jobs. I painted murals, I painted traditional animation cells, and I waited lots and lots of tables. I paid off my student loans with tip money. It was the late nights of waitressing—coming home at 3:00am smelling like other peoples’ beer and cigarettes—that got me thinking of trying illustration again.

So, I assembled some paintings, made cards, and did a mailing to my top 10 publications.

My first job came from David Carson, who was working on the third issue of Ray Gun magazine. Next up, I got a job from The New Yorker. And then, I went back to Westword where—thanks to the support of the art director, Dana Collins, who hired me weekly —I gained confidence. By working with the alternative weeklies all over the country I learned how to think and work quickly. This is when I really fell for editorial work. I loved the politics and dirty dealing and the sex stories and drug deals gone bad and restaurant reviews. Other assignments from national magazines and newspapers followed and I quit my waitressing job.

Since then I’ve been working as a freelance illustrator—it’s been over 20 years now. For the last 15 I’ve been repped by the Marlena Agency.

MY WORKSPACE:
My studio is at Ironton Studios. It’s located on three-quarters of an acre in a converted garage in the River North (RiNo) neighborhood of Denver, just a mile north of downtown. We’ve got a total of 20 artist studios, and many of us have been at Ironton for 15 years or more; I’ve been a partner for 10. It’s been cool to see up close how people make work and how they make a creative life work. There are painters, metal fabricators, woodworkers, a stone studio, a big garden with shade and a table for parties. It’s been an ideal environment to be in. There’s always the opportunity to see or discuss what someone else is doing—or simply to get your work done and be alone together.

Ironton also has a gallery that my partner Hugh and I have managed for more than 10 years, and where we’ve hosted over 100 different exhibitions and artists. We’ve had lots of openings and happy hours and First Fridays. We’ve given away thousands of beers. It’s been a lot of work but fun and I’ve learned something from everyone that’s been here.

HOW I MAKE MY ILLUSTRATIONS:
I use traditional tools, ink and paint and printmaking to create images. I scan in the parts and assemble in Photoshop.

MY FIRST BIG BREAK:
The first New Yorker assignment was a big deal, and also getting an assignment from Gail Anderson at Rolling Stone. I remember pacing around my dining room table trying to get the courage to call her back, nonchalantly. This is back when you got assignments via a phone call and sent roughs via fax.

Those were the glamorous breaks. The truly “big break” was probably more like a hundred little opportunities through the alternative weeklies.

I got into American Illustration first with personal work and it impressed me that there was a quality to the personal work that was missing from the assignment work. That was 20 some years ago and it’s still something I keep in mind. Lots of work came from being included in that book.

MY CREATIVE INSPIRATION:
I often go back to the drawings of Gorey and Hockney. I like the children’s book illustrator Roger Duvoisin when I need to be reminded to simplify. I return to the artists who contributed to the Gazette du Bon Ton for beautiful figures and patterns. I look at painter and printmaker Edouard Vuillard for texture and pattern versus open space.

Twenty years ago I began using all kinds of alternative printmaking techniques to make large one-off paintings, and when I saw the work of Gert and Uwe Tobias I totally fell for them. The scale and printed yet painterly quality validated my own attempts to use that media that way.

On my last trip to New York I discovered the works of Mamma Andersson, giving me years of her work to catch up on.

I admire Neo Rauch and he doesn’t define or defend the imagery.

Media sites like Pinterest are great for reference. I really love Aaron Smith’s paintings and his Pinterest page is my favorite.  

The Chicago Imagists have been influencing artists for years.

The American Illustration and Society of Illustrators annuals are great to look at, if a little paralyzing because of the breadth and depth of all the contemporary talent.

THE BIGGEST CHALLENGE OF WORKING ALONE:
For the most part I like working alone in the studio. The only challenge is keeping the voices at bay—the ones that tell me to make more tea, to check email again, or to go see what someone else is up to.

I’ve found that I can use an online meditation timer to carve out 70-minute chunks of work time. I turn all devices off including email and it creates some space.

I’ve been working on a couple children’s books and have found them to be quite isolating. The deadlines can be intense and that single focus for months at a time has been a challenge; with every book I hope try and find a better balance.

A MEMORABLE ASSIGNMENT FROM THE PAST YEAR:
I’m finishing up illustrations for a picture book about two women who drove across the United States and back in 1916 to get the vote for women. They were so fearless and I want to do right by them.

DREAM ASSIGNMENT:
I love having topics or ideas that require research. I’d like to illustrate One Hundred Years of Solitude and have enough money and time to spend in libraries and museums looking at books and art. I’d like to have the opportunity to make interesting and unexpected connections between things.

MY FAVORITE ART DIRECTOR:
Neal Porter and Jennifer Browne at Roaring Brook Press are really incredible to work with. They are intuitive and empowering. I did the pictures for a book they published in 2014 called The Iridescence of Birds, about Matisse as a little boy. Neal found this text by Patricia Maclachlan that was so weird and unique and so spare and perfect. Then he chose my work based largely on a large blue painting of a chair I had done. I’ve recently been in contact with some other writers and illustrators that have worked with them and it seems we’ve all had similar experiences. I think it’s all the more powerful that these two, editor and art director, can make each artist and writer feel their best, supported and understood.

SOME OF MY FAVORITE ILLUSTRATORS:
Vivienne Flesher: everything she does has a powerful integrity.

I must add my name to the Gérard Dubois fan club. His recent kids book is really spectacular.

I want to be Serge Bloch. What he can do with a single line...

The work of JooHee Yoon has joie de vie out the wazoo.

I love the way Brian Rea thinks and the way his work looks on the page.

Everytime I think I’m gonna quit Facebook I’ll see something by John Cuneo on there. His sketchbook updates are always inspiring; he’s never without a pen or an idea.

OTHER WORK:
Editorial is still my first love. I have had two lucky occasions to have regular columns that lasted a couple years each—one for The New York Times and one for the Boston Globe. I really enjoyed getting to know the writer’s POV over time.

I’ve had some fun advertising jobs. A couple of years ago I did the art for the redesigned DeKuyper bottles and have impressed many bartenders with that news. Okay, not really.

I’ve done CD covers and book covers and theatre posters; those are great jobs to get especially if there’s time to spend with the plays and books. I am currently working on a fourth picture book—this one for the great Candlewick Press—and I’m starting another for Roaring Brook in November of 2015.

I also still work as a studio artist. I show my work in galleries, and will be doing a large-scale installation at the Denver Art Museum in 2016, which will be exciting. When it’s done:)

HOW I STAY CURRENT:
It’s been important to be flexible. As I’ve mentioned, editorial is my favorite, but combining that with picture books and keeping my own painting work going has kept me busy as the illustration world changes. You never know what’s going to ring someone’s bell or open that door; my entry into the museum opportunity was the picture book about Matisse.

HOW I PROMOTE MYSELF:
The juried annuals have made the most impact. To my agent's despair, I haven’t printed a proper card in a while. It seems having work out there begets more work.

ADVICE FOR SOMEONE STARTING OUT:
Be open, do a bunch of different stuff, and find a community.

See more Hadley Hooper illustrations, new work, and updates here:
Hadley Hooper website
Twitter
Hadley Hooper at Marlena Agency
Goodwin Fine Art Gallery




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