American Illustration, the leading juried annual and advocate of contemporary illustration in North America and the world, celebrated its 25th anniversary with a special edition and exhibition, which opens on Monday at the Ontario College of Art and Design.

The book has a circular jacket illustrated by Yuko Shimizu and features an interpretive timeline of the last 25 years illustrated by 25 of today's top artists. The timeline art has been collected in an exhibition, which debuted at the Angel Orensanz Foundation Center for the Arts, then traveled to the Savannah College of Art and Argentina's Universidad de Palermo last year.

Left to right, the artists, in date order from 1982 to 2006: Seymour Chwast, Sue Coe, R.O. Blechman & Nicholas Blechman, Vivienne Flesher & Ward Schumaker, Henrik Drescher, Anita Kunz, Filip Pagowski, Ruth Marten, Matt Mahurin, Steven Guarnaccia, Jordin Isip, Frances Jetter, Jeffrey Fisher, Juliette Borda, Jason Holley, Karen Barbour, Mark Ulriksen, Roberta Parada, Steve Brodner, Guy Billout, Katherine Streeter, Tomer Hanuka, Saelee Oh & Souther Salazar, John Hendrix, Nathan Fox.

Mark Heflin, Director of American Illustration and American Photography, wanted to highlight the anniversary with something special. "Rather than reprising the best of AI," he said, "I decided to offer the task of expressing the particular meaning of each year to 25 artists whose work has had significant influence.

"The delight in the curatorial process was assigning an artist to a particular year based on their style and sensibility, while anticipating an event or a mood from that year they might be particularly drawn to. Watching the work emerge with just a small bit of nudging on my part was very exciting and very satisfying."

Mark will make a presentation at OCAD's Central Hall on Thursday, February 14, from 1:00 to 3:00 pm. The talk and exhibition are free and open to the public. For more information and directions, please visit the website.