THE NATURE OF ILLUSTRATION

Joelle Steele Interviewed by Merilee Kutchensen, 1987

For the past ten years, Joelle Steele has been finding her niche as a cover artist and as an illustrator specializing in plant and floral motifs. She talks about the creative process and her own experiences as a professional illustrator.

Merilee Kutchensen: With gardening being such a big industry I guess it must keep you pretty busy.
Joelle Steele: Sometimes very busy, and other times it's a little slow. I have a few regular publisher clients who frequently buy spots and page pieces for their gardening books and magazines. But at least half of my work is not specifically related to gardening.
MK: What other types of illustrations do you create?
JS: On my covers for books, record albums, and magazines, I don't adhere to any particular subject matter. However, I do gravitate towards the plant and floral motifs, especially when there is even the most remote chance that a gardening theme will be appropriate. But because most of my cover work is so abstract or impressionistic, you can't always tell that I'm in the gardening mode.
MK: Are there any other modes for you?
JS: Yes, I like architecture a lot, especially old buildings that have a lot of ornamentation or that have great lines in general. Historic buildings.
MK: Do you have a favorite media?
JS: Not really. I am as comfortable doing photography and hand-tinting photos as I am drawing in pen and ink, charcoal or pencil, or painting in ink, watercolor, or acrylic. I've even done some collage when the project called for it.
MK: Where do you generally go to find work?
JS: Not an easy question to answer. I guess that, for the most part, clients find me based on the postcard mailings I do. I send them out to as many publishers as I can find. I mail to my entire list about once a year, but I spread it out over the months. Every year I get some new clients, and some of the old ones fade away.
MK: Is it a matter of the publisher always looking for something new and unique?
JS: That is probably a small part of it. But what I really think happens most often is that illustration is very much a project-oriented kind of work, and a publisher either has the kind of project that is suited to your talents, or they don't.
MK: How hard is it to interpret what a publisher wants?
JS: Depends on the publisher. If they are very clear on what they want, it is usually pretty simple. If they are not all that clear and they just want you to "come up with something," it is much more difficult. I usually pass on jobs where the publisher is too vague -- it's sort of a formula for failure otherwise.
MK: If the publisher gives you all the right direction, what comes next?
JS: Usually a preliminary sketch or two. Something to show them where I'm going with whatever they have expressed to me.
MK: How long does it usually take for you to come up with an idea?
JS: Could be minutes, could be hours, sometimes it takes weeks. There was one project where I labored over it for three weeks before I finally came up with something concrete.
MK: Did the idea work?
JS: Yes, and it only took me about two days once I had the inspiration.
MK: Is that what most art is about for you, the inspiration?
JS: I think so. And I'm usually pretty easily inspired. That three-week thing was a fluke.
MK: Most projects go a lot faster?
JS: Well, a project may take me three weeks to complete, but not three weeks to just think up something interesting to draw or paint.
MK: Do you produce a lot of drawings before you settle on the ones you want to develop?
JS: Sometimes more than others. I often envision things in my mind's eye that I just can't seem to recreate on paper. So there is a process of trying this, then that, then something else, and sometimes going back to the very first sketch I did and developing that.
MK: What was the most difficult illustration job you ever had to do?
JS: A cover for a science book. The author and publisher had very different ideas about what they wanted, and each sounded good in their own way. In the end, I kind of did my own thing, which was a collage using some old photos and then doing some ink enhancement.
MK: So there really can be a happy medium?
JS: Yes, there really can.
MK: Do you have any words of encouragement for artists who want to break into the illustration market?
JS: I guess the best I can offer would be, "don't give up." It can be quite difficult to get established as an illustrator, and you really have to rely on clients from all over the country -- all over the world. That takes time, and time means patience.
MK: Patience is virtue?
JS: Patience is everything.