Illustrator and Manchester School of Art graduate Georgina Reynolds has already completed her first children’s picture book with the award-winning author Oliver Sykes. She explains her creative process and what to expect from the story about a young girl’s fight for equality.
WRITTEN BY: DOM CARTER
13 JULY 2023
It’s been a busy couple of years for 22-year-old illustrator Georgina Reynolds. As well as finishing her studies at Manchester School of Art, she’s also spent the last six months creating illustrations for Oliver Sykes’s latest book, Fishing for Rainbows.
Telling the story of a little girl called Kezia who stands up for herself and proves what she’s worth in defiance of all the odds and expectations stacked against her, Fishing for Rainbows is pitched at children between 7 and 12. And upon its release, five hundred copies will be gifted to children from low-income, single-parent and care-experienced backgrounds.
Georgina became involved with the book after pitching her ideas against 12 other students from her Illustration and Animation degree course. Her unique mixed media style impressed the judges, who included the book’s award-winning author Oliver Sykes.
“My style of illustration is characterised primarily by its materiality – in short, the materials I used when creating the illustrations are the things that mostly define my work,” she explains. “I try to draw on a variety of influences, but the impressionist art movement is one that I would say has had the most impact on my work.
“I keep visible expressive strokes and intended pencil scribbles at the surface of my work to create something that resembles the subjects I draw from, but still show my own point of view and energy.”