This Book Thinks You're an Artist is one of the rare books on the market to combine art history with practical activities on the page. It asks the reader to imagine their eccentric-artist alter-ego before working through six key topics: painting, sculpture, illustration, decorative art, photography and contemporary art. Each spread centres on a different technique for producing a piece of art, and relates the activity back to a famous artist or movement in a light-hearted and playful tone. Activities include making a Bruegel circus, playing a Surrealist game, selling a scribble for a million pounds and painting your face like a Russian Futurist. A section of paper-based crafts at the end of the book includes a kit to build a camera obscura.
About the Illustrator:
Illustrator Harriet Russell studied illustration at Glasgow School of Art and Central Saint Martins in London where she completed her MA in 2001.
She has worked for a variety of clients in the UK, US and Europe, including Phaidon press, Penguin books, Harper Collins, Random House, Simon and Schuster, John Murray Publishing, The Guardian, Independent on Sunday, Time Out, Persol, Radley and Sainsbury's Magazine.
As well as commissioned work, Harriet has written and illustrated several of her own books, including 5 children's titles for Italian publisher Edizioni Corraini. She also collaborated with Corraini on a project with the Canadian Centre for Architecture, Montreal, contributing an illustrated children's tale to their exhibition catalogue for 'Sorry out of gas: Architecture' response to the 1973 oil Crisis'.
Her book of creatively addressed mail 'Envelopes a puzzling journey through the Royal Mail' was published in the US by Random House in 2005, and London in 2008 by Allison and Busby, and was launched with exhibitions in both London and New York.
Other work of note includes illustrations for Italian cookery book 'The Silver Spoon for Children' published by Phaidon press, and 'Sixty Impossible things before lunch' published by Edizioni Corraini.
She has a lighthearted and sometimes slightly surreal approach, often combining a quirky humour or a sense of irony into her images. Hand drawn lettering, words and wordplay are also an important part of her work.
She is represented by Central Illustration Agency in London and Bernstein and Andriulli in New York.
