Tadahiro Uesugi

Finally, I got round to watching the film, Coraline having read both the book and the graphic novel - Craig P. Russell's illustrations are gorgeous.Yet, tucked away in the special features the animators talked about the work of Tadahiro Uesugi. Some one I have never heard of, but the illustrations just knocked me sideways.

It reminds me of my early discovery of Paul Hogarth's illustrations with pen and ink. Uesugi combines both this 'scratch-like' pen manship, but harks by to a 50s style. I can see how it might have been used for the silk screen with the stuck fantastic colour. The colour is subtle, but it also pulls your eye to it. Sometimes you think the clash of colour, but it works.

I hesitate to be cliched to say how different the perspective to a western eye and reminds me of the prints of the 'Floating World'. The use of white space within the image is fantastic.