David: Well, for example, I brought along some sketches actually just to show some of my process which always starts out with the idea that what I’m about to do is absolutely impossible and I might as well forget about it. That’s number one. And then having a contract signed is always sort of like having a flame thrower aimed at your backside. And so the only thing to do about that is to overcome your fear and get down to work. And I knew that this book, for example had to begin with a sorrowful moment, a moment of parting; a Mexican family being torn apart.
The dad having gotten a job in the states, in the steel mills, and him taking away his wife from her sister and his daughter from the sister who was her auntie. And so I didn’t want to begin with a sad moment, although it was necessary. So I knew I wanted to start with this embrace between the women. But I thought I should make that part sad, but I’ll make the setting gay, I’ll make it colorful, Mexican. And so I put this vase of flowers and a bowl of fruit and a typical Mexican tapestry on the table and then sort of grayed things out and showed the embrace between the three women.
The old mom, Sarah’s correcting my grammar. Here’s old grammar sitting in the corner. And the men are carrying the suitcases out the door. But as I looked at this over the days I was quite proud of those flowers and fruit, but I didn’t like the picture very much and I thought, yeah, that’s because this is actually a portrait of flowers and fruit, it doesn’t really center on
So I tried another version. And I took them all outside the house this time, expanded it, showed the street, showed the house from the outside, the embrace is happening here on the porch. And this is actually better because you can actually see the car with dad putting things into it and the brother helping. But actually the way I drew the house it didn’t look like a place that one would feel very bad about leaving. So I tried a third version where the women are embracing inside again, but you see them through an arch and you can see I’ve made a much more fanciful house.
This is actually a house that is on the street where we live in Mexico. And you can see Chavo bringing the suitcases down to dad who’s loading up the car. So it’s a little more interesting. And I stuck with that pretty much for the final. But this became the first end paper, so it’s a double page spread and I focus the reader’s attention on the good bye embrace with light and everything else is happening at this kind of blue hour just before dawn.
So that the packing of the car and dad working very hard to tie the chairs onto the packages and so on and you can see a bit of the street and the mountains beyond, the sun just
well, the moon is still up. But suddenly this sorrowful moment became to me a magical moment because of the color, the wash of the Prussian blue and indigos and blacks and the stars in the sky. There’s something sad going on, yes, but it’s in a paradise, a visual, magical place.
Sarah: It’s lovely.
David: So if you can imagine the torment that I went through over days trying to work this out. It’s really not torment at all. It’s a lot of fun. This is always the best part of the book is doing the sketches and doing the research. But this is typical of what goes on in every page. And, of course, none of it should show up in the final book. The final book should look as if you just picked it up off the shelf and it’s happening as you’re turning the page and it all happens in ten minutes. But actually it takes me about a year to illustrate a book, a 32-page book
Sarah: And burn about a thousand pages of drawings.
David: My waste basket and my burn barrel are my two important tools in my studio.
