"Vampire: Braced"

Acrylics on Clear Acrylic Glass and Stretched Upholstery Fabric
18 x 12 inches

This is an illustration from my children's book, "James's Book of Unscary Monsters." The story follows our young hero named James who encounters classic scary monsters and uses his imagination to deconstruct them, often with hilarious results. In this case, the "unscary" vampire ends up in braces.

The process is unique in that the backgrounds for all the illustrations are painted on stretched upholstery fabric. The scary and unscary monsters are painted on clear acrylic glass and placed over the painted fabric, similar to having an animation cell over a painted background. In this case, the scary and unscary vampire share the same yellow fabric background.

This is a project that I had a concept for while a student at RISD. I always loved the idea and revisited the project in 2012, writing the entire story, settling on all the monsters to include and sketching them out. Putting the project aside for another 12 years, I came back to it again in 2024, this time I had children and my son James became the protagonist of my story. I spent the better part of 2024 illustrating the entire book and self-published it in September, 2024. It is a passion project that I am so happy to have made a reality!