Happy Holidays everyone! I hope you all got the art supplies you wanted and all the positive feedback from ADs you hoped for! While we sleep off the food comas, here’s a little holiday treat, in the form of my favorite holiday (and lesser-known) illustrator, Sheilah Beckett.

Most of the 12 days of Christmas in one spread

I have a 3 year old nephew and this is the first holiday season he can really appreciate, so as I was unpacking my Christmas decorations this year I took note of the children’s books I’ve saved that I loved, and ordered a few for him. Top of the list was this Twelve Days of Christmas book by Sheilah Beckett. And I realized, hey, I always loved these illustrations, but I’ve never looked her up!

To the internet!

There’s a pretty good overview of her bio at the Norman Rockwell Museum page which tells us she passed away in 2013 at age 100, but amazingly she did her last Golden Book for kids at age 99! She did a lot of advertising work and other commercial projects, but was most well known for her children’s book illustrations, especially the Twelve Dancing Princesses and Snow White, Rose Red.

 

She also did a number of illustrated book versions of Gilbert & Sullivan plays

Although she did a more painterly style for a lot of her advertising work, it was always her delicate linework and flat colored pieces that I love, and drew my eye even as a kid. No wonder I became such a fan of Art Nouveau. I don’t know whether her work was an influence on him or not, but you can see a similar kind of line in Quinton Hoover’s work, who was my favorite Magic: The Gathering artist long before I became a professional in the field and started looking at fantasy art more seriously. There’s definitely a “It’s a Small World” era of Disney feel to her work but it’s more sophisticated than that, even in the children’s work.

And as internet rabbit holes go, I found a more fun and adult side of Sheilah’s work! It seems she did a number of illustrations for the “Ribald Reader” series of paperbacks, an illustrated version of the “Six Wives of Henry the VIII” as well as an illustrated paperback of “Green Mansions” with a heavier ink style and you can really appreciate her line (and her sense of humor) in some of these:

 

 

 

There’s also an “Art of Sheilah Beckett” Facebook page run by her family. Thanks also to @outridercreative on Instagram who just recently posted a video reminding me of her work.

 

I was happy to find so many of her illustrations online, and I’ve already ordered a few vintage copies of her books.

Enjoy! And have a restful holiday!