Marla Frazee
American
Marla Frazee is the author-illustrator of A Couple of Boys Have the Best Week Ever, which received a Caldecott Honor Award and a Boston Globe-Horn Book Honor, Roller Coaster, Walk On!, Santa Claus: The World's Number One Toy Expert, and The Boss Baby. She is also the illustrator of many books, including the Stars, Caldecott Honor-awarded All the World, The Seven Silly Eaters, and the acclaimed Clementine series written by .
She graduated from Art Center College of Design in Pasadena, where she has also been teaching children’s book illustration for 20 years. She and her husband have three sons, a dog, and a cat. She works in a small studio cabin in their backyard under an avocado tree.
Author's Comment
You’ve said you’d like your work to appear as “fresh as paint, but to have been around long enough to be a classic.” How do you accomplish this in your illustrations?
This is a hard question! No one has ever asked me that before.
I work on the book’s structure before I know what the content of each illustration will be. I think there was a formality to the classic books I admire and I try to riff on (or out-and-out rip off!) some aspect of that with each book. I never just wing it when it comes to structure – and I’m referring here to the pagination and layout of words and pictures within the picture book form. I plan it out, using the rhythm and meaning of the manuscript to dictate what the relationship between words and pictures should be on the page.