GRAHAME BAKER-SMITH

Grahame Baker Smith studied at Berkshire College of Art and Design. Deciding to pursue a career as a freelance illustrator meant that he had to teach himself the craft of illustration, working in a tiny Oxford bedsit and often buying his paints instead of the paraffin for his heater.

Grahame has now illustrated a number of adult titles (including an H.G. Wells trilogy), does regular illustration work for magazines and creates stunning children's book illustrations. Constantly experimenting with different styles of illustration, Grahame likes to challenge conventional boundaries with his artwork.

Grahame currently lives in Bath, with his wife Linda.

FREYA BLACKWOOD

Freya Blackwood is an illustrator of children's books. She was born in Edinburgh and grew up in Orange in NSW, Australia. The daughter of a painter and an architect, she was encouraged to draw and paint from a young age. Freya completed a degree in Design (Visual Communications) at the University of Technology, Sydney (UTS) where she became interested in filmmaking. She worked for several years in the special effects industry in Sydney and then in Wellington, New Zealand, where she worked for Weta Workshop on The Lord of the Rings Trilogy.

In 2002 she began illustrating books and has illustrated about ten picture books, several of which have been published in numerous countries. Her books have won awards in the Children's Book Council of Australia awards.

Freya currently lives back in Australia, in the town where she grew up. She has a studio out in the backyard where she draws and paints. She has a young daughter who is a fabulous inspiration.

You can find out more at her website www.freyablackwood.net

OLIVER JEFFERS

Oliver Jeffers was born in Western Australia in 1977 and bred in Belfast, Northern Ireland. He now lives in New York and has travelled the globe extensively, exhibiting his work in New York, Sydney, Melbourne, London, Belfast and Glengormley.

Whilst taking a break from university, Oliver settled in Sydney, Australia and got his big break, when Lavazza Coffee Company saw his offbeat coffee illustrations and commissioned him to paint pictures for them. They also featured him in a live exhibition during a coffee festival, where he illustrated in front of thousands of people using coffee rings and black ink.

Oliver finished his degree at the University of Ulster, graduating with a First Class Honours Degree in Illustration and Visual Communication. During his final year, he had a prominent exhibition of portraiture in the John Hewitt Bar in Belfast, entitled 'Boys at the Bar' depicting the drinking culture of Belfast. It attracted a great deal of media attention and all 16 pieces sold on the opening night. More information about Oliver is available at: www.oliverjeffers.com

SATOSHI KITAMURA

Satoshi Kitamura was born in 1956 in Tokyo. When he was young he read comics and these have had a great influence on his style. He was also influenced by anything visual from a tin of sardines to the fine art of the East and the West. He was not trained as an artist, but worked as a commercial artist in Japan, as an illustrator for adverts and magazines. He moved to London in 1979 and worked mainly at designing greetings cards. He started illustrating for Andersen Press in 1981. At this time he had an exhibition of his work at the Neal Street Gallery in Covent Garden, which Klaus Flugge visited and showed him the text of ANGRY ARTHUR.

ANGRY ARTHUR, written by Hiawyn Oram, was published in 1982 to great acclaim and has gone on to write and illustrate many books for Andersen Press.

Satoshi has also produced illustrations for EUREKA! The Museum for Children in Halifax. He designs cards and many stationery products. He was also commissioned to design posters for the underground in Tokyo. His work is included in the current exhibition of Japanese Picture Book Illustration at the Centre for the Children's Book in Newcastle-Upon-Tyne.

His picture book SHEEP IN WOLVES' CLOTHING was adapted into the television series SHEEEP! Which was shown on ITV.

More information about Satoshi is available at www.satoshiland.com

DAVE MCKEAN

Dave McKean was born in Taplow, Berkshire in 1963. He attended Berkshire College of Art and Design from 1982-86 and, before leaving, started working as an illustrator.

In 1986 he met author Neil Gaiman with whom he has collaborated on many projects since. Dave has illustrated and designed many children's books including five with Neil Gaiman; The Day I Swapped My Dad for Two Goldfish, Coraline, The Wolves in the Walls, Mirrormask and Crazy Hair. Dave has exhibited work in America and Europe.

CHRIS RIDDELL

Illustrator, writer and political cartoonist Chris Riddell was awarded both the Smarties Silver Award and the CILIP Kate Greenaway Medal for Pirate Diary (written by Richard Platt). He also won the CILIP Kate Greenaway Medal for Jonathan Swift's Gulliver (retold by Martin Jenkins). Chris illustrates the hugely successful Edge Chronicles (written by Paul Stewart) and is the author and illustrator of the Ottoline series. His first work for Bloomsbury was the illustrations for Neil Gaiman's The Graveyard Book. Chris lives in Brighton with his wife, three children and imaginary dog.

DAVID ROBERTS

Born in Liverpool, England in 1970, I worried a lot as a child about everything. I was happy at school until I was 11 years old and I hated high school. I left school when I was 16 and went to art school.

I went to college in Manchester to study fashion design, and while I was there I shared a house with two children's book illustrators, Gillian Tyler and Dominic Mansell, they were both older than me , and I was very inspired by their work, I think the seed was sown then that took me away from a career in fashion design and into illustration .

I have been very lucky as an illustrator to be offered such a variety of stories to illustrate. I enjoy the darker stuff I get like the Tales of terror books by Chris Priestly , were I can really try and get a sense of tension and drama into the images, but with out giving to much away ,and only using black and white tone. It is a real challenge that I hope I have achieved.

VIVIANE SCHWARZ

I was born in Hannover, Germany, but my family moved to a smaller town almost at once. I somehow worked out how to read when I was four, and by the trick of holding the books upside down I managed to hide that skill for some time, so I got to read some really exciting books before school. School wasn't so exciting, but I managed to read more books under the table secretly. After school I really felt like going somewhere else. I decided to go to England because I figured that I'd learned good English from reading lots of American science fiction novels. I now live in London

My favourite thing is to see someone laugh at one of my books. There are a lot of frightening things in the world, and I think my job is to find the happy things curled up in the corners. That can be quite hard work, but then I get to put them to paper and have them printed in a book so they are more easily found again, and that is great fun.

I like drawing with brushes and ink and being surprised by what comes out. Sometimes I am not in a mood for surprises, then I draw with a pencil instead and spend ages on it, but to be honest it still never ends up looking quite like I thought it would. I don't think it has to look like I imagined, as long as it says what I mean.

For more information visit Viviane's website www.vivianeschwarz.co.uk