Blog Tour - First Names: Nelson (Mandela): Q&A with illustrator Nicole Miles
The short answer is university. The longer answer is that my dad is Welsh and my family went on vacations to the UK every few years as I was growing up, so the UK was always one of the places I was considering for study.
Who or what inspired you to become an artist?
To be honest, it's not something I was 'inspired' to do so much as it was just something that was always in my life. I enjoyed drawing as a kid and just kept doing it. I guess I saw feasible steps towards this career and decided to try taking them.
I realise that's a terribly boring and practical-minded answer! There were, certainly, people and things that shifted my creative direction throughout my life, but I can’t even remember what set me on this path to begin with other than never being discouraged from it.
You went freelance only last year. How has it been and are you glad you took the plunge?
It's been amazing! I am so incredibly lucky because freelancing can be such a terrifying and perilous thing to jump into and somehow, due to some very fortunate timing, I was able to just hit the ground running.
That said, my previous employed work can't really be divorced from where I am now. I learned skills from working for other people (whether in my numerous minimum-wage jobs or as a salaried designer) and, most importantly, those jobs allowed me to set myself up in terms of time to hone my craft, to build my portfolio and to shore myself up financially so that jumping into freelance was much less risky than if I'd just gone straight into it.
David Fickling Books actually got in touch about a different book in the series but then there ended up being a bit of a switching around. When they asked if I'd be interested in illustrating for the Nelson Mandela volume instead, I stayed on board.
Tell us about your process for creating the book's comic-style illustrations.
We went through a few iterations for the feel of the book. The first few passes felt too 'educational' (in a stiff way) and I'm glad that DFB chose to go in a more fun direction because that's where I feel happiest to play around with visual humour — which I think is also more engaging for children.
In general, I don't really think much about style so much as whether the images are intelligible and fun. So in the sketch process, I'm mostly thinking about how to make the characters' bodies dynamic and the scene energetic while making it clear what's going on in the whole scene. I also tend to go straight from very rough sketch to worked-up final. Here's an example of some sketching:
And here's the final spread in the book:
Is this the first children's book you've worked on? If so, is it something you'd like to do more of? Graphic novels perhaps?
It's actually not the first children's book I've worked on but it was the first for this age group. I am actually currently working on a few more children's book projects across a variety of age groups and it's definitely something I enjoy and would like to continue doing. Graphic novels are a huge, intimidating but super-exciting thing I'd like to dive into. Maybe soon!
Are there any challenges you face when working in black and white, particularly when portraying Black or brown-skinned characters?
No, not really. Though I guess with printed work, in particular, you can never really go too dark with skin tone otherwise a lot of detail might be lost due to the physical constraints of printing. But I think challenges for content featuring Black and brown characters, in general, lie largely with the fact that some audiences think stories featuring certain groups are only for readers of those groups. In reality, just like how white characters have become the default that all people are accustomed to relating to, anyone can and should be able to relate to characters of all backgrounds.
How much research did you have to do, to bring Mandela's story to life in drawings?
A lot of research went into this! And it goes beyond things like 'what does tribal dress for X region look like?' or 'what did this person look like?' I remember searching for things along the lines of 'popular cars in 19XXs South Africa', 'South African courtroom interiors', or '19XXs South African mineworker' and not expecting it to be so difficult to get good reference material. There was a lot of back and forth on the matchbox rig Nelson used in prison for clandestine communication too!
What's your take on the representation of Black people/cultures in children's literature?
It's important of course, and there's no one way to do it. Black children need to be able to see themselves and their heroes, villains, nerds, creatives, etc., represented. But children who aren't Black also benefit hugely from seeing Black people in books as three-dimensional humans that they too can relate to and feel represented by.
You wear many hats: illustrator, cartoonist, hand-letterer, and designer. Which is your favourite hat to wear, and why?
Ha-ha, good question! It might be too hard for me to choose…I love making things so even many of my hobbies — analogue photography, sewing, knitting, etc. — embody that love of making. The variety keeps things from ever feeling monotonous. I probably identify most strongly with 'illustrator' though.
Excuse my ignorance but what exactly is a hand-letterer and where can we experience this intriguing craft of yours?
Hand-lettering is often the thing that people point to and say: 'What a cool custom font!' Without getting pedantic, when you think of those great hand-painted signs on vintage shops or fairground rides, that's often hand-lettering. And there are some great contemporary examples of it too. Places you might spot hand-lettering are book covers, indie café signs, wall murals, packaging, or greetings cards!
Each letter is drawn by hand and the entire word or phrase is approached in much the same way that one might approach any other drawing. No computer font manipulation involved. I'm not sure if that's just more confusing…here is an example from me:
What one art tool could you not live without?
My second-hand refurbished iPad Pro, with second-hand Apple Pencil. Without exaggeration, it is the best investment I have ever made. A debate often pops up in creative circles about whether digital artwork is real art or cheating somehow. As though you turn on a program, hit a magical key and the work just springs forth! Ha-ha!
My process is able to be faster and more professional thanks to digital — and more fluid and portable thanks to the iPad in particular. When I went home to The Bahamas in September of 2019 to visit family, I was able to take all my work with me which makes impromptu vacations more possible without dropping the ball on anything (though portability is less a priority now in Covid lockdown!).
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| Self-portrait by Nicole Miles |
It's a sort of vague answer but just getting to where I am right now. I've worked with a lot of clients that I never dreamt I'd work with. A lot of work over a long time went into my being able to do what I'm doing now, and I'm very proud of who I am and what I'm doing.
Can you tell us about any other projects you've got coming up for 2021?
I Love You More than Plunder is a board book by Kyle Sullivan for kids aged five and up and that's out now. I also illustrated a book by Susan Hughes called Walking for Water about a Malawi boy who learns about gender equality, which should be coming out 1st of June.
Then in September, there's a fun middle-grade novel Alley & Rex by Joel Ross. I'm not sure if I can mention anything else, but there are a lot of other fun projects following those as well!
Nelson (Mandela), written by Nansubuga N Ishdahl and illustrated by Nicole Miles, is available for purchase now from Bookshop.
Thanks to Nicole Miles and David Fickling Books for kind permission to use the artwork in this post.
Yay, Nicole! It's so great to read about your process and your future plans.
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