In the Fall of 2019 I retired from teaching K-12 art in a rural northern MN county school district. Upon retirement I set some personal challenges for myself as an artist, one being to illustrate children’s books. To do this I needed to see if I could paint a body of work to illustrate a story. I started out by painting the many steps required to make a Swedish Princess Cake.

Even though we grew up in a Swedish-American home, we never had Swedish Princess Cake. Raspberries grew in our backyard, handmade Danish modern furniture, and the occasional Carl Larsson print on the wall. The idea of making a Princess Cake only became interesting a few years ago. The intention of this series of paintings was to see if I could create a continuous visual story – one that had people that looked the same throughout; food that looked the same, with colors and composition consistent throughout. As a graphic designer, I also wanted to see what these illustrations would look like in a book. It was to be an example for publishers of what I could do for them. So, I designed, layed out and produced the book “How to Make a Swedish Princess Cake”.

Creating the images was pure joy. I needed something that was fun and that I wanted to do. It took over 4 months to complete the illustrations and another couple months to complete the layout of the book. Then came the “Stay at Home” order of Covid-19.

Luckily I had all the work done. I was able to “shop” the book around on-line to publishers but received no interest. The work done, I looked for an opportunity to publish the book myself. Eventually, in late Spring 2020 I had it printed at Shel-Don, Duluth. 

I continue to work towards my goal of illustrating books. Recently completing a series of 100 “Essential Worker Portraits” pastel drawings of the people asked to continue working while unvaccinated, often paid minimum wage with no health care. Not only was the subject of this series important to me but my drawing skills continue to improve. Composition skills were challenged with each new portrait as I drew subjects and places I hadn’t drawn before.

Currently I am working on new illustrations for “The Piano Lesson” – an illustrated silent book. I continue to push my ability as an artist to tell a story.