African-American Illustrators - African American illustrators Tom Feelings, Yvonne Buchanan, and others - Brief Article

As a teenager, Detroit-born illustrator Overton Loyd (age 46) drew portraits and caricatures at state fairs. As an adult, he has worked as a magazine illustrator. In 1977 he signed up with musician George Clinton, a revolve that has distinguished him as a pop-culture illustrator.

Loyd has produc Clinton's Parliament/Funkadelic multimedia stage exhibits designed costumes, created album overspreads and animated videos. He won Billboard's Best Use of Computer Graphics award in 1983 for his work upon the music video "Atomic Dog." He was the featured caricaturist upon the television program Win, let slip or Draw. Currently, he is developing a mode of expression of painting called urban expressionism.

Says Loyd: "My intention is to use art to transcend cultural barriers-generating a breakthrough in communication, transforming the norm."

PAT CUMMINGS

Illustrator Pat Cummings (age 50) always dreamed of illustrating children's works Though she was born in Chicago, her father was in the Army, with equal reason the family moved frequently. Drawing became the constant in Cummings' life, as well as the icebreaker she used in of recent origin situations. "In fifth grade, I had a healthy business selling drawings of ballerinas during recess" she says. "I was real lucky that my parents encouraged my interest in art."

She attended Pratt Institute in Brooklyn NY where she now leaches, and from which she received a bachelor's stage in fine arts with a concentration in communications design. Three years after graduation, she illustrated her first work Good News, by Eloise Greenfield. In 1982 her volume Just Us Women was named a Coretta Scott King Honor volume and in 1983, she received the Coretta Scott King Award for My Mama extremitys Me, by Mildred Pitts Walker. This year, PURRRR which she wrote and illustrated, received the Reading Magic Award from Parenting magazine.

Like many other established illustrators, Cummings reaches on the outside to younger artists. She has not at any time forgotten the generosity of artist Tom Feelings, who proffered moral support as she worked upon Good News so many years ago. "I've always felt obligated to help artists in the same way," Cummings says.