Book Cover – 826 Valencia + De Marillac Academy
Last Spring I began working with 826 Valencia to illustrate a book cover for the De Marillac Academy, a middle school in the Tenderloin neighborhood of San Francisco. And I have a history with this organization as I read there when I was just beginning to work in kid lit and I took my son and his class on a field trip there over 12 years ago.
The thing I remember back then was that the folks who started the org had a sense of duty and wonder. Duty in that they were taking it seriously; the charge to encourage literacy and creative writing. And wonder, in that their organization was housed in a pirate ship! Imagine pirate jokes and 4th graders telling you that they are “published”.
And they still have that dedication as this book is one of several published anthologies of creative writing by middle school students. Here’s the synopsis:
“In these vibrant poems, students in grades 6-8th from De Marillac Academy explore their own potential and the comfort of the things they hold dear. They find refuge in the bounces of a basketball and uncover a quiet hero in a cherished eyelash curler. In these pages you’ll find heartfelt declarations of love to their beds and a tenderness towards the quiet world their headphones offer. Students imagine life through the delicate wings of a butterfly, the sharp mind of a beloved teacher, and even providing hope as a lawyer. No matter who holds the narrative today, in the future they are building, these students assert one thing is for sure, they’ll be the ones.
Here’s a bit of process art from the making of the cover.
Shout out to Amanda Boesen and Lucy Goseline-Ratliff who assisted me in narrowing down and refining the sketch until it was right.
You can see the line work here and the color directions. Ultimately it ended up being a combination of colors. The uniforms for the actual students are red and grey though so thats what we ended up using.
And heres the final cover illustration! My fav poem from the book was called “lies” and I loved all the pieces about their video games, favorite foods, etc.
About the organization that does this work and commissioned this art:
826 Valencia equips students with writing skills to create change.
We are a nonprofit organization dedicated to supporting under-resourced students ages six to eighteen with their creative and expository writing skills and to helping teachers inspire their students to write.
Our services are structured around the understanding that great leaps in learning can happen with individualized attention and that strong writing skills are fundamental to future success.
And with chapters in:
- Boston
- Chicago
- Washington DC
- Los Angeles
- Michigan
- Minneapolis
- New Orleans
- NYC
and the founding chapter San Francisco (Bay Areaaaaaa) they are taking the task to the next level.
Dig this? Check out this book cover I did for Robert Alexander’s book “He Hit Me First” OR the cover of Libros Solidarios written by Luz Yadira Herrera and Carla España.
