EXTRACTS: Illustrators issue 14 © 2016 The Book Palace (96 PAGES in Full edition)

17 BELOW: Troubles with Heroes (2009), oil on linen, 24” x 20”, done for the ‘Silent Heroes’ exhibition at the Iguapop Gallery in Barcelona, Spain. I try to re-draw it by eye, it gets very stiff. So I loosely trace out my rough on to the drawing paper so I get that gestural quality and freeness that was there in the tiny drawing". If it’s a painting, she will stop there and transfer it to a canvas. “But, if it is a drawing for a rock poster I’ll refine it even more because that drawing will have a lot of rough edges and be a little messier, having a lot of erase marks. So then I’ll scan that again, and retrace a nicer line onto a final piece of paper. Then I make a really tight drawing that will be good for a screen-print.” Nonetheless, Tarawearsmany hats, being not only a painter and illustrator, but a comic book artist, gig poster artist for rock bands, toy designer and, since 2011, she transformed her Williamsburg studio into the Cotton Candy Machine, a Brooklyn-based retro-style art boutique that serves as a gallery for exhibitions and a showcase for cool merchandise such as books, posters, prints, T-shirts, and toys by Tara and other local talent. She also did a mural in Rome, has done solo gallery presentations and, as if that weren’t enough, she has taught in the illustration department at Parsons for 4 years. Born in San Francisco and raised in Los Angeles, Tara has been drawing Text continues on page 20