Louis Joos: Belgium ★ Illustrator

Louis Joos was born in Brussels in 1940. He did not complete his formal education at the Academy of Beaux-Arts in Brussels, because he felt that he was learning no new technical skills and was not developing as a person either. However he did work as an assistant in the engraving classes at the Academy, and a passion for working in black and white has remained with him ever since. His earliest years as a professional artist were spent illustrating educational books. In the 1980s, he began producing comics, and returned to the black and white tones he discovered when he was teaching engraving. Since then, he has branched out and uses a wide variety of different techniques and color schemes.

In his picture books from the 1990s onwards, Joos blends a variety of very different artistic media including graphite, Indian ink, watercolors, acrylic and occasionally unusual illustration media such as ballpoint pens. The bold black lines of his early work in comics are still present in many of the works, defining the central figures and objects, and shedding light on the characters’ emotions. These lines do not, however, rigidly define the limits. The colors of the landscapes and minor objects merge and flow to give expression to the mood of the narrative. The result has a tactile quality; one can almost feel the thick ridges of paint or the softness of the lightly worked charcoal.

Many of Joos’s illustrations are inspired by places, paintings, New Wave cinema and music, especially jazz. Jazz creeps into his illustrations in the smoky atmospheres and his focus on the darker aspects of life in many of his works. Allusions to van Gogh are made overt in Le Voyage d’Oregon [Oregon’s Journey]. He also cites Rembrandt, Goya, and James Ensor as artists who have inspired him. The inspiration provided by Ensor’s masked characters is evident in Joos’s illustrations of Norac’s Inuit story Angakkea, the bird man. But sometimes Joos comes closer to home and his illustrations of a recently divorced father enjoying the company of his children for the weekend in C’est un Papa [He’s a Daddy] allude more to children’s own art and toys than to the great masters. In each piece, Joos attempts to adapt his style to reflect their emotional timbre.