Illustration: Raymond Lemstra's characters make their way into an enormous book!

Date
23 April 2014

Raymond Lemstra is one of those illustrators who can do no wrong in our eyes; his incredibly fine detail, careful layers of shading and seamless combination of totemic robots with folkloric imagery makes for one hell of a package. So obviously we’re enormous fans of his new book Big Mother, published by Nobrow.

The book is a glorious A3 size, allowing Raymond’s illustration all the room it needs to breathe, and it contains an eclectic collection of the characters Raymond is best known for. He explains: "In childhood, one encounters and experiences many things for the first time. I try to bring back the sense of wonder we remember from being a child, bridging the young and mature, by creating a contained fantasy world populated by my characters.

“With my work I like to refer to the illustrative nature of primitive drawings and sculptures. What I find interesting about these is the distortion as a result of selective emphasis; parts of interest are emphasised, unimportant parts reduced or left out… A clash of intent, simultaneously assuming simplicity and complexity, randomness and reason, flaws and perfection. The purpose of which is to inspire a sense of joy and discovery.”

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Raymond Lemstra: Big Mother

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Raymond Lemstra: Big Mother

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Raymond Lemstra: Big Mother

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Raymond Lemstra: Big Mother, In Progress

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Raymond Lemstra: Big Mother, In Progress

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Raymond Lemstra: Big Mother

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About the Author

Maisie Skidmore

Maisie joined It’s Nice That fresh out of university in the summer of 2013 as an intern before joining full time as an Assistant Editor. Maisie left It’s Nice That in July 2015.

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