The Beautiful illustrations of Virginia Sterrett

Just came across Virginia Sterrett's work, a dazzlingly talented female illustrator, and am just in love with her stuff. A contemporary of Kay Nielsen, she illustrated beautiful illustrations for a variety of picture books in the 1920s, including Tanglewood Tales, Old French Fairy Tales, and Arabian Nights.

She died remarkably young at only 31 of tuberculosis, and I found it so impressive to read her life story (especially being a female artist myself, working in California, like she did)- she was truly a talent- hope you find her as inspiring as I do! I love the way she handles the female form, the colors, the art deco lines, and the content (fairy tales, etc)

Biography
Flickr Set

EL HUERTO by Mik Baro

Not clear on if this is a poster or an illustration from a book, but from what I can gather, it's an illustation of a child's dream (Dream by Lucía/ SPAIN.)  (more info/ illustrations here and here ... via Drawn!)

I love it because of the horse theme, the bold colors, and striking beauty of the roots/nerves/blood system contrasting with the body and ground.

Kay Nielsen

Kay Nielsen is another Golden Age Illustrator who did gorgeous fairy tale illustrations in the first part of the 20th century.

I love his drawings for a lot of the same reasons that I like Dulac (content, colors, and Art Nouveau style), but Nielsen brings in a slightly more Asian aesthetic- he was apparently influenced by Japanese woodprints and Hiroshige.

Asifa-Hollywood archives has some great scans of a variety of his work
Twelve Dancing Princesses
East of the Sun West of the Moon
Hansel and Gretel

Edmund Dulac

I'm a huge fan of fairy tales and especially of the "Golden Age" of illustration, and Edmund Dulac is up there as one of my favorites.

I love the colors, lines, composition (love the simple way of blocking out fields of color) and subject matter (I'm a sucker for fairy tales). I really dig the influences of Pre-Raphealite techniques and Art Nouveau / Arts and Crafts design as well.

Images from Edmund Dulac Art Images (which include prints for sale)

Additional images can be found at Asifa-Hollywood animation archives