Shaun Tan

May 29, 2007 5:58 PM

The artwork of Shaun Tan. Of particular interest is his work on the award winning new picture book The Arrival, which uses photo-realistic graphite drawings alone to tell the story of a man who leaves an impoverished town to travel around the world. [via]
posted by Effigy2000 (21 comments total)

Wow.
posted by Kikkoman at 6:09 PM on May 29, 2007

Woooow. He seriously lets himself down with that irritating website. Those pencil illustrations are incredible.
posted by fire&wings at 6:34 PM on May 29, 2007

Those are very cool drawings. I would call them very detailed rather than photo-realistic. Never heard of the guy, so thanks for the post!
posted by Eekacat at 6:43 PM on May 29, 2007

Yeah, those drawings are gorgeous, but they're not photorealistic.
posted by Horace Rumpole at 7:05 PM on May 29, 2007

Neat stuff!
posted by brundlefly at 7:10 PM on May 29, 2007

WOW! Very, very cool, thanks, Effigy!
posted by jonson at 7:12 PM on May 29, 2007

Beautiful, very imaginative... love it.
posted by quazichimp at 7:16 PM on May 29, 2007

Cool post thanks, is the website really that annoying? I didn't find it so.
posted by mattoxic at 7:17 PM on May 29, 2007

"The Red Tree" is an amazing picture book, for either adults or children. Tan's an amazing artist and some of my friends who know him say he's a top bloke, too. Thanks for the post.
posted by bunglin jones at 7:19 PM on May 29, 2007

Oh wow. Those drawings are incredible, but as for photo-realistic, I just hope there aren't giant owls lurking around.
posted by grapefruitmoon at 7:23 PM on May 29, 2007

Those are beautiful illustrations. I was reminded of "The Triplets of Belleville" by the drawing of the ugly city.
posted by Kraftmatic Adjustable Cheese at 7:24 PM on May 29, 2007

I haven't been this moved by illustration work since discovery Chris VanAllsburg.

This is the best post in ages -thank you so much Effy.
posted by squidfartz at 7:35 PM on May 29, 2007

[this is DAMN good]
posted by katillathehun at 7:46 PM on May 29, 2007

I wish there were more illustrators with his level of technical skill that had that type of imagination. These drawings are beautiful, and I really like the paintings on his website too.
posted by invitapriore at 8:13 PM on May 29, 2007

STOP THE PRESS!!!

Top Aussie polemicist Andrew Bolt has issues with it. Though in typical Andrew style he won't say what the issues are, rather he'll blow the dog whistle, and let his neanderthal audience fill in the blanks. The artist is asian, the book is about immigration.
posted by mattoxic at 8:53 PM on May 29, 2007

"prize grunter?"

Huh?

Of all the posts on the mainpage, this is the one that should have 100+ comments. Amazing that anyone can find a way to take exception to this work -I'm interested in the response, but count me out.
posted by squidfartz at 9:15 PM on May 29, 2007

Those are beautiful illustrations: I just ordered a copy of Arrival: thanks, Effigy2000.
posted by misteraitch at 12:09 AM on May 30, 2007

mattoxic: "STOP THE PRESS!!!

Top Aussie polemicist Andrew Bolt has issues with it. Though in typical Andrew style he won't say what the issues are, rather he'll blow the dog whistle, and let his neanderthal audience fill in the blanks. The artist is asian, the book is about immigration."

Bolt is all about tenuous links when it comes to bashing the art world and this appears to be no exception. His issue seems to be that a book with no words won a prize from the NSW Premier when two years ago a Victorian syllabus suggested that reading a novel wasn't important to graduate high school.

I stopped caring about what Bolt said years ago. For our overseas readers, Bolt is our version of your Rush Limbaugh (if Rush wrote words in the paper). He's a right wing blow hard and as usual, he's pissing in the wind.

I'll wind up this comment with a link to another one of Shaun's pictures I particularly like; this one. Nice.
posted by Effigy2000 at 12:42 AM on May 30, 2007

There is one solid connection between Bolt's column and The Arrival. They're both improved by removing all the words.
posted by zamboni at 3:23 AM on May 30, 2007 [1 favorite has favorites]

Oh, and there goes Shaun's bandwidth limit. In the meantime, have a look at his mural in the Subiaco Public Library.
posted by zamboni at 3:29 AM on May 30, 2007

I was sent The Arrival by an Aussie friend last winter, and loved it. Shaun Tan is a genius, and deserves to be followed around by a friendly huge white winged tadpole thingy.
posted by Pallas Athena at 8:15 AM on May 30, 2007