By Isabel Estrada O’Hagin
It’s time to celebrate National Hispanic Heritage Month,
Sept. 15-Oct.15! In recent years, I have focused on the book titles of some of
my favorite authors such as Donna Barba Higuera, Yuri Morales, and Elizabeth
Acevedo. This year, I spoke with author-illustrator, Jacqueline Alcántara,
whose work, which often features diverse characters, has already earned her
plenty of kudos.
We’d love to
learn more about you and your background.
I’m
from Chicago but spend a lot of time in Southwest Michigan, and I lived in
Detroit for a year (2021). I was part of the SCBWI Michigan for a brief time! [I
remember sending Jacqueline our Welcome to SCBWI-MI letter back then]. I
studied art education at DePaul but only taught for a year before I was laid
off and then started to pursue illustration while simultaneously doing a lot of
random jobs - framing, art gallery, hospitality, TV (Chicago Fire, of course).
I took the dive into focusing full time on illustration around 2016. I also
teach illustration at Columbia College Chicago.
I’m curious. . . when did you know you wanted to be an
illustrator? Was there a turning point where you “didn’t
look back?”
After I was laid
off from teaching, I discovered “illustration” from a website a friend shared
with me. I decided then that I wanted to give myself the time and space to find
out who I was as an artist. I took a summer intensive at Parsons in New York
and then took Continuing Educations classes at SAIC when I returned that fall.
I took a handful of classes but really think my education in publishing and
illustration came from SCBWI conferences and critique groups and a WNDB
mentorship I landed in 2016. That was the year I “didn’t look back.”
Several of
your Instagram posts are about upcoming publications and receiving recognition
for past publications. For example, Solimar: The Sword of the
Monarchs by Pam Muñoz Ryan sat on my shelf. Solimar’s stunning portrait on the front cover was one of the
reasons I picked it up from the bookshelf. Only recently, did I learn you
illustrated the book cover! What are some of your past and future projects our
readers will want to know about?
My forthcoming
book, titled Just Shine, released 9/9/25 was written by Supreme
Court Justice Sonia Sotomayor. Also published this year was my
author/illustrator debut titled Tíos and Primos (published
simultaneously in Spanish as Tíos Y Primos). I have illustrated 9 books in
total, my 10th book is the one I'm currently finishing up titled Wifredo's
Jungle, a biography
of Cuban artist Wifredo Lam written by Margarita Engle. My past titles that
I've illustrated include The Field and its companion Climb
On!, both written by Baptiste Paul; Freedom Soup, written by
New York Times bestselling author Tami Charles; Jump at the Sun, written
by Newbery honoree (and Detroit native!) Alicia D. Williams; Your Mama,
written by NoNieqa Ramos, which was a finalist for the Kirkus Prize; Jam,
Too written by Janay Brown Wood; and Ordinary Days, a
biography of Prince written by Angela Joy.
Quite an
impressive list! Congratulations on your many honors. You’ve worked with
several well-known authors. Did you get to meet any of them in person or
virtually? Also, I’m wondering if your agent was instrumental in making these
connections or did editors or authors request your work directly?
Yes! To answer
your first question: I have met Justice Sotomayor as I was invited to her
office at the Supreme Court to look through her family photo albums while doing
research for Just Shine. It was incredible— I never thought a career as
an illustrator would bring me to collaborating with someone so impressive and
beloved. I have met most of the authors I have worked with— I love to do events
with them during book launch and still have great friendships with a number of
them today.
But yes, my
agent, Adriana Dominguez, was very instrumental in all of these book deals.
While perhaps it was the editor who shared my work with the authors directly,
it was my agent who is always out there advocating for us, sharing our work and
fostering relationships with editors to keep us top of mind when the perfect
manuscript falls onto their desk.
Amazing!
Meeting Justice Sotomayor in her office at the Supreme Court! And how fortunate
to collaborate with Super-Agent Adriana Dominguez who believes in you and your
work.
Describe your
typical workday in the studio.
Well, I now have
an 8-month-old baby so my workdays are very different than they used to be!
Long gone are the mornings where I sit with coffee, jot down my daily goals, do
a little sketch, write down some thoughts, and take my dogs for a relaxed
stroll before having a long day in my home studio playing around with
materials, ideas and then maybe heading out for some research at a museum,
gallery, bookstore, or bar.
My workday now
consists of jotting down ideas in my phone whenever a spare moment allows and
squeezing an 8-hour workday into maybe 3 or 4 hours! But wow I feel like I'm
getting more efficient with my time and perhaps actually appreciating how my
art style is changing with limited time. I've long wanted to have more of an
intuitive approach to making my final art and with less time to mull over
details, I think I'm naturally achieving that! Ha!
I’m glad to hear you’re making
it work and that your stylistic approach reflects these changes in your lives.
Who are some
of the major influencers on your work, and who are some of your favorite
illustrators?
Illustrators I
love: Patricia Polacco— her people are illustrated with such personality and
movement. I've loved her books since I was a kid. Chris Rashcka - same as
above. I've long been obsessed with his style, people, and characters. Not to
mention his style of writing is what I hope to achieve— he has a contagious
rhythm in everything he creates. Olivier Tallec— his artwork made me fall in
love with using gouache. Picasso/Matisse—I know what a cliché to list them as favorite artists but
I did a study abroad in Barcelona and spent a lot of time looking at Picasso
sketchbooks and just love his way of drawing. I think too a lot about his
famous quote: " It took me four years to paint like Raphael but a lifetime
to draw like a child.” So many other artists and illustrators I'd like to keep
mentioning. For each book I do, I love the research the most, and in the
process I’m always discovering other artists
that become inspirational for that and future projects.
In addition to
SCBWI, you’re a member of Las Musas, a
collective of Latinx women and otherwise marginalized people whose gender
identity aligns with femininity, writing and/or illustrating in traditional
children's literature. What does being a member mean to you?
I'm thrilled to
be a part of Las Musas. While as an illustrator I have a nice number of books
under my belt, I'm a debut author this year and so I finally applied to be a
part of the group. It's wonderful to know you have a network of fellow creators
to ask questions, get advice, read each other’s
books to get ratings/reviews, etc. I'm looking forward to meeting many Musas at
the upcoming Latinx Storytellers conference in NYC.
[Note: The Latinx
Storytellers conference met Sept. 12-13 at the NYC Scholastics Headquarters.]
The Las Musas
collective spotlights the new contributions of Las Musas in the canon of
children's literature and celebrates the diversity of voice, experience, and
power in our communities. I, too, am a member of Las Musas and identify as
Mexican-American. Would you care to share your ethnic identity?
I’m
Latinx (Honduran/ American) I'm 100% born and raised in the USA. I’m first generation on my father’s
side - he is from Honduras where all of my Tíos and Primos still live. My
mother is from Chicago (Irish/German).
Under the
current administration, there’s an
ongoing effort to dismiss or downplay people’s
heritage, ethnicity, and related celebrations of culture and cultural
traditions, including art and literature (re: book bans). Some would call it an
erasure. National Hispanic Heritage Month— should we keep it going?
Of course! While
I hope that one day the Latinx representation in books (meaning Latinx creators
and Latinx main characters) is greater, it still feels important to highlight
the month dedicated to highlighting these stories. Of course, I wish these stories
weren’t only pulled out during this
month, but I think the time with attention to them is still valuable and helps
to put new titles on everyone's radar.
I'm still
overjoyed when I see someone who looks like me on the cover of a book— I'm more
likely to pick it up, to buy it, and read it. I'm still going to be able to
connect with characters of any background when reading— that's the beauty of
books of course—but seeing someone who looks like me illustrated still makes my
stomach jump and gives me a shock of excitement.
[Me, too, Jacqueline!]
The stories with
specific cultural or language elements are of course important and we're still
making up for lost time in having books and stories that represent the huge
Latine population. I think we ( myself included!!) need to keep assessing our
home libraries, school/local libraries, museums, curriculums, etc., to make
sure we are seeing ourselves illustrated in the pages of books and painted on
the walls of our world.
What do you
see on the horizon? Any new directions for kidlit in relation to diversity on
the page? Any predictions?
In regard to
diversity, I think we are finally moving away from thinking about all Latino
people as a monolith, and so we are finally seeing stories with more nuance in
cultural representation.
For example, in
my book Tíos and Primos, I wanted to SHOW Honduras in the illustrations
but I didn't think it was necessary to be mentioned in the story itself.
As the illustrator I got very specific— down to the mountains of coffee, the
Ceiba trees, the skinny dogs, and the architecture, etc. But I was also wanting
to share an experience that is very universal— a kid trying to bond with their
family who lives far away and they are meeting for the first time.
As an
illustrator, I love working on books where the story is just a great
story, but I'm able to illustrate it with diverse characters. It's
equally important to be creating books where black and brown kids are the main
characters but their skin tone or heritage isn't the main theme of the book. I
believe this helps to show parents just as much as it shows children— that all
are equally as innocent, adventurous, silly, curious, kind, mischievous,
creative, and full of potential.
I hope to receive
more books that give me this opportunity as an illustrator.
Your
perspectives differ from those who are leading book-banning efforts across the
country. Any thoughts?
Books that are
being “Banned” and contested are disproportionately books by or
featuring diverse characters— BIPOC and LGBTQ. So, we have to keep showing our
support for them by supporting libraries and librarians. Checking out their
books, sharing them on social media, gifting them, and buying them if
possible.
Books are some of
the safest places we can think about, reflect, and digest life experiences
before we may be faced with them head on. We need to protect children's freedom
to read.
While shying away
from creating and advocating for diverse books isn't the right thing to do in
the long term, perhaps a lesson for us all in the short term would be to start identifying
ourselves simply as authors and illustrators, versus “Latinx/e/a
Author/Illustrator.” Identifying ourselves alongside our heritage— in relation
to our creative output— can perhaps
leave us out of conversations, bookshelves, lessons, story times, etc. where
our work belongs.
I’m in agreement! Thank
you, Jacqueline, for sharing your insights with us. I encourage our members to
click on your portfolio and check out your Instagram posts that feature your
fabulous illustrations.
May our celebration of National Hispanic Heritage Month extend
through the rest of the year!
Isabel Estrada O'Hagin grew up in the desert borderlands of Arizona, dancing and singing her way through life. Always a dreamer, she blends her life experiences as a performing arts educator with her love of Mexican-American culture & folklore into stories. When she’s not writing, she loves to dance, cook, read, daydream, and play with her two gatitos, Dante and Cosmo. She also loves her volunteer work for SCBWI-Michigan as Outreach Coordinator and K.A.S.T. Co-Coordinator. LA MARIACHI is her debut storybook.
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