Fellows, Stan 1957-

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Fellows, Stan 1957-

(Stanley Fellows)

Personal

Born 1957; married; children: one daughter. Education: Minneapolis College of Art and Design, degree; attended Art Center College of Design (Pasadena, CA). Hobbies and other interests: Birding.

Addresses

Home—Iowa City, IA. Agent—Joanie Bernstein, 756 8th Ave. S., Naples, FL 34102. E-mail—stan@stanfellows.com.

Career

Illustrator and commercial artist.

Illustrator

FOR CHILDREN

Michael J. Rosen, The Dog Who Walked with God, Candlewick Press (Cambridge, MA), 1998.

Jason Root, Parables That Jesus Told, Simon & Schuster (New York, NY), 1999.

Carole Lexa Schaefer, The Copper Tin Cup, Candlewick Press (Cambridge, MA), 2000.

Kathryn Lasky, John Muir: America's First Environmentalist, Candlewick Press (Cambridge, MA), 2006.

Illustrator for "Johnny Appleseed" videos produced by Rabbit Ears.

OTHER

Lou Seibert Pappas, Jams and Jellies ("Artful Kitchen" series), Chronicle Books (New York, NY), 1996.

Michael J. Rosen, editor, Horse People: Writers and Artists on Their Love of Horses, Artisan, 1998.

Contributor of illustrations to periodicals, including Audubon, Chicago Tribune, Atlantic Monthly, Harper's, Sports Illustrated, Smithsonian, and Wall Street Journal.

Sidelights

A teacher and commercial artist, Stan Fellows creates an average of three paintings or drawings a day; by his own calculations, he produced approximately 30,000 pieces of art during the first three decades of his career. The prolific Fellows moved into book illustration in the mid-1990s. While many of his illustration projects, which include The Dog Who Walked with God by Michael J. Rosen, find him working in water color, Fellows also paints in oils and acrylics.

Born in 1957, Fellows studied at the Minneapolis College of Art and Design, continuing his education at the prestigious Art Center College of Design in Pasadena, California before returning to Minnesota to teach illustration and watercolor painting at his first alma mater. Numerous corporate assignments followed, and Fellows' art also found its way onto the pages of national periodicals such as Smithsonian, the Atlantic Monthly, Harper's, Sports Illustrated, and Audubon, the last which reflects his interest in birding. An assignment creating artwork for a children's video introduced Fellows to a whole new outlet for his art, and his colorful, light-filled paintings have proved to be a perfect fit. His first children's-book assignment involved creating artwork for The Dog Who Walked with God, a creation story by Rosen that was adapted from northern California's native Kato culture. In Publishers Weekly a contributor commented that Fellows' approach, which involves "pencil drawings with a judicious use of brown watercolor wash," supports Rosen's tale by evoking "shadows of things to come, ideas of beings not yet materialized." Reviewing these same "delicately realistic watercolors," Booklist contributor Susan Dove Lempke wrote that Fellows' "lovely, carefully detailed scenes of natural beauty" inspire a comparison to the work of noted illustrator Jim Arnosky.

Other books that feature Fellows' images include Carole Lexa Schaefer's The Copper Tin Cup and John Muir: America's First Environmentalist by Kathryn Lasky. Citing the "realistic watercolors" used in Schaefer's family-centered story, Hazel Rochman wrote in her Booklist review of The Copper Tin Cup that Fellows' impressionistic paintings, crafted in tones of blue and green, provide an opportunity "for children to imagine their own family folklore" amid the story's pages. Calling the work a "tender" story that focuses on "the strength of family ties," a Publishers Weekly reviewer concluded that Fellows' "portraits exude an earnestness and warmth that have cross-generation appeal."

Praising Lasky's biography of the noted nineteenth-century American naturalist in her review for School Library Journal, Margaret Bush wrote that Fellows' paintings in John Muir "provide pleasant impressions of the man and the impressive landscape" Muir dedicated his life to preserving. Horn Book reviewer Betty Carter noted that the illustrator's insertion of small paintings of plants and animals, inset into the text itself, helps the picture book "simulate the intimacy of a personal travel diary."

Biographical and Critical Sources

PERIODICALS

Booklist, March 15, 1998, Susan Dove Lempke, review of The Dog Who Walked with God, p. 1246; May 15, 2000, Hazel Rochman, review of The Copper Tin Cup, p. 1749.

Canadian Review of Materials, February 19, 1999, review of The Dog Who Walked with God.

Horn Book, May-June, 2006, Betty Carter, review of John Muir: America's First Environmentalist, p. 346.

Publishers Weekly, April 6, 1998, review of The Dog Who Walked with God, p. 78; June 5, 2000, review of The Copper Tin Cup, p. 93.

School Library Journal, February, 2000, Kirsten Martindale, review of Parables That Jesus Told, p. 70; May, 2000, Tali Balas, review of The Copper Tin Cup, p. 154; April, 2006, Margaret Bush, review of John Muir, p. 127.