This Illustrated Life: 5 Illustrators that Totally Rule

Okay, I’m feeling a little crazy this Monday. What kind of crazy you ask? This particular strand is translating to a post that is all about illustrators, awesome illustrators, who also happen to like cats. WHY??

I blame this weekend. Let me explain… I was doing a little shopping on Saturday and popped into the dressing room with a pile of clothes. While I was deciding if this dress looked good on me (verdict: it didn’t), two girls were chatting about how they had been dubbed by their friends as the ‘crazy cat ladies’ (their words, not mine)… And how their maine coon cats were basically separated at birth because they both liked to fetch. Which reminded me of our cat, who also loved to fetch but was not a maine coon.

So anyway, back to the post…when I started putting together my list of favorite artist/illustrators, I thought about the conversation those girls were having and did some investigating. As it turns out, completely by chance, I was able to connect each illustrator to cats in some way or another. So I thought, why not! Enjoy…

1. Mathilde Aubier (above)

French artist / illustrator Mathilde Aubier is the same exact age as me – born in ’84 (yay!) – and has done illustrations for Washington Post, Wired, and Nuvo Magazine to name just a few. She has an Etsy shop too, right here. This is her cat connection.

2. Kyle Fewell

Kyle Fewell is a Brooklyn based illustrator who love cats (it’s in his bio so it must be true) and was named after Kyle Reese from the movie The Terminator. Kind of cool. That illustration above is one of my faves from his portfolio.

3. Marc Johns

Marc’s drawings almost always have an element of humor and if you can make me laugh, you can have my ‘vote’ for this five faves (and my money for that matter – I want to buy nearly every piece he completes). He has also taught me a valuable lesson: cats are infinitely better with antlers.

4. Jamie Shelman

I like to think of Jamie Shelman as the cat queen herself. The drawings in her shop, The Dancing Cat, bring a smile to my face every single time I visit. Without fail. And she wrote a few guest posts here on papernstitch as well: gaining exposure for your work with collaborations and 5 tips for artists marketing online.

5. Amy Borrell

Rounding out today’s list is Amy Borrell, who has worked on projects for Frankie Magazine, UPPERCASE, and The Working Proof (and is apparently after my heart as well – love her work). Amy’s online shop, where you can buy prints of her available work, has this awesome cat print (which gives her the cat connection necessary for this post).