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Details
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By Neely Bardwell
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Today, the Aboriginal author and the illustrator team Laurel Goodluck and Steph Littlebird have published their new children’s pictures entitled Fierce aunts!A celebration of what makes the aunts so special.
Steph Littlebird, a citizen of the Confederate tribes of the Grande Ronde de l’Oregon, has already illustrated with the first book, “my powerful hair”. Now, with Fierce aunts!, Littlebird has taken the powerful work to illustrate the aunts that represent all the communities, even including some that reflect aunts in his real life.
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Online native news spoke with Littlebird for a Q&A to discuss the reasons why having an indigenous representation in children’s books is important. This interview has been modified for more clarity and brevity.
What made you want to illustrate for a Fierce aunt?
A large part of my work outside the publishing is to empower indigenous women. The work for which I am best known is in fact my Pocahontas series, where I dissipate myths about it because of the Disney film. What I am rooted is to empower indigenous women. It was the creation of art I needed as a young Aboriginal one I didn’t have.
When I read the manuscript, I said to myself, it’s for me, it’s my chance to honor and show my love for all women, not just Aboriginal women, but all the women who have really raised me in my own career and in my own life.
On which process we operated Fierce aunts?
It was honestly such a cool process. Whenever you work with an editor and an author, you necessarily feel friendly, but it was a really healthy process to bring it together.
It takes about a year in total for illustrations. Once the manuscript has been approved by the publisher, they send it to me. From this moment, you illustrate. What I do is start with naked sketches, just in black and white, sketches of my ideas. Once we somehow cross the process of modifying each page, which can take months, then you end up arriving at the fun part, which is my favorite part, the color. It usually takes somewhere between eight and twelve months. It really depends on the project and the publisher.
Fierce aunts! is such an imaginative and fanciful story, so there were many illustrations that were fun to do, and this is not always the case. Sometimes the stories are simpler, but it has so much fantasy and joy. It was so fun for me, because I kept thinking about all these incredible women in my own life for which I enlivened it in a way.
Is there someone you know in your real life you have attracted to the book?
Absolutely. It was important to bring in an Afro-Autochtone aunt, because our community has very diverse members, and black Aboriginal peoples are often under-represented. I have a lot of native black friends, and I also have a friend who is Afro-Latina, but she is also native. She always works with young people and teaches them things on earth, so the black-naughty aunt teaches them planting and the share of adventures in nature, and it is so much. When I showed her the book, she immediately knew that she was inspired by her.
It is so important for people to see each other in my work, and not only literally another person, but these values that each of the aunts have. I also have a mentor that is not from, but it is one of the first people who told me that my writing and my art were quite good. So the aunt who reads the girl is really her, because that person was my mentor.
There are all these kinds of underlying symbols which, I think, are really important. I hope I have encompassed the world of aunts because there are so many things that they bring to the table.
Can you tell me a bit about Deb Haaland’s features in illustrations?
Deb Holland, it is the first of its kind. She is the first indigenous first person to direct the interior department, not to mention the native woman. It is an aunt archetype. She does great things. It shows younger women which is possible, and it is so important because I did not grow up when I saw this.
Deb is this example of native excellence, and we need it. We need it so much. She is really one of the most visible indigenous women. She makes decisions and helped draw attention to the questioning system while it was in power. Deb is the first person to really push the government to think even about these things.
It is a demonstration of our potential, and it is a demonstration of all the things we can do and, hopefully, will achieve in our future. For me, it’s such an inspiration. When I died, I had to make sure she is there, because she is one of the most visible aunts in our community.
What does it mean to be an aunt?
I am a aunt of the two children who are linked to me by blood, but also all these young women that I adopted like my nieces, and for me, it is so much care and to recognize the unique beauty of each child, and to try to help cultivate this. Even if they are not my children, I want them to see their highest potential and I want them to live inspired lives, and I want them to realize their dreams.
I can tell them inspiring things that probably seem less biased from me than their parents. When my nieces see me well, and they send me love, I send them this love right away. I say everything I am doing right now, you are going to do bigger things in your life, and it is the best part of being an aunt is to live as an inspiration for them and to show them that what I have is possible for them, and much more. It is a great responsibility, but it is also the most fun thing, to give love and to take care of young people and to show them their value.
Why do you think it’s important for books like Fierce aunts! Be visible for native young indigenous young people and girls?
Aunts in native culture are so important. The idea that the village raises the child, the aunts are at the heart of that. What I learned is that the culture of aunt, while it is very important for indigenous peoples, is in fact something with which many people outside of our culture resonate.
In fact, I spoke with a black person the other day, and she was like, oh my God, I love the title of this book, because I had so many aunts in my life. All kinds of people will resonate with this book and will reflect on women who have played a decisive role in their lives.
For me, the book is a love letter to women who care, who give love to others, even if it is not their own children or their own line. Women are in this world by ensuring that others succeed and ensure that young people succeed well. It’s a nice thing. This is so deserved – the women who were poisoning themselves and the contributions they bring to their community are really important.
What advice would you give to budding illustrators?
The great thing that changed my life was to share my online work and share it via Instagram. Galerists are looking for art on social networks, looking for new artists on social networks. This is how my agent found my work for my first book.
I have had my Instagram for about 10 years, and in the past five years, it has become where people find me and people approach me for jobs. I really encourage children to one, I put your work regularly, and two, do not dress on the masterpiece. It’s really about creating work and sharing work.
I really encourage indigenous illustrators to learn a digital art program and start doing your job in this support, even if you do other things. Just start working in digital because people are looking for it. There is a large demand for indigenous illustrators at the moment, and there are not many.
I even work in the community of my own tribe to encourage these skills because there are jobs that await you, if you can go to speed. You don’t have to go to art school to do it, you can literally learn this kind of thing about YouTube.
The world is your oyster. If you devote yourself to your job and share it with the world, people will find you. There are people looking for your work and ready to love it and celebrate it.
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About the author
Neely Bardwell (descendant of the Little crosses Bay Bands of Odawa Indian) is a personnel journalist for Native News Online covering politics, politicians and environmental issues. Bardwell graduated from Michigan State University where she specialized in politics and minor in Amerindian studies.