SO FRESH, SO NEW
I can just imagine what people thought when the first color TV was introduced all those years ago, watching the formerly black and white world come to life with color. The Yellow Brick Road in
The Wizard of Oz must have suddenly made a lot more sense to those who’d only seen it on black-and-white TVs prior! Maybe those viewers felt a little like I did when I got my first set of markers. I felt as though some wizard had just given me a whole rainbow with which to color magical worlds in whatever way I wanted. For a time, life was grand, right up until I learned about the so-called
rules. Rules can sometimes be rigid and confining, and have a “delightful” habit of taking the wind out of your creative sails.
The first real rule I was taught as a child was
Color inside the lines. Along with being the first rule I learned, it was also the first one that I simply
had to break. I was much more interested in watching colors appear on the paper as I scribbled willy-nilly. It was hypnotizing. My young, little brain was thinking way too fast for my tiny hands to keep up.
Get the color on the paper was the only goal I had in mind. I was a creative kid and my coloring was in abstract overdrive. I would go wildly outside the lines, straight over the lines, and, occasionally, right off the page and entirely onto the table! New rule from Mom:
Don’t color the table. (Some rules are just no fun at all.)
Now that I’m
mostly grown up I’ve finally created a coloring book, not only for kids but also for the inner child in everyone. Nothing in the world makes me feel more like a kid again than the smell of a pack of crayons and a big blank coloring book full of possibilities.
In this collection, I hope to provide you with a really interesting and unique experience. I want whomever picks up this book and flips through its pages to feel an irresistible urge to fill in all its images with all sorts of vivid colors. You’ll be surprised by how my pieces have changed for this coloring book. I have repurposed some of my artwork, adding cool patterned backgrounds to fill the negative space—and to give you more elements to color. Ha! Ha!
Feel free to be as creative as you want! Color as you will. Break the rules if it pleases you. (But you don’t have to be messy, if you don’t want to be either.) This is a rule-free book.
Alternatively, you can use these pages to practice and to level up your coloring skills. Maybe your pencil sketches are great but you just haven’t found your color style yet. Coloring isn’t easy. And, no, I have never colored any of these images here. You will be a coloring pioneer!
Honestly, I struggle the most with choosing colors, more than with any other part of my creative process. Even when I spend all day choosing the colors, I sometimes just end up painting over them the next day anyways. Phew! Even writing about it is exhausting. Just remember you can always try again. You could even photocopy some of the images and practice on the copies before you give it a real shot in the book itself! That’s what coloring is all about—trial and error.
There is still a rebellious little child running around in my wild imagination, bending and breaking the rules of art as she pleases. My artwork blends the cute, creepy, and the surreal in a whimsical way that defies any logic or physics. I can’t wait to see what inspiration you take out of the characters and patterns created for these pages. Go wild with your choices, be a rebel, think outside the box, and definitely, absolutely, color outside the lines and straight onto the table—if that’s what you want to do! Just don’t tell your parents that I told you so. (Wink. Wink.)
Copyright © 2016 by Camilla d'Errico. All rights reserved. No part of this excerpt may be reproduced or reprinted without permission in writing from the publisher.
