A look at the World Illustration Awards 2018

This year saw the most popular awards yet, and winning entries include a set of cushions embroidered with penises, some hectic children’s magazine illustrations and build-your-own packaging for a range of Stella McCartney underwear.

The Association of Illustrators has been running the World Illustration Awards for 42 years, celebrating the best in visual art across advertising, books, packaging, interior spaces and more. In recent years, the competition has also included moving illustration in the form of animation.

This year saw the most successful edition of the awards yet, which had more entries than ever. It received 3,3000 applications from 75 countries, 1,000 more than in 2017.

In April this was whittled down to a shortlist of 200, and now 16 category winners have been picked by the judging panel, which also includes one professional overall winner and a new talent winner. The eight categories were editorial, advertising, experimental, research, book, children’s books, site specific and design.

Professional overall winner goes to Stevie Gee, who created a set of cartoon-like illustrations for the packaging of Stella McCartney’s kids’ underwear range, and will receive £2,000. Each side of the packaging has a different body part or face on, encouraging kids to interact with the range by stacking up boxes to create a mix of bizarre and unique creatures. Gee drew the linework by hand in black ink, then added colour digitally in Photoshop.

Sweden-based Monika Vaicenaviciene has been named new talent winner for her serene illustrations for children’s book What is a River?, and will receive £1,000.

Other category winners include Esther Goh for editorial, for her brilliantly hectic work for new kids’ magazine Eyeyah!, Jip van den Toorn for his rather rude embroidered cushions of male genitals, and Paul Thurlby for his project detailing British “national treasures”, which sprawls the window displays of John Lewis on London’s Oxford Street.

See all16 winners below, and the full shortlist of 200 entries here. The entire shortlist is currently on show until 20 June at an exhibition at Embankment Galleries, South Wing, Somerset House, Strand, London WC2R 1LA. The exhibition space has been designed by studio Uniform. Entry is free. For more information, head here.

Ref: Designweek.co.uk