Winner Announced!

Kate Ackley from the University of Wolverhampton is the winner of the Orion and Illustration Ltd Student Illustration Competition!

Kate Ackley from the University of Wolverhampton is the winner of the Orion and Illustration Ltd Student Illustration Competition!

The Competition was launched on 1 January 2015 to discover and nurture new talent in illustration. The competition was open to all 2nd year illustration students, who were challenged to redesign the cover for one of three Orion books. Some fifty entries were submitted from all over the UK with a high level of talent seen.

'Sophie’s World 'by Jostein Gaarder was chosen by Kate who has created a strong, playful design for the international bestseller. Among the judges were agents Victoria Pearce and Alice Ball -  Victoria commented, "Kate's use of young fun, friendly, graphic imagery and her dreamy characters immediately jumped out to us.  It feels like a very fresh contemporary take on this philosophical title and we believe it will immediately appeal to a new young audience.  We are excited to mentor Kate over the next year and help her in developing her unique style and build her portfolio. The composition was particularly intriguing, specifically the clever design of the lettering.  The abstract perspective works really well for this cover helping to create a thrilling atmosphere. The confident use of limited, bold colour adds to the strength making it very appropriate to the story".

Kate has won the opportunity to work with the award-winning Art Department at Orion and to have her design appear on the book. Kate has also won a 12 month mentoring course from us where we will provide support with her portfolio to prepare it for graduation, and she will also be able to visit the agency in London and have her work optioned for future representation.

As you can imagine Kate is rather thrilled herself, she says "I am extremely delighted to have won the competition and am very excited about the opportunity to work with two such well-established companies at the start of my career. I'm very grateful to have had the chance to illustrate a cover for such an interesting book. My idea was inspired by an intriguing metaphor that likens the universe to a rabbit being pulled from a hat, and references the humans that dwell inside the rabbit's fur".

The runner-up prize was awarded to Adam Beckett, also of the University of Wolverhampton. His highly original design for Graham Joyce’s novel, Some Kind of Fairy Tale was highly praised by the judges.

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