The recipients of the 2015 Sendak Fellowship are Richard Egielski, Marc McChesney, Doug Salati, and Stephen Savage. The fellowship consists in a four-week residency for illustrators that runs from July 6–31.
The fellowship was inaugurated in 2010 by Maurice Sendak, the goal of which, in Sendak’s words, was to “create work that is not vapid, stupid, or sexy, but original. Work that excites and incites.” The Fellowship was conducted on Sendak’s own property in Connecticut for its first three years, but has since moved to Scotch Hill Farm in Cambridge, N.Y. The fellowship affords artists the time and space needed to create children’s book illustrations. In addition, the illustrators receive a stipend.
Of this year’s fellows, Richard Egielski has previously received the 1987 Caldecott Medal for illustrating Arthur Yorinks’s Hey, Al, and has illustrated more than 50 children’s books. Marc McChesney got his start as an assistant to printer Gary Lichtenstein, and has done work in fine-art painting, and through a friendship with Sendak himself was inspired to take up children’s illustration. Doug Salati has an M.F.A. in Illustration from the School of Visual Arts, and his illustrations have received recognition from American Illustration, 3 x 3, and the Society of Illustrators. Little Tug and Where’s Walrus? creator Steven Savage has also had illustration work in various publications and teaches at the School of Visual Arts.
