Maria J. Guarda
María J. Guarda is a Chilean illustrator and graphic designer. She received a Masters of Arts in Illustration at Camberwell College of Arts (University of the Arts of London) and a Masters in Arts in Children’s Book Illustration at Cambridge School of Art (Anglia Ruskin University).
Fiction, humorous texts and poetry are the projects María enjoys working on the most. She also likes creating stories drawn from the lives and experiences of people she knows (primarily female voices) and then expanding the context so as to be relatable to young readers.
She is inspired by young children and loves observing them in play so as to discover how they relate to other people, creatures and things. She is interested in finding their perspective and narrating stories from their point of view.
Maria likes to experiment with different mediums and processes, depending on the story. Currently she is building her illustrations from layers with a limited color palette.
In 2018 María won the first prize at the Macmillan Prize of Illustration with her project Paloma Flew given by Pan Macmillan UK. This book is going to be published in Spanish on January 2021 by the publisher Planeta.
María is based in Santiago, Chile where she lives with her husband and 2 children, juggling her time between freelance illustrative projects and teaching illustration.
Please visit her author’s page.