Celia has enjoyed a number of complimentary and overlapping careers, including work as a biologist, a teacher of studio arts and an author and illustrator of children’s natural science books. She has hundreds of published illustrations to her credit, in trade and educational books, scientific journals and children’s books. Her work has been reproduced on zoo signs, exhibits at the Royal Ontario Museum and coins issued by the Royal Canadian Mint. Celia specializes in naturalistic images of plants and animals.
You can find out more about Celia at celiagodkin.com.
You studied biology and even worked for the Reptile Breeding Foundation before beginning a career as a scientific illustrator. How did you first discover your love of animals?
I can't remember a time when I didn't love animals. My first memory is of seeing a hedgehog when I was about two years old. I've always been fascinated by the natural world and curious to learn more about how it works. You can spend a lifetime studying animals and nature and never be bored because there are always new things to learn, new surprises along the way.
Your books, like Skydiver and The Wolves Return, include detailed illustrations that help inform and educate young readers along with the text. How do you research and prepare to draw the illustrations?
Whenever possible I visit appropriate locations to take reference pictures. For Skydiver I went to a raptor centre to take pictures of a peregrine falcon. For The Wolves Return I visited Yellowstone National Park and took pictures of the landscapes and animals I encountered there.
When I first started illustrating books it was much more difficult than it is now because there was no internet and I spent a lot of time collecting reference material. I used the picture reference collection at the main branch of the Toronto Public Library, where they had filing cabinets full of pictures, mostly cut from magazines. I also had subscriptions to nature magazines and an extensive collection of field guides and animal anatomy books.
These days it's very easy to find reference images of anything you want online. But no matter where I get my reference material from, unless it's a photo I've taken myself, I don't copy it because that would be a violation of copyright. Instead, I use a combination of images plus my understanding of animal anatomy to create convincing drawings of the animals. I move each animal drawing around the landscape I've created as a backdrop, changing their size and orientation as needed, until I have a convincing scene and a composition I like. All of this is worked out in graphite pencil on tracing paper before I go to colour.
As a scientific illustrator, your work has appeared in all kinds of places, including textbooks, scientific papers, zoo signs, and even collectable coins. What advice do you have for aspiring scientific illustrators?
Scientific illustrators should be trained in both art and science, as I was. When I got started in this field there weren't any scientific illustration courses in Canada, which meant I was uniquely placed to initiate courses in this subject myself. One of my students subsequently set up a program at Sheridan College. A quick internet search (always a good place to start) reveals that the University of Alberta and McGill now also have courses, as does the Masters Program in Biomedical Communications at the University of Toronto, which is where I taught.
In addition to taking courses, I recommend that anyone interested in this field get involved with organizations such as the Guild of Natural Science Illustrators, a US group that offers professional development and workshops. If you live in the GTA, check out Southern Ontario Nature and Science Illustrators. There are also many botanical art societies, a subset of scientific illustration that specializes in depicting plants and fungi.
Throughout your career, you’ve visited many schools and libraries. What is your favourite part of reading to children?
I love it when children ask me questions that only a child would ask. Once, when I was getting a class to tell me why jellyfish aren't fish, I told them that a jellyfish's gut only has one opening. A little boy asked me “how do they go to the bathroom?” Hilarious!
View Celia Godkin's art in the Picture Book Gallery.