Since the dawn of humanity, people have sought to understand chaos, comprehend themselves, and connect with others through communication. Long before written language existed, and possibly even before complex spoken language developed, humans relied on pictures to convey meaning and tell stories.
This reliance on visual communication makes perfect sense from a developmental perspective. Children learn to interpret facial expressions, body language, and images well before they master reading words. Every person grows up with an instinctive desire to create visual marks and share narratives. If ancient constellations represented humanity's first attempt to understand the universe, they also served as our earliest illustrated stories, establishing humans as fundamentally story-driven beings who communicate through countless methods.
Defining illustration proves more complex than many assume. Rather than simply being pictures that accompany or clarify text, illustration requires speed, agility, exceptional draftsmanship, and tactile intelligence to effectively communicate ideas. Anyone who has consulted airplane safety cards, navigated unfamiliar cities using subway maps like Harry Beck's iconic 1930s London Underground design, or assembled flat-pack furniture using visual guides understands how powerfully images can communicate quickly and clearly.
Beyond practical communication, illustration carries significant emotional weight and aesthetic beauty. Despite the common saying "never judge a book by its cover," people constantly evaluate visual presentations in daily life because appearance genuinely matters. American wartime propaganda posters from 1943 and countless other historical examples demonstrate how illustration shapes public perception and cultural understanding.
The distinction between illustration and fine art has evolved considerably over recent generations, with illustration increasingly approaching its closest relative, fine art, while technology and artificial intelligence create uncertainty about the field's future. In illustration, artists typically solve other people's visual problems, receive predetermined financial compensation, and work within approval processes. Fine artists, conversely, invent their own creative challenges, rarely solve them completely, and often struggle with existential self-doubt while determining payment after creating their work.
However, both forms succeed equally in creating emotional responses, whether through simple comprehension, love, horror, deliberate confusion, disgust, or joy. These visual works represent marks made by humans for interpretation by other humans, creating fundamental connections across cultures and generations.
Historically, much artwork now classified as fine art functioned more like illustration when originally created. Michelangelo's Sistine Chapel and numerous Renaissance works fit illustration's practical definitions perfectly. The concept of individual mark-making as financially rewarding personal expression is relatively recent, with the art industry itself only developing over the past century or two.
One traditional distinction remains useful: art often exists as unique originals meant for singular encounters, while illustration typically designs with reproduction and mass distribution in mind. This difference reflects their respective roles in society and cultural dissemination.
While countless museums and galleries worldwide champion fine art, the United Kingdom has long needed a dedicated center for illustration. As a board member of the upcoming Quentin Blake Centre for Illustration, the author expresses pride in this developing institution. On the UK's National Illustration Day, it's particularly important to consider illustration's cultural role and increasing contemporary relevance.
For many people, illustration evokes childhood book nostalgia, and these early encounters remain vital as children's first introduction to their cultural world and the physical archive of parent-child bonds. However, illustration extends far beyond childhood, having shaped the recognizable modern world through wartime propaganda, 1950s branding booms, political satire, fashion, and advertising. As one lecturer observed, you can learn more about any decade from its advertisements than from its articles, since illustration provides the visual record of how societies aspire to live and what they hope to preserve.
Modern illustration emerged from the Industrial Revolution and reached full power during the mass production age. As industry continues changing, illustrators' roles evolve accordingly. Artificial intelligence now threatens to make creativity accessible to wealthy individuals while making wealth inaccessible to creative professionals, though this future isn't inevitable or desirable.
While automobile invention largely eliminated horseshoe makers, it simultaneously created numerous mechanic positions. Similarly, illustrators must adapt, but photography didn't replace painting, and video didn't kill radio stars. Machine technology won't replace illustration as an art form, just as the recent NFT bubble burst when people realized they don't feel human connections with purely digital creations.
Currently, society is witnessing a small but steady return to handmade crafts and human-created art. Although AI will temporarily take many editorial and advertising visuals away from human creators and assign them to machines, this shift creates opportunities for creative writers since AI results depend entirely on prompt quality. Humans will always need visual clarification, connection, and communication on human levels through children's books, album art, theater posters, protest signs, and collaborative visual languages that exist closer to human experience than machine experience.
Maya Angelou's wisdom proves particularly relevant: people seldom remember specific words but always remember how something made them feel. This emotional impact represents illustration's ultimate power and explains excitement about establishing a national institution dedicated to visual literacy, especially during an age of widespread misinformation.
The permanent center will explore, celebrate, and help understand every facet of illustration. Sir Quentin Blake, considered the godfather of modern British illustration, envisioned the Centre for Illustration to recognize this art form as vital British heritage and educational foundation. The timing couldn't be more appropriate as society grapples with distinguishing authentic human creativity from artificial alternatives.
Oliver Jeffers, artist and author of "I'm Very Busy: A (Nearly Forgotten) Birthday Book," serves as a trustee for the Quentin Blake Centre for Illustration, scheduled to open in May 2026. His advocacy for illustration recognition reflects growing appreciation for visual storytelling's essential role in human culture and communication.
