Students take us back in time

May Kindred-Boothby, Jess Underwood, Alison Friel, Tom Harding and Juliet Klottrup from the Illustration BA(Hons) course, based at the Grand Parade campus, Brighton, were each given a classic Ladybird book and asked to respond to it in the form of a drawing, collage, animation or film.

Ladybird’s iconic images of a more innocent world and simpler times between the 1950s and 1970s provided plenty of inspiration for the students.

Jess Underwood said she was “instantly inspired by the realistic images of a Utopian world” and added: “I’m happy my work is alongside the exhibition. I found it extremely interesting to re-contextualise the books to modern day life.”

Juliet Klottrup said: “I found that the old fashioned, idyllic and optimistic ideals of youth and childhood were conforming and humorous to see in the dated Ladybird Books.

“In modern visual culture I feel that childhood is represented in a more hardened, realistic and less rose-tinted light. Ladybird Books were not part of my generation but since the exhibition I have become a secret collector.”

Paul Burgess, course tutor and Senior Lecturer in the School of Art, Design & Media, said that the students did a great job: “The exhibition will be seen by a large number of public visitors, as the Ladybird Books exhibition has had the greatest attendance of any show at the De La Warr, including the Warhol and Ivan Chermayeff shows.”

The De La Warr Pavilion in Bexhill is displaying over 200 original Ladybird illustrations until Sunday, 19 April.