LETTERING AT PLAY — Four&Sons
Art&Culture

LETTERING AT PLAY

Illustrator Cielle Graham forms the alphabet through the twists and turns of dogs chasing a ball.

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LETTERING AT PLAY

All great syllabary books assert the guiding principle of lettering: that the shapes come in multitudes, creatively varied but cohesive in style. In Cielle Graham’s illustrated book, An Alphabet of Dogs, each letter takes the form of a small shiny ball surrounded by a cast of dogs with fixated eyes, and can be read as a sweetly entertaining language of play as much as a character of sound. “Somehow I started wondering if there might actually be enough dog breeds to create something more considerable,” says the Montreal-based artist, whose project began with a single drawing simply titled, The Ball.

Graham regularly creates worlds of entangled animals, where the limbs of hyenas and the long tongues of okapi curl and tumble together. “Animals really [make] sense to me,” she explains. “Their language [is] clear, without reservation.” The intricately inked Alphabet of Dogs is filled with unshakeable determination high on competitive spirit and a singular purpose, but there’s also an air of quiet humour that pervades it. The nearly 200 dogs in her book are, in a sense, more frolicsome, searching for that happy ending—a ball caught—with joyful intensity.


All artwork courtesy of Cielle Graham
ciellegraham.com
@ciellegraham

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PACK OF DOGS

Have you ever imagined Amy Winehouse or Nick Cave as a Chihuahua, Neil Young as a Vizsla, or PJ Harvey as an Afghan hound? That’s exactly what San Francisco-based artist Michael Gillette has done through his unique illustration project, blending beloved, iconic music legends, both past and present, with their dog counterparts. Pack of Dogs, our first foray into book publishing, is a celebration of pup and pop culture for music and dog lovers alike.

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