Neil
Packer

Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix

If until then Jim Kay had worked alone on the illustration of the previous volumes, for his last illustrated edition of the saga, he collaborated with Neil Packer in order to finish Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix.

We spoke with Neil and discussed his feelings, his creative process, his inspiration and much more for this book.

Could you explain how you came to work with Jim Kay? Was it the publisher or the illustrator who approached you with the proposal?

Jim is a friend of mine. We’ve known each other for a while and we were fans of each other’s work long before we met. It was probably obvious to both Jim and the publishers from a very early stage that there was an insane amount of work to do for this book because of the size of it. Jim had already set the bar extraordinarily high in terms of the quality and the number of illustrations he had made for the previous books, so he was keen to get someone else involved to share the workload, simply in order to get the book finished within a reasonable amount of time.

I believe that it was Jim who suggested to Bloomsbury (The UK Publishers) that I might be involved as he felt he could trust me and we knew that we could work together well. He also felt that our work was different enough that it was not in conflict with each other and if I worked on some of the marginalia it would then free up time for Jim to focus more on the characters and the central storyline.

It was probably a good nine months between proposing the idea and any contracts being signed and I spent a lot of that time developing test illustrations to try and establish how a collaboration might work. We knew that getting approval from the UK publishers, as well as all of the many co-edition publishers and ultimately J.K. Rowling would take some time, but I think Jim felt that a collaboration was the only option. It was important for all of us that my work complimented Jim’s but in no way interfered with it, as his extraordinary talent for realising the characters and the world they inhabit has characterised the whole series.

Before taking part in this collaboration, did you already know the Harry Potter saga? Which other books) would you have liked to work on?

Yes of course, it was impossible to ignore as a publishing phenomenon when they first came out, and later I read them with my child before he was old enough to read them himself.

There are huge amounts of illustrative riches to be found in all of the books but considering my role within this project in all honesty I think that “illustratively” Order of the Phoenix is possibly the best. I got to illustrate the cutaway of the Ministry of Magic in a slightly faux Edwardian style rather like an old-fashioned plan of a department store, and I also got to imagine the Black family tree tapestry in a faux medieval style. I used a Victorian style for the interior for St Mungo’s and a fantasy Elizabethan Hogsmeade, all the sort of styles, periods and details that I love working on and are very much within my comfort zone.

How did you and Jim Kay divide up the different illustrations that make up this book?

Interestingly that is not something for the most part that I got to decide. It’s almost entirely the decision of the designer in collaboration with the editor at Bloomsbury although very occasionally one of us might suggest that we would particularly like to do a certain image. A lot of the book had already been designed by the time I came on board and Jim was at least half way through the illustrations.

The challenge for all of us with this book was its size, at 566 pages for a book with these dimensions it is at the limit of what is reasonable in terms of weight. If it was any bigger it wouldn’t hold itself together, so adding more pages is not an option. Quite rightly Jim was allotted most of the spreads available to carry the story and illustrate characters old and new as only he can. A lot of my role involved trying to make illustrations work as borders, (Firenze’s Divination classroom is a good example) in order to save space and yet still bring something visually interesting to a spread.

That is why making a book like this is a true collaboration, there is a surprisingly small team at Bloomsbury who put the illustrated edition together and their roles are equally important as mine and Jim’s. That they got this enormous book to work, to be coherent and look beautiful is a small miracle.

Did you feel any apprehension to take part in this book, considering the patience of the fans who had to wait for 3 years after the release of volume 4?

Yes absolutely. You always worry about how people are going to react to your work but even more so for this book given what it is and the love and respect in which both the story and Jim is held by the fans.

Yes. Three years is a long time to wait but I know how insanely hard I had to work on this book, and Jim would have been doing exactly the same for the two years before I was involved, and for the seven years prior to that for all the previous books. I am not complaining: I love what I do and it is a privilege to be able to do something I love for a living and to work on a project like this but illustrating a book of this size for one person, and even ultimately for two is not easy and does take time. Just to give some sense of how much time, The Ministry of Magic spread which, to be fair, was the most complicated piece I worked on, took nearly two months. That was nearly one sixth of my time budget gone on a single spread.

How would you define your style, your approach for this book? What techniques did you use? Your references and sources of inspiration?

My approach to illustrating any book is always to serve the text. The illustrations need to emphasise, reflect or explain what is happening within a storyline or sometimes reinforce a subtext or occasionally point outside of the story to something else that may be relevant. The choice of what exactly to show might be made by the illustrator but is often a decision made by the art director and the editor.

Stylistically my inspiration from this book came from many sources. Most importantly my work had to sit comfortably alongside Jim’s work but not look like it. Jim and myself share many of the same interests and reference sources, we are both influenced by Medieval art and in particular the Herbals and Bestiaries (early books about the natural world and fantastical creatures). We share a passion for architecture and typography, and all these things help to create a coherence.

Because I was not illustrating the core narrative of this book I could afford to shift my style slightly depending on what was being depicted, so for instance I heavily drew on Medieval tapestries when working on the Black family tree. I drew on sources of Edwardian architecture and advertising material for the Ministry. Sometimes I might push my style towards traditional woodblock printing and on one occasion a 1970’s style bubble gum wrapper but always taking my cue from the text and what Jim has done.

When working on a book what are the first steps you take?

Read it, then read it again and then again.

This project was different from many books I have worked on in recent years where I might have a lot of freedom to choose what to illustrate and to plan an overview myself. I came to The Order of the Phoenix two years into the project and pretty much all the planning was already in place which actually was a relief and I was very happy to be told exactly what required illustrating without having to make those decisions myself.

Was it necessary for you to go back, observe and based on Kay’s work in this book but especially in the previous books of the saga in order to have a complementarity on the whole and to avoid in a way a marked denaturation?

As I have mentioned previously it was very important to complement Jim’s work and to understand exactly what he was planning. Interestingly, Jim shifts his style in this book too in order to complement the style of the writing which becomes darker as themes develop. The characters are growing up by book five, and the normal anxieties of teenage years as well as the overwhelming sense that something monumental is approaching builds towards the end of this book – and Jim’s art reflects this beautifully. There is a loss of innocence and it is absolutely essential that the style of illustration reflects this. It is all about creating moods like switching keys in music to create tension or staccato editing in film-making to create excitement. The choice of what to illustrate and how to render it can do the job of a good soundtrack.

Did you need to read this fifth volume as a whole? The others? If yes, how much did reading the fifth volume influence how you approached your illustrations. If not, how did you proceed?

Yes. I did read it and more than once, I actually had Covid at the time and was confined to bed so frankly I was glad of something to pass the time. It was also a useful way of getting some work done whilst I was unable to do any drawing. I had no idea at the time what I was going to be asked to do for the book, (this was before I was given the green light to work on it). It was a few years since I had read it so I really needed to get up to speed but even if you are only working on parts of a book it is important to know the story in detail to gain an idea of context.

Of all the illustrations you made for this book, which one(s) do you like the most? And why?

Undoubtedly the Ministry of Magic. It wasn’t originally planned as anything as detailed as it eventually became, and it was going to be horizontal and split over the two preads. At some point we decided to orientate it sideways because it would work better as an image. There was a delay in getting the artwork briefs for the set of images that were to follow M of M so I found myself unusually with the luxury of a bit of time to work on this spread. The production team saw the possibility of making something special and kept sending me more and more information about the Ministry and its workings. In the end I think we managed to reference just about every mention of it in the entire series.

It was roughly two months’ work on this illustration and pretty long days too, but when a piece is going well and you are in the right frame of mind and are enjoying it, which I was with this drawing, then the time passes very quickly. However if you are not in a good place and not happy with what you are doing it can be an awful struggle.

It is probably very premature for this answer, but following Jim Kay’s departure / retirement, could you pick up the torch?

In a word, No! Firstly I am not a character illustrator and there are very few people who can do it as well as Jim, although he brings so much more to these books besides the characters. He has a deep understanding of the natural world, of science and a knowledge of Medieval art, architecture and his sheer ability as an artist and visual storyteller all feed into these books. He is going to be an incredibly hard act to follow as his style and imagination are so much a part of what is most loved about these books. That is however not to say that there aren’t illustrators who could do it although it would be unfair to name any but I am not among them as my strengths as an artist lie elsewhere However I do have complete faith in the team at Bloomsbury that they will make the best choice for this editions’ future.

“I wouldn’t want to be an illustrator starting out now, I think it’s incredibly difficult,” quips artist Neil Packer, an illustrator who has Harry Potter and Dante on his CV, as we discuss his latest work for the The Folio Society’s beautifully illustrated 400th anniversary of Shakespeare’s first folio, The Complete Plays. He is, of course, joking. “I don’t want to put people off because it is a great job,” he adds, with a broad smile.

Neil Packer is a refreshingly honest and passionate person, who’s love of art, the texture and the process of working with inks, watercolour paints and materials comes through as we discuss his latest project, creating 39 illustrations, one for each of Shakespeare’s works within the new Folio (see more at Neil Packer’s website). From comedies to historical epics, Packer was tasked with bringing all of Shakespeare’s plays together, unifying them under one style, his style.

“I’m aware I have a style, but depending on the job, I’ll try and reinvent it. I like that because it keeps it fresh, it keeps you on your toes,” he tells me. The idea of having a style, or honing a style, is something Packer considers, and tells me: “It’s not about skill, I wasn’t a great student. I never had myself down as particularly good in terms of drawing, but what I did have was an insane desire to do this, to the point where it’s almost a condition, it’s a compulsion. I’m not happy if I’m not drawing every day. It literally keeps me sane. And so that in a way, will probably sustain you better because if you draw that much, you’ll get good at it and your style will come.”

The way Packer talks you’d think he’d be an artist with cupboards of sketchbooks, but, “no, I don’t really keep sketchbooks,” he says, “it’s in here,” Packer prods his temple and continues: “Ideas are weird; I think I’ve recently realised that ideas are all around, hidden in plain sight, and they’re going in all the time, but you don’t know that they’re an idea. It’s life experience, basically. It’s that simple. But I tend to remember particularly visual things. I’m very visual, a visual learner. So it goes in, and then when it comes time for an idea, maybe some of those will resurface.”

Packer’s life-experience-drives-style approach bears fruit in his work for the The Folio Society’s Shakespeare project. It’s a blend of influences from traditional woodblock printing to typography and graphic design. Packer’s first job was working for acclaimed graphic designer Peter Hatch. “In a way it’s at the heart, still at the heart, of what I do,” he says. “I love typography, I love design. I’m so grateful that I learned how to make a page sit; look nice graphically. All that stuff I use every day, still.”

He will also wander around the V&A “looking at plates and all that stuff”, loves mediaeval books, spending hours in museums and just absorbing influences anywhere, at any time. “It all goes in,” observes Packer, offering some advice: “Don’t just look at other people’s work or what’s current. Look at other things, like labels. If you absorb enough of it, it’ll come out at some point in some fashion.”

Packer tells me his style, a look he’s finally happy with, didn’t come until “about 2000” when he finished illustrations for The Folio Society’s In The Name Of The Rose. “At the point where I thought, okay, now I’m happy. Now I think I’ve nailed it. This is where I want to be. I’m really happy with this style,” he says.

We’re talking a lot about style because Packer’s work is so evocative of an era, an age, while also remaining timeless. His work reduces detail, simplifies silhouette and uses colour sparsely, he’s always editing downwards, reducing to make the story emerge. Packer tells me good illustration is about “just telling a story quickly, and in a way, the simpler the better. You want a nice shape, you want something that has character, and that dances on the page, and is different from everything that went before, which seems fairly easy, but it’s actually not.”

For the Shakespeare Folio this meant creating illustrations that echoed Elizabethan artwork but felt contemporary, but not too modern. Packer had to tread a fine line between appealing to today’s reader and remaining truthful to Shakespeare 1623 heritage. He says, “because this is a celebration of the First Folio from 400 years ago, it needed to really tie into that brief”.

The illustrator drew visual inspiration from the 16th-century woodcuts, playbills, and the distinct look of Elizabethan woodblock, to achieve historical accuracy. But look closely and you’ll see mid- and turn of the century styles, a nod toward Victorian design and even Regency periods.

Packer wanted his illustrations to transcend being mere visual aids for the plays. He emphasises, “I don’t want to be clever with Shakespeare because you can’t... I mean, it’s those beautiful, beautiful words. I mean, they need to stand alone.” Packer’s minimalist approach allows the text to shine, and his illustrations serve as markers for the beginning and end of each play, creating a visual pattern that respects Shakespeare’s words.

He’s learned to hone his style and approach, and with illustrations for over 56 books, including Harry Potter, The Divine Comedy, The Odyssey, and Catch 22, he has a lot of experience to draw from. Depending on the work, Packer tells me how he “tries to reinvent” his style, saying, “Shakespeare actually, it’s not that dissimilar to Dante with Harry Potter in the middle; that was different again, in fact, even within the works in Potter, I had to sort of reinvent myself depending on the illustration.”

Deciding which character or scene to illustrate to represent a play required research, and reading. Lots of reading. He chose some iconic moments – how could he not include the balcony from Romeo and Juliet? – but also played with themes and characters to offer something new, but art fans will instantly recognise.

“Each image had to not look like another image in the book,” which considering there are 38, one for each play, this was a tall order. Packer got creative, for example with The Two Gentlemen of Verona he honed in on the dog, as this is the only Shakespeare play to feature man’s best friend.

Packer works in a unique and meticulous way. “Everything is done by hand. I try to stay away from the machine as much as possible,” Packer says, explaining how he uses pencils and fine-point pens to create his initial sketches on tracing paper. “Then it’s scanned and put into Photoshop, where I have a lot of textures that I make myself,” he adds. This process ensures that the final art retains a handcrafted, almost woodcut-like quality, as if pulled through time.

Though he uses Photoshop, Packer is not a big users of digital art software, “I’ve learned a tiny little corner of Photoshop deliberately,” he laughs, telling me he just uses layers, undo and simple tools, “which keeps the algorithm of the machine out of the process”, resulting in an engaging blend of digital and analog.

Using Photoshop has enabled Packer to stay closer to the art, using less process and tracing paper layers. He would look at old sketches and think, “The lines here are pure and better, this is a better drawing than the finished wash. By scanning that and then working with that in a slightly different way, I had something that was a bit more alive.”

The more we talk the more I come to understand Packer lives in his own world, one of paper and ink and a celebration of his surroundings. “I’m not aware of, I’m not into, trends,” he confesses. “I mean, there are illustrators who I love and adore, and there are a lot of really interesting contemporary illustrators too, but that’s not necessarily where I’m drawing from.”

He draws from life around him, using experience to infer his illustration. Right now that world he inhabits is in boxes, lots of boxes. As we talk his life is packaged up behind him. Packer is moving from London to village life, and this will likely have an influence on his work. He’s already moved on from Shakespeare and has two new projects on the go, meaning more ideas, more tracing paper.

As we leave I ask about his original art, all those sketches and scribbles on tracing paper, he must keep them, right? “No,” Packer tells me as he gestures how its all been scrunched up, crumpled, torn and thrown away.”People can’t believe it when I tell them that,” he laughs, “I keep nothing, I move on”. For someone who loves the past, celebrates the artisan styles of history, Packer has little space for old ideas and past work.

Neil is an important artist in his own right, working in his own eclectic style to create beautiful, complementary artwork that is skilfully woven into the heart of the book. This differentiation is conscious and deliberate, and Jim is excited to see his readers embrace Neil’s guest role on the project. Neil has created approximately a quarter of the imagery for The Order of the Phoenix. Neil’s decorative illustrations include an astonishing cutaway of the Ministry of Magic and an exquisite interpretation of centaur Firenze’s Divination classroom, along with other magical artefacts and favourite locations from the wizarding world. Each piece is totally original – complementing Jim’s painterly narrative scenes whilst remaining uniquely Neil Packer.

Neil Packer adds: ‘As both a friend and a colleague it was an honour to be asked to work alongside Jim Kay on this book. Jim has invested so much in this series already and I was very conscious of not wanting to encroach on the stunning work which only he can do. The sheer scale of this book and the wonderful richness of imagination within the writing perhaps left space for a second approach and it has been a great joy and a challenge to try and work in harmony with Jim’s pictures and to visualise some of J.K. Rowling’s wizarding world.’

Jim continues to be the creative essence for the imagery and the emotional heart of the book, visualising beloved characters, pivotal scenes and narrative moments. Highlights include new portraits of the toady professor Dolores Umbridge and loyal friend Luna Lovegood, incredible views of 12 Grimmauld Place, and spine-tingling scenes as good forces battle evil inside the Department of Mysteries.

From late 2020 through to late 2021 I was working as a guest illustrator along with Jim Kay on the Illustrated edition of Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix. Because of the size of this book it was felt that having a second illustrator on board might take some of the pressure off Jim and could work well. Jim is still illustrating the characters and the main drive of the plot but my role was to visualise many of the other aspects of the book which are pointed to within the text such as The BlackFamily Tree, and a cutaway of the Ministry of Magic.