Britta Teckentrup

With more than a hundred picture books to her name, author and illustrator Britta Teckentrup has established an international reputation for her work, which often features collage or printmaking to enhance tales that revolve around nature or human emotions. ...

Britta was born in Hamburg and grew up on the outskirts of Wuppertal, crediting the wonder she felt when exploring the forest and fields near her childhood home as the source for much of her creative output. The illustrated fairy tales she read and her father’s art books also provided inspiration, along with memories of her grandmother’s bountiful garden.

On moving to London in 1988 to study illustration and fine art at St Martin’s, Teckentrup was able to develop her interest in collage before a spell at the Royal College of Art led her to specialize in printmaking. It was at a degree show that she was approached by a publisher, launching her into a career in illustration, and later writing stories and poems, that she hadn’t anticipated but has excelled at. Her work is regularly nominated for prizes and her accolades include reaching the shortlist for the Kate Greenaway Award in 2018 with Under the Same Sky and receiving the 2020 Books Are My Bag Readers Award for Tiger, Tiger Burning Bright.

Teckentrup moved to Berlin in 2005 and in addition to illustrations for magazines, clothes, packaging and books – largely for Prestel and Jacoby & Stuart – she continues to create exhibition pieces for galleries and art fairs. Continuing her work with collage, she now tends to create her pieces by printing, painting and cutting paper, then scanning the different textures and shapes in order to manipulate them digitally and build up layers of colour.