To celebrate publication of The Coming of the Iron Man, we spoke to illustrators Mini Grey and Chris Mould about their creative process and how they arrived at their visual interpretations of the Iron Man.
Chris Mould:
I first discovered the Iron Man as a young lad in school.
It left a lasting impression on me and gave me much creative inspiration. I think it probably had a lot to do with me drawing so much as a kid.
So to find myself working within publishing as an illustrator, and to be able to eventually return to the story and give it my own twist, was a dream job.
Developing my own Iron Man ‘look’ was something that took many hours.
For me, this should be a mixture of paying homage to the existing versions of him, using what was there descriptively in the text and adding my own personal touch. I constantly questioned my own work. Why was I creating my vision of this story? What did I bring to it that was visually new?
I pulled out a few particular scenes that I wanted to explore. The Iron Man underwater, the Iron Man being taken to pieces, the Iron Man buried under the earth. The Iron Man falling from the cliff. Each scene with their own unique feel in terms of palette, environment, mood, etc. All of these a great challenge. All of them great fun.
I can’t think of a time I’ve enjoyed more than the time spent on this book. The story has meant a great deal to me for my whole life and I feel honoured and very grateful to now be a part of its legacy.
Mini Grey:
For me, Chris Mould’s Iron Man is the definitive one.
When I knew I was going to illustrate the Iron Man as a picture book, I had to hide away Chris’s version and not look at it, otherwise I knew I’d want to give up!
Before I started illustrating the story, I was on a flight to Costa Rica and one in-flight film was The Iron Giant, an animation by Brad Bird. It’s a fantastic reinterpretation of the story, and also really touching in its portrayal of the Giant and Hogarth’s growing friendship.
Leah, my wonderful editor at Faber, gave me several volumes of Ted Hughes’s nature poetry.
It felt like a very British landscape. I see many of these animals when I run down the riverbank in Oxford: herons, cuckoos, kingfishers, swifts and swallows.
One initial challenge was to work out how my Iron Man would be constructed. But also, I had to decide exactly how big he was. Feet the size of single beds . . . I settled for around 36 feet tall – smaller than a biggish tree, bigger than a house.
My Iron Man is a sort of steampunk mashup of washing machine and steam engine.
He has a furnace in his chest. I wanted him to be simultaneously metal-y and rusty, but hopefully not too human – more like a friendly appliance.
Drawing the Iron Man’s hand holding an eye and wandering the beach looking for the rest of his body parts was maybe the hardest picture; I wondered if this was the image that sparked Ted Hughes’s story: the picture of a metal giant toppling off a cliff, shattering to pieces, and then the pieces still alive, putting themselves together.
The Coming of the Iron Man is out now.
Browse all editions of The Iron Man.
See more of Chris and Mini’s pictures in the gallery below.
Buy the Books
This gorgeous abridged edition brings The Iron Man to a picture book audience for the very first time! A landmark publication.
A stunning full-colour edition with illustrations by Chris Mould bring this Ted Hughes classic to life. For fans of The Wild Robot, and perfect for reading aloud.
