Striking a pose in front of my Broadway theater poster for Blithe Spirit

EMAIL ZINA HERE

Zina Saunders has been a writer-illustrator for more than 15 years. In addition to contributions in a variety of periodicals (including The Wall Street Journal, Time Magazine, The Progressive, The Nation, The San Francisco Chronicle, and Foreign Policy Magazine), her client list includes Chronicle Books, Simon & Schuster, Random House, Scholastic, and Oxford University Press.

In June 2005, her focus shifted from general illustration to reportage illustration, when she wrote a story for Time Out New York magazine about the Puerto Rico Schwinn Club, an outgrowth of the Overlooked New York website, her series of interviews and portraits of impassioned New Yorkers. She wrote and illustrated another feature in the August 4th issue of Time Out New York magazine, profiling Central Park portrait artists. Her Overlooked New York series was selected for the 3x3 ProShow Illustration Annual No. 4.

Blackboard Heroes, her series of portraits and interviews with dedicated teachers across the US, was featured in Scholastic's Instructor Magazine, and excerpts from Art Talks, her series of portraits and interviews with illustrators and art directors, appears in every issue of ILLO magazine and was selected for the American Illustration 26 Annual. Another portrait from that series is in the American Illustration 27 Annual, and five of her portraits have been selected for inclusion in both the Communication Arts Illustration Annual 2008 and the 3 X 3 ProShow Illustration Annual No. 5.

Her series of political satires, The Party's Over, was selected for the Society of Illustrators Annual; the series was also selected for the Applied Arts 2009 Annual and chosen for the American Illustration 28 Annual. One of the series was also included in the New York Times Gallery 7 exhibit chronicling political caricatures over the last 40 years. You can buy the 40-page full color book here.

Zina is the daughter of pulp magazine artist Norman Saunders, who painted some of the most popular bubblegum cards from the 60's and 70's, including Mars Attacks, Batman, and Wacky Packages. As a child, she got her first taste of being a professional illustrator when she would "correct" her father's paintings, when he was away from his drawing board. Many an eyelash on Norm Saunders' damsels in distress was painted by a nine-year-old Zina.

Zina lives and works in New York City, where she grew up and attended Music and Art High School and The Cooper Union. She left Manhattan in her 20’s to be a levitating lady with a traveling circus in upstate New York, but eventually returned to her senses and her beloved city.

If you're interested in knowing more, she maintains a blog on the illustrator blogsite, Drawger, that features her works-in-progress and outside projects. You can also read more in the Wikipedia article about Zina and she maintains a portfolio on illoz.com.

If you're interested in buying limited edition prints of Zina's work, please email her.

EMAIL LINK