ABOUT ME
My name is James Chapman and I’m an illustrator based in Leeds, UK.
I paint pictures with acrylic paint in a cartridge paper sketchbook and post a lot on social media. I love the movies!
My career in art began during my PhD studying Physics at the University of Manchester. Science is a hard thing to communicate and I found myself drawn to the ways we can make it feel more accessible. Through diagrams and imagery, complex ideas can be presented simply and that’s something I’ve tried to do in all my artistic work.
I want to condense 1000 words into a single picture, and if I can make it look cute while I’m at it, that’s a good day for me.
I’ve never been to art school but I’ve practiced drawing as much as I can every day for the past 15 years, and now I try to pass on the little tricks I’ve learned to others through simple lessons on social media (and once on TV teaching Frank Skinner to draw a tiger)
If you’d like to support my work, I have a shop, I run a film club, and I am available for commission.
But if you’d just like to browse, this site hosts a lot of my previous projects that I’m very proud of.
Books about language
Sounds All Around | A World of Wisdom | A Goose, Standing on Tiptoes
Books with painted illustration
Nice Paintings of Shit Places | Could This Be A Sign | Don’t Put Yourself Down
Books with digital illustration
What If Death was Cute? | Movie Cat | Festive Facts
I’ve also worked extensively as a designer at for animation in both 2D and 3D. Previous shows I’ve worked on include, Ada Twist, Scientist (Netflix), Eureka (Disney+), Powerbirds (Universal Kids) and Nella, the Princess Knight (Nickelodeon).