Tony Ross has recently illustrated "Through the Cat-Flap" by Ian Whybrow, published by Hachette.

1. How important do you think the illustrations in a book are to pre-school children, as opposed to words?

I don't think illustrations are important as opposed to words rather WITH words. Of course preschoolers cannot read, but are read to. At that age, they can recognise the importance of words, and have ambitions to decipher them one day, yet at the time, gain understanding from the pictures, which should relate and entertain without pomposity.

2. What process did you go through in order to create the pictures of the boy in the Cat-Flap story, both in terms of the boy himself and the environment?

The Cat-Flap boy DID cause me some concern - whether I should treat him with more reverence than any other boy I draw - but then I thought not. I think disability is one part of a child's being. In the main, they are totally normal, so I drew what I would be like with sticks. I would stand at funny angles, sometimes fall over, sometimes not, sometimes forget that I should take more care, so I drew him as a normal boy who needs sticks, rather than some sort of patient.

3. Has this differed for other books where you have drawn disabled children?

I haven't done many. Andersen Press did an excellent book with me and Jeanne Willis, called Susan Laughs, all about the normality of disabled children. The only other disabilities I have drawn have been the obvious, poor eyesight etc.

4. If you were asked to include children with different kinds of impairments, perhaps ones you were unfamiliar with, how would you go about it?

In the same way as I would draw anybody else. I may make fun, I may not, depending on the story.

I am not aware of many medical, or practical criteria, so I would expect those to be supplied by the author or publisher.

If the disabled child was nice, I would draw him/her that way, if he/she was not I would draw him/her that way too.

5. Would resources like a demonstration image bank, and the specific guidance developed by "In The Picture" help you in the future? Do you have any helpful suggestions for what else might be useful to illustrators?

Yes, most illustrators are a bit lost on the medical boundaries, of various disabilities, and on things like equipment. I would remind other illustrators that a child may well be disabled, but he/she is a million other things as well - funny, clever, sly, deceitful, resourceful, happy, loyal, determined, a winger, tough, weak, brainy, sensitive, greedy, handsome, pretty, plain, a joy to be with and a pain in the tail, and so on ... bit like all of us eh?

Read illustrator Jane Ray's interview here.

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