Jerome Lagarrigue

STAR WARS - THE ART COLLECTION OF JEROME LAGARRIGUE

Born in Paris in 1973, Jerome Lagarrigue was raised in a family of artists. Leaving France for America, he attended the Rhode Island School of Design from 1992-1996. There he majored in illustration and was honored with the Joseph Lefevre Award for excellence in painting. In 1998, he began to teach drawing and painting at the Parsons School of Design, where he continues to inspire his pupils while living nearby in Brooklyn.

Upon his arrival in New York, Lagarrigue also embarked on a successful career as a children’s book illustrator. His visually resonant work won him the prestigious Coretta Scott King/John Steptoe Award and the Ezra Jack Keats New Illustrator Award for his work on Freedom Summer. He also completed unusual, abstract illustrations for My Man Blue. The artist’s most recent and continuously moving illustrations were for Maya Angelou’s newly-published poems for young readers.

The Metropolitan Opera recently commissioned the artist to paint a portrait of Tosca, to be displayed on stage in Act One of the opera. Also, Lagarrigue will be among a group of 100 artists to have been personally selected by George Lucas to participate in an exclusive project commemorating the original Star Wars trilogy. Published in a coffee table book in 2010, the artworks will be exhibited worldwide before being auctioned at Christie’s. - Wiki