Bio:

Update... An 2012 overview Go to http://marjorie-cv.blogspot.com/ to see all the "fun" I had in 2012 - a busy year for me. Also go to see the blog I made about the books, Numbers Do and Ears Hear (a pair of bilingual books for very young children written by Chu-Ren Huang & Kathleen Ahrens and illustrated by Me) published by a Chinese publisher Sun-Ya in 2012. http://booksfromtheeast.blogspot.com/

Marjorie van Heerden grew up on a farm in the Hex River Valley in South Africa. From an early age she loved drawing animals and fairies and people and dinosaurs and children and dragons and monsters and today they appear in all shapes and sizes in the more than 100 books that feature her work. Since the publication of her first children’s picture book in 1983 Marjorie van Heerden has been published as illustrator or illustrator/author in 33 languages in Africa, England, Europe, the East, Canada and the USA.
She and her husband lived and worked in Stellenbosch near Cape Town, South Africa for 20 years, in Johannesburg (SA) for another ten, travelled for eighteen months on honeymoon in a camper van around Europe, lived for a year on the banks of Lake Michigan in the USA and for four years in a forest on a mountain north of Athens in Greece. From each of these places Marjorie drew inspiration for her menagerie of animals, fairies, dragons, monsters and people.
Since 2003 the Van Heerdens live next to the sea in Gordon’s Bay, once again near Cape Town. Their two children are grown up and out of the house. Marjorie’s studio is in the loft and she sits looking at the magnificent view over False Bay while she writes and illustrates her stories.
Marjorie tirelessly works for the development of South African children’s book writers and illustrators and in 2003 she started the South African chapter of the international Society of Children’s Book Writers & Illustrators (SCBWI) based in Los Angeles and active in more than 40 countries around the globe. She is currently the co-regional advisor of the SA chapter. (She also started the SCBWI chapter in Greece in 2000).
In 2009 Human & Rousseau Publishers commissioned Marjorie van Heerden to illustrate André P. Brink’s Afrikaans translation of Lewis Carroll’s classic Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland (1865). The publication coincided with the celebrated novelist, scholar and translator’s 75th birthday.
In 2008 Marjorie, with children’s book author, Wendy Hartmann, won the M.E.R Award for best illustrated children’s book, for Nina and Little Duck published by Human & Rousseau (SA) in 2007 (also available in Afrikaans) and in 2011 she won the W.B Mkhize Award given by the Usiba Writers’ Guild for Uhambo LukaLulama Olude (Zulu version of Lulama’s long way home, which she wrote and illustrated (Giraffe Books, an imprint of Pan MacMillan.
She has just completed two Chinese children’s picture books written by Kathleen Ahrens, the SCBWI Regional Advisor chairperson and Chu-Ren Huang.

Website www.grafikon.co.za
Sketch Blog http://marjorie-van-heerden.blogspot.com/
Trade books http://marjorie-books.blogspot.com/
Educational Books http://marjorie-educational-books.blogspot.com/
Curriculum Vitae http://marjorie-cv.blogspot.com/
Articles (children’s books) http://marjorie-van-heerden-articles.blogspot.com/
Reading Series - http://marjorie-readers.blogspot.com/


Writer/Illustrator
PAL
Member since 2001
Region: South Africa

Contact Information

Email:  marjorie@grafikon.co.za
Current Location:   Gordon's Bay
Website:  http://www.grafikon.co.za

Published In Children's Market: Yes