twikga is internationaal op weg. Onder de palmen van het Grand-Café restaurant 1e Klas op het Centraal Station van Amsterdam, werd na een gesprek met Erik Kunst van Multilibris, besloten over te gaan tot de lancering van Phanhabs in Nederland. Door de samenwerking met deze in Nederland gevestigde uitgeverij zijn twikga boeken voor boekhandelaren bestelbaar via het Centraal Boekhuis. Consumenten...
Wild dogs are amazing animals, very social and real team players. They care for each other when wounded, something not many predators do. Last year in Mombo, we met the famous alpha-female who teamed up with jackals, after her pack was killed by competitors. They are also fierce hunters. The first time we saw them was fifteen years ago in Savuti, Botswana. A pack of thirteen dogs managed to...
Most of the time I am glued to my computer. Sometimes I need to get my fingers dirty. That's why I look forward to the days when I can go to Irene Velthuis. She runs a painting school in Ottensen, a trendy part of Hamburg. I know her from the days when she helped me to develop my portfolio for Art School. Now I call her my "creative conscience", because critical questions, unsolicited good...
It was time for our morning coffee-stop. We found ourselves a nice shady tree and made our bush latte. Suddenly an elephant appeared out of nowhere. We froze, the elephant came closer. He checked us out and then decided to have a mud-bath just in front of us. The picture of him throwing the mud, I used for one of the Phanhabs illustrations. I think, we were all impressed by this bush latte...
"Leopards climb trees, lions stay on the ground", is what many safari guides will tell you. Not on the Busanga Plains, in Zambia! Our first encounter with that behavior was in 2009. We were traveling with a group of family and friends. My mother in law was still getting used to the idea of driving around wild animals in an open car. We had just been picked up from the airstrip and on the way to...
The lion pictures for this illustration were taken in 2009 at Duba Plains, in the Okavango Delta. By then the famous Duba Boys had split up and the remaining lions were struggling to "form a new team". In the meantime the buffalos were often winning. They had practiced their defence tactics for years.
Publishing is something completely new for me. I grew up in the Netherlands, where I studied Business Administration. After my studies I worked in marketing and e-commerce for big multinational companies. Moving to Hamburg, Germany, gave me the opportunity to study illustration design. My first book-project Tata&Squack, Die Grosse Reise, I developed together with the author Elisabeth Visser....
"Are there really that many animals in one area at the same time?", people ask me, when they look at the illustrations in Phanhabs Lush Bush. The answer is a "yes, but..." The pictures show the habitats of the animals and how they interact. So if you were to stay in one spot, you would see them all coming by. Nevertheless the biodiversity and abundance in some wildlife areas, where the pictures...
