David Miller’s first picture book was Boo to a Goose by Mem Fox. It took over ten years for the manuscript to find an illustrator and it took David ten seconds to agree to illustrate it then six months to make the brightly coloured paper sculpture illustrations. More picture books have followed, some like What’s for Lunch? and Just Like You and Me which he wrote. The latest, Over the Hill and Around the Bend with Granny and Bert (and Me) written by Helen Lunn, is a Scholastic book. David has also produced two ‘how to’ books (one on paper sculpture) and illustrated a couple of junior novels.
David’s father was a sculptor and David’s bedroom was in his father’s studio so he grew up with clay, wood shavings, cement and fibreglass all around him. That is why he makes his sculptures out of paper. 'Much cleaner, much lighter and the colours are endless. I enrich the coloured paper with paint, pencils or oil pastels, cut the paper with scissors and scalpel, bend, fold and glue to make the sculptures. The finished works are photographed in my studio and the photos are used to make the picture books.'
The earliest sculptures he can remember making were small ducks that he made when he was about four years old.
David was born in Sydney and grew up in Melbourne. He studied advertising art and worked as an art director before starting his own graphic design and illustration studio in a mud brick building in the Yarra valley. David loves the bush and that’s
why he is an officer in the local volunteer fire brigade. This keeps him busy, driving fire trucks, training other firefighters and going to fires and accidents.
David and his wife Sylvia have three grown-up children and two grandchildren. They share five chooks with the family next door. When his children were small, David wrote and illustrated books just for them. Now his books are for everyone and he has fun drawing with his grandchildren.
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