Senior Lecturer Illustration

  • Academic
  • Professional Practice
Dr Yang Dong

Dr Dong is the Senior Lecturer at UCA, helping to lead MA Illustration course. She was awarded a practice-based PhD at Cambridge School of Art, looking at using the physical form of the book-object as narrative language.

Dr Yang Dong

Bio

Dong has worked in illustration and design industry since 2010. My clients, including China National TV station, Poplar Publishing Co., Ltd.(Japan), The Salariya Book Company (UK), China Children’s Press & Publication Group etc. I also collaborate with the largest publisher in China, Thinkingdom Media Group Ltd. to assist illustrators and designers in getting their books published and editing their work. 

My academic career started in 2018, worked as a visiting lecturer and designed the picturebook-making course taught at Communication University of China and Beijing University of Technology - Gengdan Institute.

I also founded the picturebook studio - ‘32 Pages’, the first private picturebook studio providing a picturebook-making course in China.

Research statement

A growing number of picturebooks emphasizing the importance of using the physical book object to convey the narrative are being published. I define these types of picturebooks as un-flattened in my PhD research. I provide a framework for integrating further types of play into picturebooks by using the physicality of the book object to convey the narrative from my research. Combining forms of play enhances the effect of reading the book on children’s development, while also presenting a more engaging narrative.

Publications:

  • Dong, Y. Unflattened Design: Conveying the Narrative of a Picturebook Using the Physical Nature of the Book-object. in 8th International Conference on Illustration and Animation, CONFIA 2020 978–989 (2020).
  • Dong, Y. Un-flattened Picturebook: A practice-based investigation into the use of the physical form of the book-object as narrative language. in Theorem 2019 (2019).
  • Dong, Y. Mine! (Scribblers, 2017).
  • Dong, Y. Blueberry Pie (Popular, 2018)

Professional Membership, Affiliation and Consultancy

Exhibitions:

  • "Ways of storytelling", 2020, Ruskin Gallery, Cambridge, UK
  • "Theorem 2019", 2019, Ruskin Gallery, Cambridge, UK
  • "Beauty of Life” Contemporary Illustration Exhibition, 2018, Shenzhen, China,
  • "Key Colours" illustration competition exhibition, 2018, Bologna, Italy
  • "Hello, Childhood" Contemporary Illustration Exhibition, 2017, Beijing, China

 

Awards:

  • Picturebook “Once upon a Hole!” was shortlisted for the dPictus "The Unpublished Picturebook Showcase 2",2020
  • Illustrations form “Good Morning, Good Evening” shortlisted for the Key Colours illustration competition,2018
  • Picturebook “Mine!” shortlisted for the 1st Little Hakka International Picture Book Competition, 2017.