Annet Kossen

Annet Kossen
Annet Kossen's youtube profile picture
Full name	Annet Kossen
Born	May 28, 1938
Died	October 20, 2024 (aged 86)
Birthplace	Alkmaar, The Netherlands
Occupation	Wikipedia:Illustrator
Years active	1964-????

Annet Kossen (May 28, 1938 - October 20, 2024) was a painter and an illustrator. Born in Alkmaar. She was the illustrator to bring the originally French fairytale, Drakestail, to Herman van Veen's attention, which was the start of everything Alfred Jodocus Kwak.

History

New York

Kossen developed a passion for drawing from a young age. After completing mulo, she enrolled at Schoevers, studying office management and secretarial tasks—fields she disliked but pursued at her parents' insistence to learn a trade. She lived in Alkmaar until age 19 before relocating to Amsterdam. This education allowed her to secure work at Carré and Uitgeverij Querido.

In 1964, she moved to New York and managed the work of prominent young American illustrators, leading a successful company. During her time in America, she also briefly attended the School of Visual Arts, where she focused on painting. During this period, she received her first illustration commission, creating black-and-white illustrations for a cookbook for a publisher friend in New York. She later contributed several illustrations to the magazine Puffin Post.

In 1973, she returned to Amsterdam with writer Rob Chrispijn, whom she married. She used her professional illustrations from America, along with other work, to create a portfolio for publishers. In 1977, publisher Lemniscaat commissioned her to illustrate a picture book called Repelsteeltje (Rumpelstiltskin).

Alfred J. Kwak

Around this time, Kossen met Herman van Veen through her husband, Rob Chrispijn, who writes song lyrics, takes photographs, and manages lighting for van Veen’s productions. Van Veen, impressed by Kossen's illustrations, expressed interest in creating a picture book with her and asked her to find a suitable story as a foundation. Kossen reported struggling with imposter syndrom during this period, as she had not formally trained in illustration and was self-taught.

Kossen found inspiration in an old fairy tale, Drakestail, from The Red Fairy Book, written by [[wikipedia Lang|Andrew Lang]] in 1890. Lang adapted this story from the French tale, Bout-d'-Canard (literally "Duck Butt"), by Charles Marelle, published in 1888. She translated this story into Dutch for van Veen, who contributed some verses.

Before beginning a picture book, van Veen incorporated the story into a small stage play, created as a birthday gift for a friend of a Harlekijn Holland employee in 1976. Shortly after, in 1977, the director of the Residentie Orkest asked van Veen to develop a children’s musical production, prompting him to further adapt the story into a play, which premiered in February 1978.

Kossen’s illustrations were featured on the vinyl cover of the Alfred J. Kwak theater play, and following the play's success, a story book was published in 1979, with a revised edition in 1987.

Kossen later expressed frustration over this period, feeling resentment toward Herman van Veen for appropriating Alfred Jodocus Kwak. Although she had no contractual agreement on ownership, she lamented missing out on shares of the profits generated by Alfred’s success. She was replaced by illustrators Harald Siepermann and Hans Bacher, who created a comic adaptation based on Alfred’s stage play adventure.

Egel & Muis

After Alfred's success it wasn't as hard for Kossen to get illustration work. At the end of the seventies she had moved to Vledderveen where she worked on book covers for children's books, stories with pictures in children's magazines like Okki and Ezelsoor. For Okki she created comic strips that would be collected by the publisher Casterman into the first two Egel & Muis (lit. Porcupine & Mouse) books. Originally those were meant to form a series of 10 books, but only 3 were made. Kossen would frequently spend an entire year on the process of making these books, covering the illustrations and the stories as well. The books would consist of one-page stories.

She also made a series of episodes about Egel & Muis for the Dutch version of Sesame Street. Frank Groothof would read the story and sing the songs, written by her husband Chrispijn, and Dutch Sesame Street characters Ieniemienie and Tommy would provide commentary. Footage from these episodes was not archived.

Works

This list is incomplete.