Meet the alum who wrote an award-winning graphic memoir

Maurice Vellekoop’s prestigious career in illustration spans nearly 40 years and includes such clients as The New Yorker, Vanity Fair and Criterion.

He graduated from the Ontario College of Art (OCA) in 1986, before it became OCAD University, from the Communication and Design department. The freelance illustrator and cartoonist is based in Toronto.

Now, Vellekoop has published his first graphic memoir, I’m So Glad We Had This Time Together, about growing up gay in a strict, conservative Christian household. The memoir includes references to OCA in the early 1980s.

Image: cover of I’m So Glad We Had This Time Together.

In November 2024, Vellekoop was awarded the 2024 Toronto Book award for his memoir - the first graphic novel to ever win this award and in March 2024, the memoir won an an Award of Excellence at the Museum of Comic and Cartoon Art (MoCCA) festival, the major indie comics festival by The Society of Illustrators in New York City. I’m So Glad We Had This Time Together is now widely available in bookstores across Canada and the USA.

A timeline of Vellekoop’s career illustrates the talent, passion and commitment it took him to get here.

“Since 1986, I’ve worked for top international magazine and advertising clients,” says Vellekoop. “I’ve published numerous zines and comics, notably with Drawn & Quarterly and Koyama Press. Books of my work include Vellevision, A Cocktail of Comics and Pictures, Maurice Vellekoop’s ABC Book: A Homoerotic Primer, and A Nut At The Opera. I have created concept and background art for animated films, and my original ink on paper artwork has been exhibited around the world.”

Vellekoop’s illustration clients include: The New Yorker, The New York Times Magazine, Vanity Fair, Sports Illustrated, Esquire, British GQ, Marie Clair France, Forbes, Abercrombie and Fitch Quarterly, The Boston Globe, LA Times, Mother Jones, Conde Nast Traveler, Town and Country, Toronto Life, Saturday Night and Out.

His 38-year career spans vast and varied milestones, such as in 1994, when American Vogue sent him to Paris to view the fall/winter couture collections and create a four-page comics reportage for the magazine’s September issue. This led to an association with Vogue that lasted several years. During this time, he illustrated a regular column, Plum Sykes’s Fashion Fiction.

Image: Page One of “Paris Couture Diary 1994”

His fashion illustration work appeared consistently in the first dozen or so issues of Wallpaper magazine.

One of the most ambitious projects of his career, Vellekoop notes, is his 2006 mural for Spotco, the premier advertising and branding agency for Broadway shows. The mural depicted roughly one hundred years of Broadway/Times Square history and included portraits of dozens of singing, dancing and acting legends, greeting folks at Spotco’s then offices at 512 Seventh Ave. in New York City.

Image: A portion of the Spotco mural.

In 2014, Vellekoop had a retrospective show, titled Cockadoodle, The Erogenous Art of Maurice Vellekoop, at a bar/gallery called Twenty Twenty Two in Manchester, UK. The following year it moved to Space Station Sixty-Five, a gallery in London, UK.

“In the last 10 years I've been doing work for the Criterion Collection of arthouse DVDs,” says Vellekoop. “It’s been an honour and pleasure to create artwork for three of the films of one of my favourite classic Hollywood directors, Preston Sturges. I also created the art for the DVD of Edouard Molinaro’s original 1978 film of La Cage Aux Folles.”

Even more recently, in 2021, with Reactor, he created about thirteen minutes of simple animation for the documentary feature Boulevard, A Hollywood Story, directed by Jeffrey Schwarz.

And most recently, of course, Vellekoop has shared his story about growing up gay in a strict, conservative Christian household in his first graphic memoir, I’m So Glad We Had This Time Together, an enthralling story about being true to yourself.

Q&A WITH MAURICE VELLEKOOP

Tell us about your book!

My graphic memoir, I’m So Glad We Had This Time Together, is about growing up gay in a strict, conservative Christian household. It’s a “compassionate, moving, and hilarious late bloomer’s coming of age memoir and an enthralling portrait of what it means to be true to yourself, to learn to forgive, and to be an artist,” – from the book jacket.

It was inspired directly by the crisis I faced, of not getting sufficient illustration work in this century. I needed to find a new source of revenue and considered several ideas, such as trying to get with a gallery, before turning to comics.

I had always drawn and published comics in my spare time, but I’d never written anything longer than a 10-page story. I began to think about my life and my eccentric family and thought that this material might be a good fit for the genre of memoir, which has remained popular in prose and graphic work since the 1990s.

In 2012, I successfully pitched my book idea to a publisher and got a decent advance. As well, in the ensuing years, I was lucky enough to receive grants from the Canada Council for the Arts and the Ontario Arts Council.

During the 11 plus years I worked on it, my book grew to nearly 500 pages, a huge leap for me into long-form writing. It was published by Pantheon Books NYC and Random House Canada in February of 2024.

In March, it won an Award of Excellence at MoCCA, the New York indie comics festival put on by The Society of Illustrators. It is widely available in bookstores across Canada and the USA.

How did your education at OCAD U support your career?

The main thing I took away from OCA, as it was called in the 1980s, was what I learned from some really amazing life drawing teachers. I augmented my Communication and Design illustration courses with as much life drawing as I could cram into my remaining electives, and that daily practise for those four years remains the foundation of my work to this day.

What advice do you have for artists and designers currently studying at OCAD U?

I have only ever taught illustration a little. It’s not really for me, but here are a couple of simple but oh-so challenging bits of advice I tried to impart to my students. First: do what you love. Without love, it won’t work, and you’ll be unhappy. The second is related: don’t let your head be too turned by current fads and trends. Experiment with style, absolutely for sure, but if you think, oh, if only my work was like what's popular now, that is a dead end. Keep making work and your own unique style will emerge. It’s important to trust your gut.

How are you celebrating Pride Month?

As part of ongoing book promotion, I am doing an event with Aesop, the skin, hair and body care company. Over the last few years, as a philanthropic gesture, Aesop has created something called the Aesop Queer Library. During Pride Week, the stores are emptied of products, and the shelves are filled with queer books that the company gives away for free. This year they have chosen my memoir as one of the books, and I will be doing a presentation in their Queen Street store on June 27.

Other than that, no plans, but to relax and take in the scenery!

Article updated November 11, 2024