Dawn of The Wolf Criers

Introducing our editor Kato McNickle

Wolf Criers Club 
Vol. 2

 Thanks to all of you who boarded this Wolf Criers Wonkavator on the ground floor. 

 Over the next several months we will be introducing the illustrator/writers of Wolf Criers while figuring out how we will use this space to let you know about our projects and offer insights into how anyone can move their art forward in the ever-changing landscape of opportunity.

Our posts will be landing in your in-box once a week as we get cranking. 

To kick things off, I will introduce myself. I’m Connecticut-based artist Kato McNickle and am the newsletter editor figuring out how and why we are putting our ideas and images into this space. Last year I decided to go all in learning how to write and illustrate picture books. 

 While taking an online class called Children’s Book Pro from SVS Learn, I set-up a once-a-week Zoom Room for classmates to meet and help each other. That was the start of Wolf Criers Club, a collective of creative storytellers using words and images to craft new, interesting worlds. We’ve been meeting ever since.

 My previous arts career was in theater as a director and playwright, with a specialty in new play development and teaching at The University of Connecticut. But live-performance radically shifted in the wake of the pandemic. This led to an exploration of other types of storytelling. Before my ventures into theater, I trained as a graphic artist and worked in a couple of art departments. I was even employed for a year as a professional caricature artist, which is a blend of drawing while drawing a crowd. Art has many ways of becoming performance. 

Kato working in an art department cutting color separations for flags on a giant light table in Mystic, CT circa the 90s.

 This past year has been all about learning to compose picture book texts and laying the foundation of my return to illustration. There are many new tools and techniques to master, but one of my resources to help me focus and build skills is this group of Wolf Criers.  The support and insight gained from traveling with a pack is keeping me on track. 

 During the shutdowns caused by covid, I was the chair of a newly formed New London Arts Council in Connecticut. Many artists, including myself, lost teaching gigs and public shows.  To keep our local arts community connected, we led weekly live meet-ups via Zoom and invited artists to show work-in-progress, take us on tours of their studios via their computer cameras, and discuss strategies to stay in the art-groove.  We also organized workshops to help artists navigate the opportunities provided by the state for fellowships and grants. 

 It shaped my understanding of my role in my arts community: To help guide fellow artists through these disruptive times. 

This mission inspired the Wolf Criers Club. It’s designed to be a flexible, cooperative effort, because we are more intelligent as a group than as individuals.  Everyone in the CBPro course came together from different experiences. We are traveling in a similar direction toward improvement and accomplishment. 

And now you are part of this journey too. It will be fun exploring the possibilities of Wolf Criers as a group of art colleagues and as a community. Thanks for coming along.

5 Questions for Kato:

• Where are you from originally and where are you located now?

I grew up in a rural town in Southeastern Connecticut called Ledyard. While it is now the home of the largest casino in the Western Hemisphere, when I was a kid there was one traffic light and a few dirt roads. I even rode a horse up to the store in the town center and it was not considered odd. Now I’m one town south in Groton where I live close enough to Long Island Sound to hear the fog horns.

• How did you get your name?

The name ‘Kato’ is a nickname given to me by a theater colleague when I was 21 years old as a joke. The whole name she used was ‘Kato Potato’. While people understood ‘Potato’ was not my last name, the ‘Kato’ part stuck.

• Who was an important influence, teacher, or mentor?

My 5th grade teacher Mr. Pier was an important mentor in my life. A former pro boxer and ball player who taught 5th grade, he taught everyone the rules of league play for flag football, softball, and boxing, but prized good sportsmanship above winning. When we learned the states and their capitals we got extra credit for knowing the professional ball-clubs in the host cities. He used to say, “When the going gets tough, the tough get going.” Yeah, Mr. Pier was tops.

• When did you start taking your art seriously?

Learning how to manage deadlines without going into a frenzy at the end was a turning point. It took a decade to figure that out, but once I did it left room for much more skills-building and growth.

• What is grabbing your attention this year?

Besides the Dune movie (I’m looking forward to seeing the extra features on the blu ray), my focus is on learning how to punch into the publishing world. I spent 8 months last year doing a deep-dive into learning to write interesting picture books. Half of last year I was part of a mentorship program with The Society of Children’s Book Writers and Illustrators (SCBWI) that accelerated my development. Shout out to my mentor, author and language geek Kathy MacMillan. Now I have several manuscripts in good shape and am eager to send them places. I’m on the steep part of the learning curve.

Follow me on substack

Kato McNickle

on Insta @katoagogo and Facebook
My in-flux website katoagogo.com

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Our Wolf Criers logo is by Michael Luk