Myrea Pettit and David Rich\u00c3\u00a9 recently visited Sweden to meet the renowned fairy artist and painter Ann Mari Sj\u00c3\u00b6gren.The visit was filmed and featured on Swedish television and in the national press.<\/p>\n
Ann Mari is a lady of 85, full of warmth and humour, crystal clear in mind and with lots of stories to tell.<\/p>\n
Ann Mari had a natural talent for drawing, quite from early childhood. After school, she started a career as commercial artist, then was employed by a publishing house for a short time; that’s how she came into the book business.<\/p>\n
Most of her life she has been a freelance, working with books as well as advertising.<\/p>\n
“A Day in Fairy Land” was published in many languages in the 1940’s and possibly in quite large editions. Information from some old newspaper clippings shows publishers talking about “millions of copies” being printed in the United States, but we understand they may have been more marketing than facts. The royalties the artist received very little of it all, just a payment once for the pictures.<\/p>\n