Freelance Illustrator and Children’s author – New Zealand
After studying, Martin Bailey first began his freelance illustration career in Sydney in 1980, working in advertising. Since then he has worked in Wellington, Tokyo, San Francisco, and for the last 35 years, Auckland. During that time Martin has also illustrated (and written some) children's books, mainly for education. More recently he has written, illustrated and published his own children's stories, which are selling in the U.S., Canada and New Zealand.

Art director, Scribble – Australia
Miriam Rosenbloom has been working in publishing for more than a decade, in both Melbourne and London. After working as a Senior Designer for Faber & Faber, in 2011 she took up the role of Art Director at Scribe before launching Scribe’s first picture-book imprint, Scribble, in 2016. Miriam’s ethos and innovative approach to book production are at the heart of Scribble, which focuses on combining meaningful narratives with the best design and production values. Miriam’s success within the children’s book industry has seen her invited as a guest to major literary events such as the Sydney and Melbourne Writers Festivals, and the Melbourne Art Book Fair, which is held at the National Gallery of Victoria.

Lecturer, Illustration dept., Graduate School of Design, Univ. Of Seoul – Korea
Lecturer, Illustration dept., Graduate School of Design, Univ. Of Seoul. Lecturer of illust. Dept. Graduate School of Design, University of Seoul, ph. D in history of illustration. Art director of Albus gallery, Freelance editor and translator of children's picturebooks, Curator of dPictus team.

Associate Director of Itabashi Art Museum - Japan
Since 1986 she has been a curator at the Itabashi Art Museum. In 1989 she became responsible for the Bologna Illustrators Exhibition in Japan and since then she has collaborated with the Bologna Book Fair in organizing the world tour of the exhibition. Kiyoko has organized several series of exhibitions of picture book artists, such as Leo Lionni, Yasuo Segawa, Tomi Ungerer, Dick Bruna, Bruno Munari and Dusan Kallay. She has also organized workshops on the creation of books for children, as well as events and courses for adults and school children.

Founder & CEO, Everafter Books – China
Founder & CEO, Everafter Books Huang Xiaoyan is the founder & CEO of Everafter Children's Books. She founded Macmillan Group's joint venture in China—Macmillan Century in 2011 and in 2017, she also founded Bayard Group and Trustbridge Global Media’s joint venture—Bayard Bridge in Beijing. She has also worked with a number of international publishing companies including HarperCollins, Amazon and Hachette. Through 27 years of experience in the publishing industry, she has gained rich experience in publishing at home and abroad. She is also a mother to a warm-hearted and beautiful 19-year-old daughter.

Freelance Illustrator and art director, Auspicious Design – Taiwan
Art director, Auspicious Design Page Tsou is a picture book illustrator, sometimes a visual artist, sometimes a curator. Currently in charge of the art director at Auspicious Design Studio in Taipei , he believes that cross-domain can bring more possibilities for creation and his work content often between visual graphic and interior design projects. He obtained a master's degree in communication art & design from the Royal College of Art, and has been selected for the Bologna Illustrator's Exhibition several times. H He is also the winner of the BCBF-SM International Award for Illustration (2011) and the Best of Show Award of 3X3 Professional Show (2010, 2011, 2012). Other Awards: American Illustration 29, 31, 33, 34; 3x3 PictureBooks Show 2012 (Gold); Bologna Illustrators Exhibition 2008, 2010, 2011, 2016; BolognaRagazzi Award 2017; Correll Book Awards / winner 2019. Publications: Tallest Tower, Smallest Star, Big Picture Press, UK 2018; Highest Mountain, Deepest Ocean, Big Picture Press, UK 2016; The Trace, Department of Cultural Affairs, Taipei City Government, Taiwan 2015; The Gift, Taipei Fine Art Museum, Taiwan 2014; El Soldado de Plomo, Ediciones SM, Spain, 2012

Consultant editor for Duckbill Books at Penguin Random House India – India
Consultant editor for Duckbill Books at Penguin Random House India Sayoni Basu reads, edits and infrequently writes books for children. She also likes looking at books and buying books, but hates dusting them. She was the co-founder of the acclaimed Duckbill Books in 2012, whose publications have won many awards.

Director of TUTI Books, Fatemi Publishing – Iran
Director of TUTI Books, A division for Children & YA Fatemi Publishing Sahar Tarhandeh was born in Tehran in 1977. She graduated in 2000 from Azad University of Tehran with a B.A. in Visual Communication & Graphic Design. Through becoming a member of Children’s Book Council (Iran’s national section of IBBY) in 1997, she had her first contact with children’s literature and has been working and researching in this field ever since. She started her career as a graphic designer and research assistant at “Picture in Children’s Books” in the Institute for Research on the History of Children’s Literature in Iran. She then moved to the UK and lived there until 2007, working as an Art & Crafts tutor for the Durham County Council Education Department and Family Learning program. In 2007, she graduated from the University of Sunderland with an M.A in Design: Multimedia and Graphics. She moved back to Iran and started working as a freelance graphic designer, art consultant, and art director for many publishing houses. She has written and translated numerous critics, reviews and articles in important scholarly journals, both national and international, mostly on children’s literature, illustration and picture books. She frequently participates in conferences and workshops regarding children’s books and literature. Moreover, she served as a jury member in many national and international exhibitions and awards, most importantly as a juror for the Hans Christian Andersen Award in 2012 and 2014. She has been invited to various universities and academic institutions to give lectures about picture books and children’s literature and therefore has extensive teaching experience. Currently, she is a member of the IBBY Iran Executive Committee and works as director of TUTI Books, the publishing house that is well-known for its high-quality picture books.

Freelance illustrator – Greece
Illustrator freelancer Iris Samartzi was born in Athens, Greece. She studied at the Vakalo Art and Design College, where she obtained her two Bachelor degrees, in Graphic Design and Interior Design. She also attended seminars on Children’s Art and Drama in Education. It was back in 2004 when she discovered that Illustration is her dream job and started showing her work to publishers. “...If you want to be an illustrator, first you have to be a director, a scenographer, a graphic designer, a photographer, an interior designer, a costume designer...and last but not least a painter. I could add more occupations, such as historian, explorer, engineer, physicist and more. Of course, I am none of those things but, to me, illustration is constant research in oh-so-many fields...” Fifteen years later, she has illustrated more than 80 books and some of them have been translated into other languages (Spanish, Italian, Swedish, Catalan, Portuguese, Galician, Basque, French, English, Chinese, Korean, Turkish). She loves her work and she is always looking for ideas, new projects, and new techniques to explore; her work has received domestic and international acclaim and has won her a number of prestigious awards including the following: IX Compostela Prize 2016 for picturebooks?for the book “Una ultima carta” by A. Papatheodoulou (Kalandraka Editorial); IBBY Greece Illustrated Book Award 2017 for the book “Summer, Autumn, Winter, Spring, Summer...” by A. Pipini (Patakis Publishers); Greek State Picturebook Award and IBBY Greece Illustrated book Award 2016 for the book “The Magic World of Federico” by S. Trivizas (Diaplasi Books); Greek State Picturebook Award and IBBY Greece Illustrated Book Award 2012?for the book “The Good and the Bad Pirates” by A. Papatheodoulou (Papadopoulos Publishing); IBBY Greece Illustrated book Award 2015 and IBBY Honor List for the book “Badboy” by A. Darlasi (Patakis Publishers); IBBY Honor List 2014?for the book “Odyssey, the Ingenious Story” by M. Angelidou (Vivliofono Books)… and more. Τhroughout all those years she’s been working in nursery and primary schools teaching art, organising art workshops for children, making book presentations, and getting inspired by the children’s creativity. Last year she ran a workshop (“Paper Bag Stories”) at Bologna Children's Book Fair 2019. She was nominated for the 2020 Hans Christian Andersen Award by the Greek section of IBBY. She’s also been a member of the judging panel of the Greek State Book Awards (2016-2017), Greek IBBY Book Awards (2019). On September 2015, she attended Picturecamp Masterclass with Benji Davies, Chris Haughton, Alexis Deacon, and Jorge Martin in Atapuerca, Spain. Right now she’s been working on a new book for Kalandraka Editorial and a version of Dr.Dolittle (Hugh Lofting) for Papadopoulos Publishing, both written and adapted by A. Papatheodoulou. More about Iris and her work at www.irissamartzi.com

art-director Samokat Publishing House - Russia
Polina Plavinskaya is an illustrator, co-founder of an independing children’s bookstore in Moscow, art-director at Samokat Publishing House.

Publishing consultant and Picture Book agent – Italy
Picture Book Agent Born in Los Angeles to a spirited Japanese mom and an unconventional American Jewish dad, she grew up in a sleepy suburb of Northern California, now the hub of the Silicon Valley. After earning a degree in Political Science at the University of California in San Diego, and working at a language school in San Francisco, she moved to Italy to teach English in 1992. While carrying on with her teaching, she enrolled in an invaluable three-year photography program at the Istituto Riccardo Bauer in Milan. Her background in photography and the visual arts landed her her first job in publishing, working for the contemporary art publisher Charta, where she learned the ABCs of bookmaking and bookselling. She was fortunate to have had the opportunity to work with artists such as Marina Abramovic and Shirin Neshat. She moved on to work for the art publisher Skira, managing their international sales and distribution, and then for 5 Continents Editions where, among other things, she edited a series of books on design, co-published with the Museum of Modern Art of New York. After twelve years of publishing and two years of project management for a design studio, she founded her Agency in 2011. When asked what makes a good agent, her one-word reply is: vision.

Cathy Olmedillas is the creative director and founder of Studio Anorak, publishers of Happy Mags for Kids, Anorak and DOT. In 2006, she launched the internationally-acclaimed Happy Mag for Kids, Anorak when she couldn't find a fun, educational and collectable magazine to read with her son. Studio Anorak went on to launch a family-focused content agency producing pieces of communications for brands such as Airbnb, H&M and Pottermore amongst others.

Publishing Editor A Buen Paso – Spain
Publishing editor A buen paso. Arianna Squilloni founded in 2008 A buen paso, a publishing house which specializes in picture books. She contributes to specialized magazines and runs workshops for writers, illustrators, librarians and schoolteachers. Sometimes she writes for children: L’estate e tutto il resto (Topipittori 2016). She has been member od the jury of the Illustrators' Exhibition at the Bologna Children's Book Fair in 2017.

CEO Nobrow/Flying Eye – UK
Sam Arthur is a founding partner and CEO of Nobrow and Flying Eye Books. He studied Graphic Design at Central Saint Martins in London. Upon graduation he went on to direct many commercials, music videos and short films for 10 years before setting up Nobrow with his business partner Alex Spiro in 2008. They currently publish around 40 new titles per year and are distributed all over the world. Their children’s books include winners of the UK’s most prestigious Children’s Book prizes the CILIP Kate Greenaway Medal and the Waterstones Picture Book Prize. Amongst their most successful projects is the Hilda comic book series by Luke Pearson. The BAFTA and Emmy winning animated series of Hilda was developed for TV by Silvergate Media and Netflix. Sam is co-founder and Director of the East London Comics & Arts Festival (ELCAF) now in its 9th year. He is also the Deputy Chair of the Association of Illustrators (AOI). Sam lives in East London with his wife, two children and dog.

Deputy Art Director of Süddeutsche Zeitung Magazin & Founder and Creative Director of Studio Steinbeck – Germany
Birthe Steinbeck is currently Deputy Art Director at Süddeutsche Zeitung Magazin creating it together with a team of talented designers while collaborating with some of the world’s best creatives which has earned her numerous recognitions. Steinbeck has also established Studio Steinbeck renowned for its versatility and content-driven design ideas always on the lookout for an original vision that really stands out. The studio is handling images and typography for books, magazines, identities, websites and printed matter. Besides that Steinbeck lectures at universities across Europe.

Art director Thierry Magnier – France
Florie Briand is a graphic designer and art director in children books. She started in 2009 in Thierry Magnier’s editorial picture books service, a house for which she still works a lot today. Now as a freelancer, she works with other clients, including Talents Hauts, Hélium, Actes Sud, Little Urban and the National Publishing Union.

Editor Pallas Editora – Brasil
Mariana Warth runs PALLAS editora together with her mother, Cristina. PALLAS was founded in 1973 by Antonio Carlos Fernandes, her grandfather. Graduated in journalism and master in Publishing Production, Mariana is responsible for children’s catalogue since 2002.

Senior Agent at The Bright Agency – UK
Lucie Luddington heads up Bright Educational, applying her 20 years of agenting experience to pair talented artists with fantastic projects and opportunities that take their career to the next level. A force to be reckoned with, Lucie is known for going above and beyond as an agent, turning Bright Educational into one of the company’s largest, most successful divisions. Now going into its fifth year, Bright Educational is an established industry pioneer, with Lucie championing fresh, diverse, high-quality artwork and creating fantastic results globally. Not only is Lucie passionate about elevating Bright’s artists, she is dedicated to changing the wider perception of educational illustration.

Children's Books Editor of The New York Times – USA
Maria Russo, author of How To Raise a Reader, is the children’s books editor of the New York Times Book Review. She has been a writer and editor at the Los Angeles Times, the New York Observer, and Salon, and holds a Ph.D. in English and Comparative Literature from Columbia University. She lives in Montclair, New Jersey, with her husband and three children.

Consultant and Publisher Instituto Emília and Estúdio Seringueira – Brasil
Consultant and Publisher (Instituto Emilia and Estudio Seringueira) Publisher and manager focused on the segments of literature and reference books for children and youth since 2000. With an academic background in Social Sciences, a Master in Political Science and a PhD in Economic History, she has conducted research about Children’s and YA Literature and taken part in the main national and international discussion and reflexion seminars on Children’s and YA Literature in the last few years. Nowadays, she is Visiting Professor of the Master of Books and Children’s and Young Adult Literature at Universitat Autonoma de Barcelona. She also coordinates the Caribbean and Latin American Chair of Reading and Writing in Brazil. She is a founding member and publisher of Emilia Magazine since 2012 and has been a curator and coordinator for many Seminars. Member of the Jury of The Hans Christian Andersen Awards 2016, of Bologna Childrens Book Fair 2016, of the Chen Bochui Children’s Literature Award, 2019a. She is consultant of the Bologna Children's Book Fair for Latin America.

Editor, designer and publisher at Petra Ediciones – Mexico
She works also as an independent publisher for Diario Siglo 21 (Art and Design Director), Guadalajara University (books and magazines), among others. She received many national and international awards and recognitions, including the 2014 BOP - Best Children’s Publisher of the Year at the 51st Bologna Children’s Book Fair and three New Horizon Awards; the FIL 2015 Editorial Merit Award; the 2016 Latín American Editorial Design Award, Fundación de Libro, at the 42nd Buenos Aires Book Fair; and the Juan Pablos Award for Editorial Merit granted by the National Chamber for the Mexican Publishing lndustry.

director Alboroto – Mexico
For more than 25 years, she has dedicated herself to the research and creation of literature for children and young adults. She worked at Ekaré, Tecolote and Alboroto in Mexico. El libro negro de los colores, which she edited, received the prestigious prize New Horizons at Bologna Children’s Book Fair (2007). Because of her publishing work, she was awarded with the White Ravens (2006 and 2007) and the Honour List of the IBBY (2008), among other awards.

Originally trained as an architect, Maria Osorio made a career shift towards children’s literature in 1986. She started as publishing director of the Colombian Association for Children’s Books (ACLIJ) and served as vice-director of Fundalectura (the Colombian Section of IBBY) from 1990 to 2000. In 2001 she founded Babel, an independent bookstore, library, publishing house and distributor all in one. Between 2014 and 2018, she directed several projects in Colombia, such as the Children’s Book Festival (now in its 12th edition) and the Medellin Children’s Book Fair, which is part of the local book festival. She is a founding member of the Colombian Association of Independent Booksellers (ACLI). In 2017, Babel was awarded the BOP Award as Best Children’s Publisher of the Year for Central and South America. In 2018 she received the “Homenaje al Merito Editorial” awarded by the Guadalajara International Book Fair as arecognition of her career’s contribution to publishing.

senior editor Chronicle Books - USA
Naomi Kirsten is a Senior Editor at Chronicle Books in San Francisco, California. She acquires over 20 titles each year, ranging from picture books to games, board books, and novelty formats with a focus on smart, art-driven projects. Naomi’s titles include A funny thing happened on the way to school…, The truth about by unbelievable school…, New York Times Notable Book and Society of Illustrators Gold Medal Winner The bear’s song, New York Times Best Illustrated Book of the Year, and I didn’t do my homework because…, for which there are 21 international editions to date. In addition to acquiring picture books from all over the world, she also develops publishing programs and products with Taro Gomi, Marc Boutavant, Benjamin Chaud, Marianna Coppo, and Lucasfilm, among others. On Instagram and Twitter: @naomi_kirsten