Mikołaj Pasiński

(b. 1982) – a comic-book writer, graphic designer and collage artist.

He and illustrator Gosia Herba have made books that have been translated into a whole range of languages.

Pasiński and Herba’s wordless Fertility, based on beliefs about female fertility, is a dark visual narrative about desire, revenge and cruelty. For younger readers, ‘Słoń na księżycu’ (Elephant on the Moon), alluding to the alleged sighting of the titular animal on the moon by a seventeenth-century astronomer, looks at passion and determination in reaching a goal. The subject of Balonowa 5 is diversity and fruitful co-existence – inspired by Georges Perec’s Life: A User’s Manual, it is about a building inhabited by all kinds of creatures: ‘mad and eccentric, but always joyful and friendly’. Created for preschoolers, Van Dog is a humorous look at making art, while ‘Nikogo nie ma w domu’ (No One’s Home) takes young readers on an adventure prompted by a well-meaning misunderstanding. ‘Podziemna przygoda odważnej żaby Rene’ (The Underground Adventure of the Brave Frog Rene) kicks off a new series by the duo, looking at curiosity about the world and an explorer’s passion.

No One’s Home took the visual award at the Book of the Year 2023 competition of the Polish Section of IBBY (International Board on Books for Young People), and Balonowa 5 received a graphic art prize in the same competition (2019), as did Pasiński’s design of ‘Wiersze dla dzieci’ (Poems for Children) by Stanisław Grochowiak (2017) and his graphic design of Jerzy Ficowski’s ‘Lodorosty i bluszczary’ (Treeweed and Alivy, 2017). This book was also singled out in the Polish Graphic Design Awards and Most Beautiful Book of the Year competitions, organised by the Polish Book Publishers’ Society (2016). Van Dog was on the List of Treasures of the Museum of Children’s Books in Warsaw, and was given the Yellow Ciżemka Award 2022 and the Main Prize in the Child-Friendly World Competition (2021).

For more on the work of Mikołaj Pasiński, see here.