Make It Now! is a magnificent graphic autobiography. In his elegant, concise style, Anthony Burrill juxtaposes pictures, personal memories, snippets of conversation, drawings, collages and typographical experiments. “Make it Now. Make it New” is the mantra at the base of the entire book. This is a manual that generously dispenses practical advice and precious rules for people starting out, looking for inspiration, wanting a method to follow or some fresh energy for their work.

A small selection of key personal episodes allow us to understand the kind of person Burrill is and how he became a successful graphic artist, print maker and designer. His account touches upon the early influence of his grandfather (an extensive traveller and storyteller); his youthful obsession with the pop-music scene of the 1980s (especially the band The Human League); his sudden love for vernacular typography, found in graphic design school in Leeds (where he met John Ross); the Royal College of Art in London (where he met his wife, the photographer Emma Parker); and his predilection for colour that must be “undiluted and as pure as possible”.