Danielle Ridolfi

Danielle Ridolfi is an illustrator, graphic designer, and lecturer in the Sam Fox School of Design & Visual Arts and the College of Arts and Sciences. She holds a Master of Fine Arts in Illustration and Visual Culture from WashU and a PhD in Clinical Psychology from Kent State University. Her visual work includes children’s picture books and periodicals. She investigates image-making processes, particularly collage, that are contingent upon contact with the natural and material world. Given her background as a clinical psychologist specializing in the impact of visual culture on children and young adults, Ridolfi is particularly drawn to using theories of learning and development to guide her studio practice and her scholarly inquiries in visual culture. Her research exists at the intersection between illustration, early childhood pedagogy, and material culture. 

Ridolfi’s debut picture book as an author-illustrator, “When the Dark Clouds Come,” will be published by Quill Tree Books, an imprint of HarperCollins, in October 2025. She is also under contract to illustrate three other picture books for Astra Young Readers, Viking Children’s Books, and Post Wave Children’s Books, which will reach market in the next. year. She is represented by Ammi-Joan Paquette at Aevitas Creative. Her writing and curatorial work has been featured in Uppercase Magazine and in WashU Libraries, and her design and illustration work has been featured by Honest History Magazine and AIGA St. Louis. Before her academic career, Ridolfi spent several years in the design industry working at agencies in St. Louis. She teaches courses across WashU in illustration, communication design and children’s studies with a focus on how the experience of childhood is shaped by visual material.