Dick Bruna and a rabbit built from two dots and a cross

“I make more with less” — out of a thick black line, a few colours and a little white rabbit from the Dutch dunes came one of the most recognisable characters in the world.

In 1955 the Dutch artist Dick Bruna was on holiday with his family in Egmond aan Zee. In the dunes he saw a hopping rabbit, and in the evenings he told his one-year-old son Sierk about it — bedtime stories about a little white rabbit from the garden. From those stories came the first book, and from it — over 100 million copies sold in more than 50 languages. The rabbit got the name nijntje, because that was the shortening Sierk tried to say when he meant “rabbit.” Around the world we know her as Miffy.

Bruna’s style

Bruna was born in Utrecht in 1927 — fittingly, in the Chinese year of the rabbit. He was meant to become a publisher like his father, but he went off to Paris, where he discovered Matisse and Léger, and decided to draw. Miffy is drawn with a thick black line, simple shapes and only a handful of colours. Bruna held that purple isn’t a real colour and never used it. Each illustration was made by collage — he cut out coloured papers and laid them over the ink drawing, spending as much as several days on a single page. “I make more with less,” he said of his philosophy.

Miffy versus Hello Kitty

Dick Bruna claimed that Hello Kitty was copied from Miffy — both share a similar minimalist aesthetic, a round head and the absence of pronounced features. The matter went to court and ended in a settlement in 2010 whose terms were never disclosed. After Bruna’s death in 2017 it was announced that no new books would be made — Miffy would stay as he had created her. The rights are managed by Mercis BV, and collectible plush toys, figures and collaborations are flourishing.

Miffy’s world

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