Children's Book Illustrator: Brian Floca

Discovered a new children's book illustrator, Brian Floca.  He recently spoke at the Nolan Library at the Metropolitan Museum. I loved the quote from the Met's blog piece about his presentation:

The picture book is often one of our first points of entry into the world of art appreciation and a natural companion to the museum experience.

Must get to visit 1000 Fifth Avenue some day.

Photo: By me.  Illustration by Wanna.

Father knows best

Getting Information Out of Pa

      Anon.

My pa he didn’t go to town

Last evening after tea,

But got a book and settled down

As comfy as could be.

I’ll tell you I was offul glad

To have my pa about

To answer all the things I had

Been tryin’ to find out.

And so I asked him why the world

Is round instead of square,

And why the piggies’ tails are curled,

And why don’t fish breathe air?

And why the moon don’t hit a star,

And why the dark is black,

And just how many birds there are,

And will the wind come back?

And why does water stay in wells,

And why do June bugs hum,

And what’s the roar I hear in shells,

And when will Christmas come?

And why the grass is always green,

Instead of sometimes blue,

And why a bean will grow a bean

And not an apple, too?

And why a horse can’t learn to moo,

And why a cow can’t neigh?

And do the fairies live on dew,

And what makes hair grow gray—

And then my pa got up an’ gee!

The offul words he said,

I hadn’t done a things, but he

Jest sent me off to bed.

This poem is hardly like our Pa at all.  He is more than willing to explain things to the children in matter-of-fact detail and it always astounds me just how much he does know from identifying historic military hardware, the pH levels of various liquids and the origins of geomorphic structures to handy knowledge about calculator functions, the locations of capital cities of the world and how to grow pond weed.  Which gives me the perfect out.  "Go and ask your Father" I say, and they do.

Illustration: Cool Daddy Rat by Mike Lester.

Who's hiding in the barn?

These are our set of well-worn and well-loved books for infants, most of which were purchased a decade ago from The Reject Shop, one of those two dollar emporiums full of junky goods and occasional cheap treasure.  They are pocket-sized editions made of hard cardboard.  Some have lift the flap pages which provided endless hours of entertainment for our littlies.  Great value for money. 

Even though they were either written in the UK or the US and included images of non-indigenous animals, such as hedgehogs, squirrels, pandas, flamingoes and deer, which we were never, ever likely to see, the children happily accepted that these were real things.  Should we have encountered elephants tromping down Commonwealth Avenue or cows or pirates on the way to the supermarket, my toddlers would have known them instantly and thought it perfectly natural.

Part of learning to read involves recognising that the image of the object or animal has a name even though it is unfamilar to us in the real day-to-day world.  That two dimensional representation is all the child has to work with and, amazingly, they can transfer the memory from one picture or illustration to another.  Where would we be without zebras to introduce us to the letter Z? 

I've always thought it odd that so many of our early books were about farm and zoo animals neither of which were part of our suburban life. I've noticed there are more picture books these days about life in cities which feature everyday items, but they are still mostly from overseas and there is the occasional need for a translation eg. from lollipop to iceblock. 

Lovely memories, but what to do with the books now that we have outgrown them?

 Stop being so sentimental for one and look forward to collecting those lovely thick chapter books.  Now that we know our A,B,C.  Sigh...

World Cup

Tim Ayres Poster 01, Girl With Football, 2005, GB © 2005 FIFA

Michael Craig-Martin, Poster 05, Foot-Ball, 2004,

Sarah Morris, Poster 12, Gateway, 2004, USA

  Hisashi Tenmyouya, Football, 2004, Japan

 

Beatriz Milhazes, Maracanã, 2004, Brazil

Tobias Rehberger, 90 Minutes, 2004 Germany

Mirror mirror on the wall

Could you please return our ball

Our football went through your crack

You have two now

Give one back.

Poem by Benjamin Zephaniah
First image by me

Other images from an Edition of Official Art Posters for the 2006 FIFA World Cup in Germany

Book Illustrator: Lynne Chapman

Major excitement. 

Following my recent review of the 2001 children's picture book, Big, Bad Wolf is Good, I blithely contacted the illustrator, Lynne Chapman, to let her know how fond we were of her illustrations and to declare that I had copied images from her book on my blog, when, lo and behold, she replied last night.  That is me, above, leaping in my PJs.

I have nothing but admiration for book illustrators of any type and from any era - children's literature, anatomical text books, histories, cook books, atlases, architectural guides, maintenance manuals, encyclopaedias and field guides to the birds of Australia. You name it. They are the real working artists, the tradesmen. They just quietly go about their anonymous ways, creating small masterpieces for mass reproduction which are accessible to every-one and put to immensely practical use... like, in Ms Chapman's case, learning to read.

This is functional, nut and bolts, art for every-day use. The works become stained with coffee, wine rings, lemonade spills, splashes of dish water, gravy blobs and baby's dribble. The corners of their images are creased, pages torn and margins filled with hand-written notations.  They are lugged about inside and out.  No vast canvasses and brooding temperaments (well, maybe some), no opening nights, curators, critics, dealers, dimmed lights or freight in thermostatically controlled crates.

Now that I have enthused over the these unrecognised and undervalued artists, let me tell you more about the lively Ms Chapman of Sheffield who has the most charming dimples, a pair of very fancy new spectacles and an outstanding collection of novelty socks, not to mention a huge talent. 

Her website and blog contain abundant examples of her sketches and final illustrations, as well as fascinating information and step-by-step images to explain the book design process for those of us who have absolutely no idea of what is involved behind the scenes.  Not only that, but there are exquisite sketches of people and places, on buses and in waiting rooms, and from her holiday travels. 

That she should draw some characters from her imagination in pencil and pastel, and have them published in a book which ends up on my shelves on the other side of the world, to be read often to three children for almost a decade, then become a real person at the other end of the computer is astounding and thrilling.  Isn't it!

Just wait until I tell the children. We must work our way through her entire collection before they grow up, and learn more about the art of book illustration and the people who work as illustrators.

Image by Lynne Chapman
Her blogs: An Illustrator's Life For Me! and The Picture Gallery