Book Makers Meet Up
Here Comes April! Yes, the award-winning author of Here Come the Humpbacks! came east from Indiana, and migrated to my shore last week. What a pleasure to meet April Pulley Sayre for the first time. April’s always on the search for natural wonders and wanted to explore tide pools. I brought her to the best spot at low tide, Picnic Point, where she didn’t waste any time getting her feet wet. I perched nearby, sketching Whitehead Passage. She caught me in a pano shot. We watched a tanker emerge from the distant mist. The steady tanker flow into Portland harbor became ready...
Read MoreWonders at the Weymouth Waterfront Library
Last Tuesday I visited the Weymouth Waterfront Library on the last day of my MECA residency. What a blast! The library sits, literally, at the edge of a salt marsh on the Sissiboo River in Nova Scotia. I visited the day after my arrival to meet their gracious library clerk, Margaret Thibault, who invited me to share my children’s book illustration with two grades in Azure Thurber’s French Immersion classes from the nearby Weymouth Consolidated School. I made a quick flyer from my pastel of the view from the Jenny Family Compound. It was a kick to find that Margaret had posted it...
Read Morelong live lunacy
Have you heard? There will be a full moon on Christmas for the first time since 1977. I’m well versed in lunar cycles, thanks to my contributions to the Lunar Calendar since 1983. Over the years, I’ve had the honor of creating the color cover several times, always a treat. These are a few of the ideas I presented to publisher Nancy F. W. Passmore for the 40th edition. The calendar is a vertical format with a fold, and I like to cross that, if possible. Nancy is fond of the idea of keeping her moon boat afloat, so she picked the bottom left. I was happy to develop the one idea...
Read MoreStorybook Waters
The Storybook Waters of Illustrator Jamie Hogan opened last week, with a swell flock of peeps gathering to see my originals from 7 picture books, and hear Eva Murray read Island Birthday. It’s not every day two island girls make a book. We both deal with crossing water; I was delayed leaving Peaks Island because of capacity crowds on the Casco Bay Lines ferry. Eva flew from Matinicus, thanks to clear weather. Smiles abound when serendipity brings us together, in the Sam L. Cohen Children’s Library at the Main Branch of the Portland Public Library....
Read MoreOceans away!
Today is World Oceans Day! Now’s a good time to share my recent visit to Portland’s Reiche Elementary School at the invitation of Side x Side, an arts integration program. I felt right at home upon seeing this lively mural: I came to draw ocean creatures with three second grade classes, and talked about using the long horizontal for this illustration in Here Come the Humpbacks! by Caroline Arnold. I brought along my handy humpback toy for reference. This artist made great use of his page area, lower left. Everyone was provided with a line drawing of their chosen creature to look...
Read MoreTiger Boy launch
I waited years to illustrate Mitali Perkins‘ book, Tiger Boy. How proud I am to celebrate it’s recent publication! We gathered at Newtonville Books yesterday, home of many of Mitali’s book events during her years living in Newton, Massachusetts before moving to California. The retail counter is cool. Mitali talked about the evolution of her story, thanking Charlesbridge editor Yolanda Scott for her steadfast nurturing of the book. The plot, people, and place Mitali created were inspired by her father’s youth, travels and research to the Sunderbans, and her own abiding...
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