I can’t say enough good about little big books: Illustrations for children’s picture books.
This 2012 book edited by Robert Klanten and Hendrik Hellige is both beautiful and informative. It starts with an introduction to communication, especially visual communication, which segues into a review of some of the major illustrators who led to and influenced the contemporary age, names like Tove Jansson, Maurice Sendak, and Leo Lionni.
The bulk of the book then presents the best illustrators from the world of children’s picture books. It does this an artist at a time (except for rare cases where artists create as a team), usually giving each artist a two-page spread that is mostly illustration (and about a paragraph of text).
I had known some of these artists, but not most of them. I found myself reading this book slowly, with my fingers caressing the heavy paper, my eyes lingering on the images, and, often, my mind wondering, “How did they do that?”
This really is a joy of a book. One of its values–and one reason I knew so few of the artists–is that it takes a global perspective. Artists are included from all over. Yes, Western culture predominates, and the Global South isn’t as strongly represented, but for readers like me, who largely read American and British picture books, with a few translated works, this was like an explosion of possibility. Artists from Portugal, Brussels, Italy, Norway, Germany, France, Sweden, Australia, Argentina, Spain, New Zealand, Finland, Poland, South Korea, India, Greece, Taiwan, Iran, Chile, Switzerland, Ukraine, and Canada appear in these pages, dazzling and overwhelming readers–or at least me. And I see that list really isn’t complete: many of the artists have lived and worked in multiple countries, and how do I list someone like Narges Mohammadi, whose website says she was born “somewhere between Kabul and Tehran”?
In addition to this magical encyclopedia of visual treasures, there are a few longer textual entries: an interview with the wonderful Kitty Crowther, another with Jerry Lempart (a jury member for the Astrid Lindgren Memorial Award), and interviews on the publishing/licensing picture books, on picture books and education, and on the history and psychology of picture books.
Each of these was intelligent and helpful, but I’ll be frank: they pale before the images.
I have at least a year of exploratory reading and viewing, and I literally dream images from this book.
It is over-sized and pricey, so maybe a reference book for libraries and specialists…but man is it great.
