This post is part of Nonfiction Monday
hosted today by Wrapped In Foil
(pub. 1.8.2013) 40 pages
A True Tale with A Cherry On Top
A uthor: Jen Bryant
and Illustrator: Melissa Sweet
C haracter: Horace Pippin
O verview from the publisher:
"As a child in the
late 1800s, Horace Pippin loved to draw...He drew pictures for his sisters, his
classmates, his co-workers. Even during W.W.I, Horace filled his notebooks with
drawings from the trenches . . . until he was shot. Upon his return home,
Horace couldn't lift his right arm, and couldn't make any art. Slowly, with
lots of practice, he regained use of his arm, until once again, he was able to
paint--and paint, and paint! Soon, people—including the famous painter N. C.
Wyeth—started noticing Horace's art, and before long, his paintings were
displayed in galleries and museums across the country..."
T antalizing taste:
"Then, if he could find a scrap of paper and a piece of charcoal, he drew pictures of what he'd seen that day.
Horace loved to draw. He loved the feel of the charcoal as it slid across the floor. He loved looking at something in the room and making it come alive in front of him. He loved thinking about a friend or a pet, then drawing them from the picture in his mind."
Horace loved to draw. He loved the feel of the charcoal as it slid across the floor. He loved looking at something in the room and making it come alive in front of him. He loved thinking about a friend or a pet, then drawing them from the picture in his mind."
and something more: I was intrigued to read the collaborative efforts behind A Splash of Red. Melissa Sweet recounts the background in her Illustrator's Note: "Typically, authors and illustrators stay fairly separate when making a picture book, but after Jen [Bryant] wrote this text, we bucked the tide by researching Horace Pippin together. Driving through the back roads of eastern Pennsylvania, we shared what we both knew and loved about art and Pippin."
And, as Jen Bryant explains in her Author's Note: ".... once the story was written, Melissa and I retraced many of these paths [of her earlier research] and forged some new ones. We were inspired and amazed by the very real struggles in Horace Pippin's life and the incredible, simple elegance of his work. Through his art, he transcended personal loss, injury, poverty, violence, and racism, producing a body of work that remains wholly original and deeply American"... AND inspiring!
And, as Jen Bryant explains in her Author's Note: ".... once the story was written, Melissa and I retraced many of these paths [of her earlier research] and forged some new ones. We were inspired and amazed by the very real struggles in Horace Pippin's life and the incredible, simple elegance of his work. Through his art, he transcended personal loss, injury, poverty, violence, and racism, producing a body of work that remains wholly original and deeply American"... AND inspiring!