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artdjgblog · 5 years ago

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Innerview: Sonya Baughman / Review Magazine

July 2008

Image: DJG's "Live & Let Die" Record by Paul McCartney & Wings

Note: Interview for a magazine feature.

01) Where did you grow up and where do you live now? My young cloth diapers treaded a lot of dirt, dead animal and doggy acres in the North Central stick regions of Missouri, Mid-West, USA. Currently, adult plastic diapers drag and sag me in mid-town Kansas City, MO. The first six years had me bucking bales, falling off hay wagons, piercing my cheek on a hay bale stinger, assisting with the old cow stuck in the mud, designing elaborate tunnels and forts from tomato cages, watching “The Muppets” and “Star Wars” a lot, hearing scary stories of Leopard Man, posing for many pictures with dead and live animals, rocking out in cowboy boots to “Live & Let Die” on my Papa Smurf guitar, and crying at night to my raccoon wallpaper…among many other early formative brain tattoos. Act Two had many dry summers and the bank repossessing the farm and moving us to the home and acres where my Dad grew up. The new place had a blacktop in front of it and a gravel lane with a bridge/creek. The blacktop was a reservoir for leaving behind summertime shoe and bike impressions and for popping tar bubbles in the blistering heat. I also was of age to really explore and build many forts and treehouses in the ditches, barns and woods. Also, I started to go hunting and spend time in the fields with my Dad. We never had a shortage of animals and pets too. A lot of spare time was also spent in the sandbox or in the bedroom designing and building things based on what I saw and experienced. There was also a massive in-take of drawing and pop-culture from comics, books, music, television and movies. There wasn’t much of a cap on what my siblings and I could devour. Oh, and loads of sugary sweets and cereals. Go through the yearly motions and I end up at Southwest Missouri State University in Springfield, MO. There I got some very formal education and incredible interaction with students and design professors from the great making thing ways of Eastern Europe and Russia. I pretty much maxed out my art and design class card and was even making a ton of design work on the side for musicians. I then received a higher calling to drop out of school and make my guts out in Kansas City, MO which is where I’ve flopped around now for the past seven years. 02) Talk a little about your artistic background. Are you self-taught, did you go to college for art (if so, where)? My background is painted with loads of pop-culture from the 1980s and ’90s mixed in with the soil of farm life. I also designed and built many elaborate tree houses and forts up until the age of eighteen and spent most any spare minute in the sandbox or locked in my room drawing, reading, studying, video game playing, movie watching and just playing in general. I’ve never understood people’s ability to get bored or to not use the creation within them to ooze life out. I’ve enjoyed drawing comics, sports mascots and WWII battle scenes with my Dad at a young age that involved aircraft carriers, tanks and flags of those involved in conflict. My older brother would also draw a lot with me. He was better though. My younger sister and brother were pretty solid too. We have no idea where our creativity came from other than a great uncle, maybe? Also in my youth I would make giant collages out of magazine clippings and lots of mix tapes of Dr. Demento’s bizarre radio program and recorded and memorized many a variety of cartoon episodes and cool shows like Pee-wee’s Playhouse. I’ve also been a constant collector all my life. Back in the day I was all about the whole spectrum of toys, comics, ball cards, cereal boxes and loads of other junk…even kept dead animal parts under my bed. In the fifth grade I won a county wide logo contest for a skating and bowling fun center and it was the first time I realized disappointment with design as my logo was butchered by those higher-up. In middle-school up until my junior year of high school I studied more comics, logos, sports architecture and wanted desperately to design new-vintage baseball stadiums until the realization of my poor math skills hit like a ton of collapsed buildings. I even won a Kansas City Royals baseball essay contest. Getting made fun of daily in high school stunk, but it really fueled my work ethic, dreams and caused me to lock up in my bedroom at night. Though, I still wish I would have worked harder in my youth. I still really enjoy working hard and being alone to this day. In the summer of 1996 I was selected to attend the first ever Missouri Fine Arts Academy and learned that I had more to offer with my insides and got a chance to interact with more likeminded minds. I came back to my senior year of high school with notebooks of typographic graffiti designs and a whole new language of what I thought was the art world. There was also a new art teacher at my school and he was serious and seriously cool and recognized that I had something to offer. I also came back to my senior year with more confidence in expressing myself and decided to dive into the world of graphic design for my post-high school studies. I had no idea what I was going to really do with it, but I knew I just wanted to use my gift of making stuff for the rest of my life. And graphic design somehow promised a bit more security in money than going the fine art route. Though, I’ve now managed to merge the two and to still not make any money. My high school scores had me at number 12 out of 24 in my class and I scraped the bottom of the test barrels to get me into college. Southwest Missouri State University in Springfield, MO said I could come and so I did. They were the only institution I applied for and I had liked it from my three week stay at Fine Arts Academy the previous year. College was great, but I could tell quickly that I wasn’t a top art pup like I was in my small school way back down the line. I was with the bigger dogs now. I struggled with drawing classes because I realized that I wasn’t as good as I had been told I was for the previous eighteen years. That was a set-back and I still wish to this day I would have worked harder at drawing. But, mostly I have trouble drawing in a cramped room with a ton of people breathing down my neck and at certain times of the day. The introduction and foundation art classes were more my calling and I could take the stuff home and work alone and all night. Most of my friends complained because they couldn’t wait until sophomore year when we would be on the computer for design. I didn’t really understand what I was getting into with graphic design. In fact, one day I exclaimed to my friends that I was taking the graphic design route that didn’t use computers and was entirely hands-on. They thought I was pretty insane for saying that and pretty much called me a fool. It’s kind of funny now though. I was so naïve at 18 and 19 to what the formal graphic design world was and I think I still am ten years later. Back when I was more bushy-tailed, I just wanted to make things and cut stuff out and not chain up to a computer…and I guess I’m still bushy-tailed, though I have a computer and use it mostly as a tool. When I finally did get placed in front of a computer, it was a struggle and I just couldn’t get into it and past the screen barrier. It almost stopped me from majoring in graphic design. But, we weren’t on the computer all the time as we were taught to conceptualize and to think and to be hands-on too. But, we needed to know the computer too. I just couldn’t get along with the computer for the longest time. Of course, the computer whiz kids just couldn’t wait for the next semester that involved a wordy world called typography. Which, naively enough I thought was about the art of map making. I liked maps, so I was excited too. But, I soon found out it was a whole new world that would poison the ABCs in me forever…good and bad. At least in type class we were still taught to think and do things by hand before messing with computer fonts. That first year or two of official design school was just terrible for me as I felt I wasn’t really “getting” it and didn’t think I would be happy as a graphic designer. I was just fulfilling project requirements and with zero heart or much care. It wasn’t until I haphazardly signed up to duel major in illustration that things started to make music inside of me. I began to really pour myself out and realize that I could approach things in a similar light as to when I was a child and be happy. Illustration saved me and I found my voice with it and my classmates and instructors started noticing. The energy there was great and everybody fed off of each other and helped each other see in new light(s). I also began to understand the valuable importance of the experience of my schooling as the instructors not only had a unique style of teaching, but they also had interesting backgrounds and culture from Eastern Europe and Russia. I could mildly relate to them as I was a transplant from the foreign farm world of North Missouri. After many design trips to studios I began to feel a very empty feeling with the profession I had chosen to represent my working life. It was not what I wanted to do with a “career”, or my time. I didn’t wish to work in a factory of fried monitor goo-lash. I wanted to just make stuff and at my own pace and pleasure. I was also very protective of my work and wanted parental rights and not for it to belong to another man’s name or dream. My love for music started to fuse with design and I began to start making many things on the side for musicians, which spread to other types of word-of-mouth work for me. An eye-popping lecture by modern rock poster designer Art Chantry sealed my personal deal for wanting to do my own thing. Shortly after that I decided I needed to change many gears in my life and secretly drop out of school following my final design class in the fall of 2001 and live with a band (and some) in a big old dilapidated orange house behind the original Lamar’s Donuts in Kansas City, MO. While some senior students had trouble looking for one real world client to work with for their final projects, I had close to 10 off the top of my head and whole bunch of future blank pages to fill. 03) During the time you have been making art have you always been drawn to this type of graphic expression? Did you “find” a style or did a style find you? I’d say a bit of both. I’ve never really gone for a set “style”. I’m sure that I’ve got one that has become recognizable to my thumb prints. Honestly, I never really think too hard about what I’m making or the why or how of the making until I have to answer questions like this. Then I start to over-think things. Also, whenever I’m told that I’m a good collagist or good at hand type or so-and-so rendering, then that is the only time I really make an effort to switch gears. I have boiled the majority of my output to be relational to the immediacy of my moods, thoughts, tickles, inclination and whatevers. Though, sometimes life can get in the way and I’ll have to slide down a small sliver of time and energy depletion, like I am with trying to get this writing out on time! But, I’m a big fan of cranking stuff out no matter what. Life is pretty darn short to sit on my hands. It seems that style can be a bit of a drag for some people and/or a hole. I’ve always been more in-tune to the folks who just follow what their gut, heart, hands and eyes speak instead of creating a set template. Some people never stray too far from that and only a few can truly get away with it. Edward Gorey is perhaps one of the few who could really make it work for me. I would certainly love to draw and think as well as he did, but I might be quite miserable doing the same thing over and over even if I was able to do it for a living. I think that a lot of people get confused and think they need to have a style and either invent one or pick other people’s noses instead of sniffing what they’ve been wearing all their life. Style to me is a lot like decorating or something. Though, at the same time that decoration might marriage perfectly to what somebody thinks they need. I don’t know though. Sometimes I think it’s funny when we as people think we need something to look or feel a certain way that’s already been communicated or visualized. I think that sometimes we are too caught up in what’s done before instead of thinking for ourselves. I’m guilty too. What’s really confusing to me, on a personal level, is when I get a request like, “We like all your work so make whatever you want!” and then the client ends up being really disappointed because it wasn’t in their “style” and then it’s awkward. Style is just an odd thing to me. But, most things are. I try to just trust my gutty heart and just make. 04) Do you see your work as communicating your identity or as helping to communicate the identity and message of others? … or both? I see it as me communicating what I’ve gathered from being on the Earth for 29 ½ years and spreading that manure the best I can. It’s a heaping helping to tell the story of others by telling my story. Most of my work fits into fine art and design, at least I’m always told that. I’m not really sure. Of late I’ve been pushing into more of the fine art bin. But, I’m not a big fan of labeling things and I would like to do many things with this thing I do. With design, one does have a role to play with helping somebody else tell their story, and at times, sell their story. There is also a responsibility to the venue the product is in or where it will eventually end up, whether a fine package on a shelf or a poster in the gutter. I feel it can be easy for a designer to lose perspective of the role playing. With leaving behind an identity…well, I like the idea of a paper trail, time-line and bruising thumb prints on this life. However, I don’t necessarily have the intent to say “Hey, look at me.” I am just another human, and one who happens to make things. If the work speaks or inspires (probably frightens and confuses on occasion), then that means a lot to me, especially in these fast-paced and flashy “everyone’s a designer-decorator” times with millions of images and advertisements everywhere. I think it’s great to recognize and at times celebrate gifts and achievement. But, I feel there needs to be a healthy balance. It can be a dangerous thing to play with at times. Some artists I feel become the work of art themselves and end up playing God with the gift and this saddens me as it usually ruins them in the long run. 05) Is there anything about your geographic location that has given you a unique perspective on design and the art you create? Certainly, growing up country might have my visions at a stranger advantage, and a howling merge to that with the city life now. You might see a lot of wonderfully strange things on the streets of the city due to the amount of activity by varieties of people and culture. But, only in small town Missouri do the deer pile up outside the meat locker and blood runs next door to the Baptist church as the high school band splash-marches through it. Growing up it was easy to take my lifestyle for granted. I enjoyed it immensely, but when I was 15 to 18 I wanted to get out a bit more. I was hungry to explore, and not just the many acres we lived on. I wanted the rest of the world. I became a little disgruntled with growing up country and I think that there is a certain stereotype placed upon people anywhere they are, but country folk get it pretty bad. I definitely ate from both sides of the fence, but also didn’t want to be hung up in it for a living. As I grow older I appreciate my roots a lot more and celebrate them and am very thankful. I enjoy going back home. And some day I’d like to move outside of the city to a small plot of land with a making things shack out back. But, my family home isn’t too far down the road for a getaway weekend visit to sit with the stars, coyote yips and fish. 06) What do you consider influences on your art? (this can be other artists, music, philosophy, nature – anything. this question is not just limited to “I’m a big fan of Banksy”) First thing, I believe in the compiling of all days in life to influence an artist’s output (horse apples or clean streets). Our walks tell a lot about who we are in the present prints. I feel that one would be lying to me if what they created was not in their full vision. But, I too think that we all wear and share influences as witnesses to what we’ve seen and where we’ve been. We all help shape each other. I’ve rattled off my early influences of popular culture. I think I’m more in-tune with my child’s self now than I was then as I sit alone and make things and pull from all my days. It’s also easy to feel that I was really moving and discovering more back then with naïve, childlike faith that I’m trying to get back now. I have some good days though and mostly when I’m not thinking too much. I’m still a fan of absorbing lots of things and from many angles. Of course I have my artistic influences. One of my big influences as a child was my Grandma Gibson. She is from the old school of the country and a very hands-on person with making many things like clothing, dead animal backpacks, blankets, pillows, fridge magnets and game board pieces. I still have a lot of the things from those years. I think a lot of my approach to making things came from her. My “professional” art world as a kid had an outside knowledge from trips to museums and PBS specials, though I felt a little detached from that world and still kind of do. My heroes were at the movies because they were more immediate to me, guys like Jim Henson, Stan Winston, Dr. Indiana Jones, Rambo and Han Solo. But, it was Henson’s world that opened me up to the first idea of an artist’s legacy, vision and spirit and glimpse of another world. Something big-time ached in my decade old gut the day I found out he passed away. Musically speaking I was very much a child of my Mom’s Beatles records, “oldies” music and a ton of television theme songs, novelty sing-alongs and old church songs. I still put a lot through my ears now and my biggest influences in music in my older years are Bruce Springsteen, Jeff Buckley, Elliott Smith and Bob Dylan. Also, I am still a big fan of tons of picture books and just anything really. I just know that I’ve never had bare space on the walls and shelves of my home and head. Oh, and wherever I am I’m usually distracted by the stuff on the ground. I’m a big collector of found notes, writings, scribbles, addresses, children’s drawings and good-bad-silly-stupid-smart designs. I like to collect ‘em all. I’ve also collected stamps since I was 10. I’m a big nerd. Here’s a listing of some names in the art and design canon who have made things that either attracted, influenced or moved me in some ways (in no particular order): Saul Steinberg, Seymour Chwast and Push Pin, Lester Beall, Edward Gorey, Ray Johnson, Art Chantry, Henryk Tomaszewski, Vaughn Olver and V23, Raymond Pettibon, Paul Klee, Stanley Donwood, Stefan Sagmeister, Cy Twombly, Saul Bass, Ivan Chermayeff, Ralph Steadman, Robert Rauschenberg, Jean Michel-Basquiat…most anybody who has something to say and develops a bad back carving out their paper trail. Movies are also a giant influence on my work and I study them almost daily. Some of the filmmakers who capture a certain craft of unique spirit that I enjoy include P.T. Anderson, Wes Anderson, Michel Gondry and the Coen Brothers. Folk Art is another big mind-blow and one of my favorite areas to study and get ticked by the of-the-moment heart, purity and passion. I love the idea of somebody just up and making something for the heck of it and not for art’s or ego’s sake. That’s the childlike thing I miss the most. The makers and shakers that move me the most from the folk art movement are Henry Darger, Bill Traylor and Robert E. Smith. And sometimes I get more out of the work on display in county and state fairs by everyday arts and crafters than so-called “professional” art and design work. 07) What is your perspective on the place of poster art here in the Midwest (or KC specifically) as it interacts with the rest of the art community and how the poster art coming out of this community may be perceived on a more national level? I’m curious about this because of the recognition Kansas City artists in general have been receiving lately on a national and international scale and how the art world tends to waffle between interest and disinterest in artists in this region. The music scene here is very interesting to me and a lot of times I think that it is just like 20 people all making it happen. Though, there is a lot of talent, diversity and genre-bending for a small town like this. There are a lot of groups making a mark here and down the highways, same with the people making stuff for them. Though, I get a little strange sometimes because I sometimes feel that the small scene mixed with the internet’s social networks and fewer record stores (oh, and most of my posters take up a whole bulletin board!) makes the poster almost secondary information and so-so decoration. In the same thought though, most of the stuff I see on the internet passes by me in a two-second window like that of highway advertising. Though, some do stick out to me because I’m always on the look to get tickled. And I don’t feel the art of the printed piece will die any time soon. Anyway, the scene just works here in Kansas City somehow and everybody takes care of and appreciates each other’s roles and contributions. I’ve had some great response to what I’m slapping up, but at the same time I think that a lot of people don’t get it. What’s not to get, it’s not too special? But, that’s fine with me. I’m not sure where I am in the scene. Maybe more-so in the “seen” department with my meager budgeted work hanging above a stool in the blurry-eyed late hours. I still think that toilets are one the best places for information gathering. Poster art in general in the last ten years alone has received a great breath of fresh air. Many of the makers are respected within a small collective, and have also been breaking through to represent on a national level of design aesthetic, as well as a well-rounded view of the printed timeline to life and culture. It’s also something that anybody can do and a lot of bands still just make their own stuff, which I’m cool and whatever with it. Everybody has their own style, agenda and empty pockets. But, the personal computer has saturated the landscape with a lot of “samey”. Then again, if it works, it works. In the end if it gets people interested and enthused, then what is there for a bum like me to complain about? And sometimes I really get a kick out of unskilled design stuff(s). I try to stay out of design politics for the most part. There is more to life than design dogma. Though, there is design all around us as we interact with it in every way from the tip-top of a tree to a paper scrap for this article. I enjoy the simple act of creation and inspiration that comes from something that seems like nothing, yet has always been a “something” growing and building and will continue to grow if the viewer lets it do so. You just have to add the proper mix of ingredients, I guess. And I guess my brain isn’t one to formerly function on the full realization to what it’s thinking. So, I’m babbling right now. I do know that something I’ve always enjoyed about the concert poster is the relatively short life span it has and how that can be used to the advantage. I just want to encourage people out there, designers/artists, non designers/artists or even church secretaries, to really push things and work harder. I don’t really care if everyone isn’t versed in design and art. In general I just encourage more to experiment with poster art, find your voice(s) and find new ways to spread the good word. Even if it’s not for a concert or an event, just make something and get it out there. Throw your junk off the overpasses if need be. 08) How has your work been received within the arts community here (and also in other geographic regions if you have been branching out)? For seven years now I’ve somehow managed to remain fairly anonymous and at the same time have sparkled a bit of attention…maybe just a glittering. Life and day job dwindle my hours to where it’s hard to even pay attention on my own stuff sometimes, so I don’t get out much here in the city. Though, I guess it is easier to keep up with things on the internet, papers and here-say. I think Kansas City is making her own dent right now with a wide variety of things going on in the arts landscape. The town is kind of booming and bustling right now. Being that we’re a small town, it’s easy for a small fish to get more wet feet. Though, I’ve never put my whole foot into anything. I just do my thing. Some days I’m not really sure what that thing is, but I do it despite my muck. When I first started on my design quest, like when anyone tackles something head-on, I was head-over-heels and not sleeping much. I was also living with bands and interacting more and actually going to shows several times a week. I don’t know how I did it without exhausting my ticker, but for some reason it all worked. I started to garner a little bit of buzz here that seemed to spread quick outside the state and international borders. Many people contact me from all over and slap my stuff alongside some of my design favorites in magazines and books. It’s a hoot. People are always interested in my story and creations. It’s all still really odd and blushing to me in some light that the little things I make are reaching a selective audience on a much grander scale. Anyway, I’ve certainly learned now that sleep is important and that it’s better for me to work smarter, not harder. Though, that’s not entirely the truth as I still work pretty darn hard and I believe in it greatly. Still, I’ve struggled with my own brand of discontent since I fell from a slide and blacked-out at the age of five. It’s something that I’m working and wrangling with. But, with any kind of actual work you’ve studied, worked hard with and duct taped up the switch with 24-7, you learn to just not think and rather DO and the moves become mechanical. I just have to put to use different types of oil to keep from rusting. It all becomes a fluid thing, or something constantly coming down on me in the grocery aisle, tree leave holes and side walk crack scribbles. It can be challenging when life stuff gets in the way, but I shouldn’t see it as getting in the way. I easily get confused, but then I realize that the things I experience and see and do (good-bad) all go into my design pot mixed with my past and then I just have to do the upchucking as I move forward and I tend to feel better. Recently I’ve definitely stepped back on my massive production of concert posters and I’m sure that many people reading this will think, “Geesh, I don’t think I’ve ever even seen this idiot’s work?” Not only has my life changed in some ways, but I also had to give myself permission to take a time out and to learn to say no to some things. A break was needed before burnout and bitter rotted my worms in the apple, among other things. I had a year of little activity and practiced sitting on my nest. I still made a bunch of stuff, but a lot just for me. I’ve also been involved in various group art shows around the country, design books and special art projects with friends spread about. Another thing I did, and still do, is just to see what other avenues I’d like to take my one man show. I’m learning to use the internet for the medium that it is too. Anyway, I’ve always got some stew samples back burning, but my biggest competition is myself…on top of time, energy and money. Mostly myself, as I’ve always been extremely hard on myself. Though, I’ve been told I make it look easy. I’ve never been good at math, so you go figure. I get exhausted from trying to figure this out. 09) Is artwork your main profession and, if not, are you intending to make it so? It’s really flattering and kind of sad when every spring I get more and more inquiries from freshly plucked and talented college students about a possible internship or job with DJG Design. In general, due to what most think to be a large and varied output of work, people who don’t know what I’m about think that there is a D, a J and a G making things. It always excites me to be contacted by enthused students and other design people (any walks of life, really) who saw something or connected to my work and got a spark. It makes me rosey, but it also keeps me a little down as I don’t make enough money to do this full-time. But, it all keeps me at my little basement bay working on my bad back and poor eye sight, keeps me (under)grounded in some ways. I’ve always worked full-time jobs and have been married now for three years. So, certain responsibilities come with walking hand-in-hand with another. For now I just spin the day job blues and try to stay content and disciplined, burning the fuel before and after work. But, age is setting in a bit and I’m getting antsy. I also grow tired easier. Good things do come out of day jobs, good design work does too. For the first four or five years I was a janitor and groundskeeper. So, loads of perks came from great finds, discards, dumpster dives and lots of free food and more time to read and study and draw. Heck, I even designed a few posters between clock punches. Currently my position has me staring at a computer doing data entry. The health care, artificial air and hours are great and I can walk out my back door and be there in seven minutes. But, it can be difficult to know that I’m sitting and squandering something back home. I do take it with me everywhere upstairs, and I do a bit of networking during the day time, but there is still that itch to make things full-time and not have a full plate of non-stop. It’s all hard to balance. But, making things is the only thing that I’m told that I’m somewhat good at. Well, other than eating junk food, watching movies, being confused and petting my four kitty cats. I am fast approaching thirty and the visual of time stacking is more evident than ever. Each space between second hand clicks is another scratch of tiny pine box to me. I am slowly checking off my list of “Before 30 Goals”, but I’m usually several cars back and sometimes it’s a pileup. Life takes a different course too. But, I have caught back a hold of a torch of some sort. I am constantly tacking up side boards to the wagon. After eight years of looking at Gigposters.com, I finally have ALL of my poster work up on there. It’s a great way to generate exposure and get my work out some more. I also have my new website up and an extensive volume of imagery on my Flickr.com account. It can be a bit odd to put one’s self out there in such a reservoir fashion, but I do like the idea of the timeline and personal file cabinet. And if my house burns down, it’s all digitized and makes it easier on my friends when they have to move me. So, day jobs…they are both blah and bling in my mind. My sling shots just point back at me on certain days. Sometimes they change direction with every sentence. At least I’m now under a thousand dollars on my student loans. I don’t make a thousand dollars in most years on design. 10) Tell me a story – have you had any strange poster requests? A project where you just about lost it? A poster that succeeded beyond expectations or failed in a way that took you totally by surprise? A project-situation-chaos that always sticks out when I’m asked a question like this happened to me back in June of 2002. It’s not a poster, but it’s pretty whacky and ended up being one of the best things that I think I’ll ever make. It was a special run of 250 homemade CD packages for the band Elevator Division. I’ve had many projects that demand more production time than my little brain imagines, but this one was the worst. Actually, the finished piece is a lot tamer than my initial idea. Though, the final image’s concept married to what the band was communicating on the disc inside is way better. The following true story I’ve released for a previous interview, I just tweaked a few glitches… The idea came at the night I started printing. Well, actually it was spray paint. I had an image made for a month or more and then changed it at the last stroke of inspiration. It married the themes for the album “Whatever Makes You Happy” perfectly. With reflections of war and relationships in the songs, I made an image of a hand shooting off its index finger like a missile. It was the idea of shooting off one’s options and making decisions. It was aggressive, inviting, serious and humorous all in one. It was not only fitting for the band/music but also to the national/world agenda and climate. I went to war that night with many cans of spray paint and the idiot mind to do two-hundred and fifty all in one massive sweep, and in my basement, which is something I will never do again because I could have died. I will probably also never be involved with another package like this again (take that back, I have been). Anyway, each one was hand-cut from cardboard and handmade stencil sprayed and rubber stamped. Inserts were cut, folded and glued. At the last mist of red spray a crack of thunder shook the massive turn-of-the-century home and I bolted from the basement and out the front door to a down poor fit for Noah himself. I was like a much less cool version of Dr. Frankenstein though. I leapt off the front porch and slid head first down the embankment and into the street turned river current. But, like a taxidermy nightmare, I was born again. The drug dealing squatters across the street were on their front step perch per usual summer evening, looking at the fire in my eyes and the red paint streaming from ears, nose and mouth. It was a high much higher than that of chemical substance. Well, maybe a three pack of design, life and paint fumes. 11) What is it about the poster as an art form that you feel is unique among other art forms? What purpose does it serve in your mind that can’t be served by another type of visual art? I’ve hinted at this in a previous question. I like the idea of the poster’s life-span being short, relative to the date and time…event, whatever. But, if it connects in the right way, and it can be different for everyone as art-design-whatever, is all relative to the viewer, I think that even a concert poster’s impact can last a long time. Since my first year in Kansas City I’ve had people find me out and say that they had a bedroom wall filled up with my work. It really moved me that something so simple (and sometimes stupid) that I squeezed out caused somebody else to be moved enough to hang it above their dreams at night. It means a lot to me when others get something out of something I’ve made. I know from child to adult, I myself have gotten something out of the stuff I’ve collected and tacked to my walls. It’s odd, yet a really nice feeling to know I’m somehow contributing to a landscape in some way. Making things is an act that I’ve always needed to do and has helped me get the best out of many days. I’ve always had difficulty with contributing in many forms of communication and on some days it’s terribly hard even just to be out and about. Making things has served as my calling with communication. It’s nice to know it can help others too in whatever way. -djg

#innerviews

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ktliterary · 4 years ago

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What I'm Looking For: Aida Z. Lilly

I’m excited to be open to queries for speculative fiction in upper middle grade, YA, and adult; in YA and upper MG contemporary, I am exclusively looking for stories from LGBTQIA+, BIPOC, and other marginalized groups; graphic novels for upper middle grade, YA, and adult from author-illustrators with a unique story; fresh, modern, and original contemporary adult fiction that fits in with my wishlist; and narrative non-fiction (but no true crime).

Across all genres, the writing, voice, and characters have to hook me and make me feel something. I want stories about the good, bad, and ugly of sex, drugs, and rock and roll. I’m also interested in cults, the occult, mental health, and magic. I’m looking for the kind-of-weird and completely amazing! Good writing is the most important aspect for me. I love great ideas, but I really need the execution of those ideas to be brilliant. I want to be drawn in within the first few pages, and I’m okay with not having all the answers (at first anyway). I want to read the story only you can tell. I want to accidentally learn things only you can teach me.

I love all things speculative—well, except horror (touches of it in other spec fiction are fine though). What really catches my eye is SFF with real issues tackled in thought-provoking ways, like Grossman’s MAGICIANS series (and show). This shouldn’t be super shocking since I grew up loving the ANIMORPHS series. I like a big, diverse cast with love in their hearts and problems in their lives. Even though these kids had to save the world, they still dealt with familial strife, romantic problems, the failings of adults, and the emotions that accompanied the war and the “normal” lives they had to lead. So give me ANIMORPHS for adults with even more diversity.

On that note, I want feminist projects (especially where feminism is unexpected) and books written by and about people from marginalized communities. As a first-gen Middle Eastern American, I enjoy hearing other people’s immigration tales. If you have written the next KIM’S CONVENIENCE, EMAIL ME RIGHT THIS SECOND BECAUSE I LOVE YOU.

I want ALLLLLLL the queer SFF please! There is so little of it, and it is so needed!

I like mythology (especially when it’s written as beautifully as Madeline Miller does it), music (Juliet, Naked and Daisy Jones & The Six are some of my faves), unreliable narrators, multiple viewpoints, stories that take place at college/grad school, flawed characters, a sense of humor, friendships (complicated ones, too), L.A. stories, tales of NYC, puzzles (think more Dan Brown, less National Treasure), and the atmosphere of Carnivàle, Darren Shan’s CIRQUE DU FREAK, Euphoria, and New Orleans. Magic and superheroes are some of my favorite things, especially when those characters act in a very human way and have very human problems (The Boys, Hancock, Super Ex-Girlfriend). I love a good origin story (even if I’ve seen Peter Parker have three of them onscreen…)

My taste veers from AMERICAN PSYCHO to HOWL’S MOVING CASTLE (and lots in between). Engage me enough to make me laugh AND cry. Give me humor and heart (like Handler’s LIFE WILL BE THE DEATH OF ME); give me a character like Dr. Cox from Scrubs or someone Gordon Ramsay-esque, who secretly has a soft center. Conversely, I also want ALL THE DARKNESS. Because while I love the cuteness of Detective Pikachu, I also live for authors like Leïla Slimani, Bret Easton Ellis and Chuck Palahniuk, who capture the ugly sides of human nature in sharp, acerbic light. I won’t shy away from your THREE WOMEN, TWEAK, EDUCATED, or MY DARK VANESSA.

Shows and movies I love: ALL THINGS STUDIO GHIBLI, Kim’s Convenience, Pose, American Horror Story: Coven, The L Word (both), Big Love, Fresh off the Boat (the book and show), Guardians of the Galaxy (and the entire Marvel Cinematic Universe), Supernatural, Lost, Modern Family, anything Mindy Kaling touches (books and shows), Workin’ Moms, Abrams’s Star Trek reboot, The Affair, South Park, Dexter (the books and show), Broad City, The Last Man on Earth (I nearly cried when they canceled this), Diary of a Mad Black Woman, Crash, What Dreams May Come, Interview with the Vampire, Queen of the Damned, Death Note, Straight Outta Compton, Monsters University, The Sopranos, How to Get Away with Murder, Stepbrothers, Zoolander, The Boondocks, Little Nemo, Selena, Shin Chan, Rent, Sweeney Todd, Dope, The Halloween Tree (the book and the movie), The Office, American Housewife, For Colored Girls, LotR, Mad Men, Mystery Men, Sons of Anarchy, Fringe, The King of Queens, Cloverfield, Super 8, Blade Runner 2049, Good Will Hunting, Adventure Time, Detective Pikachu, Good Boys

Books and authors I love: The Awkward Thoughts of W. Kamau Bell (and his standup), Mira Jacob, Daisy Jones and the Six, There There, Eat a Peach, Convenience Store Woman, Double Cup Love, Tweak: Growing up on Methamphetamines, Born a Crime (and Noah’s standup), Tranny, The Hate U Give, Warcross duology, Leïla Slimani, Rainbow Rowell, The Heart’s Invisible Furies, The Time Traveler’s Wife, I Am Legend (the movie, too), The Amory Wars (and the music about them), Saga, Deadendia, The Devil Is a Part-Timer, Chuck Palahniuk, Kid Gloves, Zatanna and the House of Secrets, Sing, Unburied, Sing, The Wheel of Time series, Hyperbole and a Half, Bret Easton Ellis, Harry Potter (but not Rowling), Artemis Fowl, Riordan and friends, Life Will Be the Death of Me, The Interestings, Station Eleven, Laura Dean Keeps Breaking up with Me, Hey Kiddo, The New Kid, Furious Thing, Number One Chinese Restaurant, The Girls at 17 Swann Street, Ready Player One (and the movie), Wildwood, Red at the Bone, Juliet, Naked, The Misadventures of Awkward Black Girl, Fun Home, American Housewife, Madeline Miller, Gaiman, Christopher Moore, Haruki Murakami, Patrick Rothfuss, The Goldfinch, Eleanor Oliphant is Completely Fine, Kevin Kwan, Dave Eggers, My Dark Vanessa, All of us with Wings, Graveyard Shift, Life of Pi, The Brief and Wondrous Life of Oscar Wao, America for Beginners, The Storyteller’s Secret, Never Let Me Go, Priestdaddy, Educated, Three Women, Augusten Burroughs, Furiously Happy, Okay, Fine, Whatever, Fights: One Boy’s Triumph over Violence, The Usual Suspects (Maurice Broaddus), V.E. Schwab, The Silent Patient, Uprooted, Pierce Brown, The Enderverse, Blake Crouch, The Hunger Games, John Dies at the End

Maybe not the best fit for: Political thriller Gross out Horror (some touches are okay in SFF) Picture books Chapter books Animal protagonists Flowery language in fantasy Very technical or math-heavy sci-fi Historical fiction WW2 or cops or Civil War/antebellum “Inspirational”

What I’m Looking For: Aida Z. Lilly was originally published on kt literary

#Aida Lilly #queries #querying #querying writers #time to query #what I'm looking for

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mackidsbooks · 6 years ago

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The Inspiring Norfolk Airport and Envelopes Filled with Hubris: Defining Creative Moments for the Author and Illustrator of Two’s a Crowd.

Matthew: Hello, there. My name is Matthew Swanson. I’m the author of The Real McCoys series.

Robbi: And I’m Robbi Behr. I’m the illustrator.

M: We are married and have four kids and make books together in the hayloft of a barn on the Eastern Shore of Maryland.

R: The people do not want to hear about our family. They want to know about The Real McCoys, especially book 2, Two’s a Crowd, which just came out!

M: Right. Two’s a Crowd is the second book in a critically acclaimed middle grade mystery series about an overconfident fourth grader named Moxie McCoy who thinks of herself as the world’s greatest detective. She’s great at some parts of solving mysteries but is terrible at others.

R: And so she is forced to join forces with her quiet, shy, observant little brother Milton, who not coincidentally, has the exact set of skills that Moxie lacks.

M: Moxie interrogates the suspects and collects the clues.

R: Milton notices the small details and strings them all together. It takes both of them to get anything done.

M: Kind of like you and me.

R: This is true. Two’s a Crowd is a true collaboration. It has been written like a novel, but it has 1,000 illustrations. Our librarian friends tell us that it’s part of a new genre called hybrid, a cross between a graphic novel and a traditionally illustrated chapter book.

R: But I want to point out that even though you do the words and I take care of the pictures, I feel like we’re both equal contributors to both parts of these books. I’ve had a lot to say about the writing and you’ve had a lot to say about the illustrating.

M: Agreed. You’re a remarkably good editor. But then there’s the fact that I can’t draw to save my life.

R: I feel these people need some evidence. Here are a few of Matthew’s drawings:

M: I just gave myself goosebumps. I mean…do you think it’s possible that I’m just a man before my time?

R: I love your drawings. They just aren’t very good. But what you are good at is helping me think through my illustrations. Maybe you can’t execute your own ideas, but you sure do help me with mine.

M: This has been an invigorating introduction. But perhaps we should get to the point. For this post, we have been asked to talk about a defining moment that helped us realize when we wanted to devote our lives to writing and illustrating books.

R: That sounds interesting. I look forward to hearing. You first.

M: All right. Since I was really little, I loved doing creative stuff. In elementary school, it was community theatre. Throughout high school and the early part of college I wrote a lot of poetry. Rhyming poetry. Truly awful rhyming poetry. My college application essay was a four-page poem in heroic couplets. At one point I offered an invocation to Zeus.

R: I’m so glad this was before we met. I don’t think I could have handled it.

M: I took a poetry workshop in college and learned in an abrupt and painful way that I am not, in fact, a gifted poet. It was a disturbing insight. I spent a full year fretting.

R: This story is so sad.

M: It gets better! My junior year, I took a fiction workshop and found my stride. People liked my stories, but they didn’t understand them. I was good at certain parts of writing and lousy at other parts. I wanted to be a writer but didn’t think I was good enough, so when I graduated from college, I moved in with a girl, went to work at a grocery store, and surrendered my dreams of literary glory.

R: This story got sad again.

M: It was a really nice grocery store.

R: I’m talking about how the story with the girl ends.

M: Ah yes. Well, as you know, the girl and I eventually broke up, I got a job as a college admission officer, and I got together with you.

R: See? THE SADDEST.

M: One day, I had a really long layover in the Norfolk airport. I took out my laptop and started to write. But for some reason, instead of writing the serious stories I thought I was supposed to be writing, I let myself write a weirdo story with a funny voice. The story was called Top Gun, but it was not about fighter pilots. It felt so good. It was so fun. Something in me started to sing. And from that moment, everything changed. I stopped writing like somebody else and started writing like me.

R: Are you almost done?

M: Almost. Today, I know that a project is going to work if I feel like I did that day in Norfolk. It felt like Norfolk when I was writing Two’s a Crowd. But every once in a while, I still start working on something that my HEAD thinks is a good idea, and the experience is awful and painful and doomed to failure.

R: Wait. So was that your defining moment? In the airport?

M: Yes.

R: That felt like a long moment.

M: You DID interrupt me a few times.

R: True. I will try to make my story short and uninterruptible.

M: Go for it.

R: I actually am not sure if I had a DEFINING MOMENT.

M: Well, then, your work here is done. You have answered the question. That really WAS short and uninterruptible.

R: No, no, I’m not done! Ok. Let’s see. I have to say growing up I always liked art and liked making things. Drawings and elaborate machines and costumes made out of paper bags.

I always thought that illustrating picture books would be a “fun job” that could maybe turn into a career, but I had NO IDEA back then how hard it actually is to break into this business.

As a project in college, I made a picture book and comped it up and even sent it out to some publishers. I found it again the other day in my parents’ house –in a manila envelope on which I had written in big letters, “HANDLE WITH CARE – ORIGINAL BOOK COMP INSIDE” like it was some kind of amazing priceless artwork. In retrospect, I see it was a really truly TERRIBLE book and that it’s no wonder I never heard back from any publishers about it. I cringe at the thought of it coming across anyone’s desk.

Anyway. Long story short (or maybe I mean long story less long): I think I always wanted to be an illustrator. It just took me a while to figure out how. But when I realized how much fun it was to work with Matthew on books, it really lit a fire under both of us to make it happen. We self-published for ten years before breaking into commercial work, and now we have 60-some very strange illustrated books to show for it.

M: 62. I recently counted.

R: Well, I wish you had been around to write the manuscript for that class I took in college. It was truly horrendous. We could’ve saved ourselves a few years, and I wouldn’t have felt such shame when I came across that envelope full of hubris.

M: If it turns out we can’t make a living in children’s books, maybe selling envelopes full of hubris could be a worthy plan B?

R: Who would buy them?

M: Aspiring college students, maybe?

R: Are we done?

M: I think so. We need to put these people out of their misery.

R: If you are interested in more misery, you can find us on our site or visit our shop to browse our wares and book us to speak at your school, library, or muffler convention.

M: And if you want to hear us say things out loud, follow us on Facebook or Instagram where we post a new 60-second video every single day.

R: The videos are about nothing at all. Such as what we had for lunch. That sort of thing. Do not expect to be enlightened.

M: But do expect to have a defining moment.

R: No. Do not expect that, either. That is not going to happen.

M: Well then, what can they expect?

R: Envelopes full of hubris. Nothing more. Nothing less.

M: Sounds like a defining moment to me.

#bookish #booklr #bibliophile #book lover #book nerd #kidlit #mglit #middle grade books #the real mccoys #matthew swanson #robbi behr

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bisoroblog · 7 years ago

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10 Books to Spark a Love of Math in Kids of All Ages

Math is at play in every sphere of our lives, from recipes to internet security to the electoral college. But that reality can be hard to convey through the drills, static numbers and strict rules that make up so much of K-12 math education. Educators have made strides to engage students through math. One way to bring the subject to life, according to a math research organization, is through literature.

“Mathematics is very creative and playful and joyful,” says Kirsten Bohl, a spokeswoman for the Mathematical Sciences Research Institute. “Books connect with that sense of wonder and imagination and creativity.”

To spotlight such books, MSRI created the Mathical Book Prize in 2015. Each year a panel of librarians, teachers, mathematicians and early childhood experts selects winners and honor books in five age categories. This year’s picks brings the full Mathical list to more than 50 titles that cross genres and formats, including picture books, graphic novels, biographies, and young adult novels.

What matters most, according to Jordan Ellenberg, co-chair of the selection committee, is that the books succeed in communicating mathematical ideas or problems and also succeed as great books.

“Anybody can stick a lot of math in a book,” says Ellenberg, a University of Wisconsin professor of math who also holds a master’s degree in creative writing. “If it’s a bad book, it’s not going to interest kids.”

The committee also looks for books touching on a range of interests. “A lot of kids don’t think of themselves as math people, but the intention of the award is to help kids understand that math is for everybody,” says Bohl.

Below are 10 books on the Mathical list, including this year’s winners.

Baby Goes to Market Written by Atinuke, illustrated by Angela Brooksbank Pre-K 2018 Mathical prize winner

At a Nigerian outdoor market, Mama shops while Baby attracts edible gifts from the vendors. Baby eats one of each treat before adding the rest to the basket. When the basket gets heavy, Mama hurries home to feed “Poor Baby!” who’s “not had one single thing to eat.” According to Ellenberg, the math in a children’s book need not be announced in the title, but children should be able to recognize that it’s happening. For example, Fran Wilson, one of the other judges, shared that second-graders in her classroom pointed out the subtraction at play in Baby Goes to Market without her prompting. “That’s a sign of a real winning book,” says Wilson.

Have You Seen My Dragon? By Steve Light Pre-K 2015 Mathical prize winner

A child narrator searches high and low for his pet in this multilayered counting book. Children will enjoy spotting the roving dragon amid a richly detailed, pen-and-ink cityscape. They will also practice counting via a set of objects featured in spot color on each spread: two hot dogs, five water towers, 12 pigeons, and so on — up to the 20 lanterns in a final scene where the child and dragon are reunited.

Sheep Won’t Sleep: Counting by 2’s, 5’s, and 10’s Written by Judy Cox, illustrated by Nina Cuneo Grades K-2 2018 Mathical prize winner

Clarissa tries all the usual tricks for falling asleep, including counting sheep. When that fails, the sheep suggest counting alpacas — this time in pairs. When that also fails, the alpacas recommend counting llamas — by fives. As the trend continues, Clarissa’s room fills up with woolly animals in bold colors and patterns. The comical storyline and bright illustrations will engage early elementary schoolers as they practice advanced counting skills.

Absolutely One Thing By Lauren Child Grades K-2 2017 Mathical prize winner

Big brother Charlie guides little sister Lola through the rules of numbers as they trek to the store to pick out a toy. Younger readers will enjoy correcting Lola’s faulty number sense, while older readers can join Charlie in embedded calculations, such as: how many stickers does Lola have left after sticking five on the pavement, three on a tree, two on her shoes, one on her brother and one on the dog? (Answer: zero.) Although the pages are chock full of digits, a well-paced plot, sibling humor and funky illustrations make for a breezy read.

A Hundred Billion Trillion Stars Written by Seth Fishman, illustrated by Isabel Greenberg Grades 3-5 2018 Mathical prize winner

How do you convey the immensity of numbers like three hundred seventy billion billion? Writing 37 followed by 19 zeros likely won’t do the job. Instead, this book uses awe-inducing facts from the cosmos (a hundred billion trillion stars in the universe) and the ground beneath our feet (10 quadrillion ants on Earth) to explore scale and estimation. According to Ellenberg, literature can’t replace classroom instruction in the practice of math but books like this one can spark a “dizzy excitement” that’s also important to the learning process. “You can tell a kid there’s no largest number,” he says. “If they can feel it, that’s a different story.”

Secret Coders #1: Get with the Program Written by Gene Luen Yang, illustrated by Mike Holmes Grades 3-5 2016 Mathical prize winner

Hopper knows there’s something strange about her new school. When she and basketball star Eni team up to find out what, things turn out weirder than she imagined. Readers are introduced to the principles of programming through logic puzzles, a robotic turtle and creepy birds in this adventure-filled graphic novel from the 2016 National Ambassador for Young People’s Literature. The book is the first in a series. Mathical also offers an educator tip sheet for Secret Coders.

Giant Pumpkin Suite By Melanie Heuiser Hill Grades 6-8 2018 Mathical honor book*

In addition to presenting calculations, figures, and puzzles, another way for a book to be mathematical is by portraying characters who love and practice math. In Giant Pumpkin Suite, math and cello enthusiast Rose deals with literal and figurative growing pains as she joins her shorter, nonmusical twin brother in a project to grow a record-breaking pumpkin for the state fair. “We want kids to see mathematics but we also want kids to see mathematicians, because math is in the end a human activity,” says Ellenberg.

Really Big Numbers By Richard Evan Schwartz Grades 6-8 2015 Mathical prize winner

With frank, funny narration Schwartz takes readers on a numerical journey that begins at one and proceeds through mind-bogglingly large figures — but still ends very far from infinity. Complex ideas are tackled through everyday objects and patterns in whimsical, geometric drawings. Unanswered questions on some spreads will encourage readers to keep pondering and calculating after putting the book down. Mathical also provides an educator tip sheet for this book.

Hidden Figures: The American Dream and the Untold Story of the Black Women Mathematicians Who Helped Win the Space Race By Margot Lee Shetterly Grades 9-12 2018 Mathical honor book*

Better known as one 2017’s hit movies, Hidden Figures tells the inspiring story of African-African women “computers” whose brains and grit helped launch NASA astronauts into orbit. With more depth than the film, this book illuminates the interconnections between math, careers and social history. A young readers’ edition and a picture book version also are available.

Genius: The Game By Leopoldo Gout Grades 9-12 2017 Mathical prize winner

Three online friends and tech prodigies from diverse parts of the world connect in real life during a high-stakes global tech challenge. Together they embark on a quest not only to win “the Game” but also to solve their individual problems: Rex is searching for his missing brother, Tunde is on the run from a military warlord, and Painted Wolf must conceal her identity after exposing corrupt Chinese officials. Told in realistic, rotating voices and filled with suspensful plot twists, this book will grip teenage readers regardless of their prior interest in coding or programming.

*The Mathical selection committee did not name winners for middle or high school grades this year. According to Bohl, that decision reflects the lack of frontlist titles that were submitted by publishers for the older age groups.

10 Books to Spark a Love of Math in Kids of All Ages published first on https://dlbusinessnow.tumblr.com/

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obsidianarchives · 7 years ago

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Black Woman Creator: Vashti Harrison

Vashti Harrison is an artist originally from Onley, Virginia. She has a background in cinematography and screenwriting and a love for storytelling. She earned her BA from the University of Virginia with a double major in Media Studies and Studio Art with concentrations in Film and Cinematography. She received her MFA in Film and Video from CalArts where she snuck into Animation classes to learn from Disney and Dreamworks legends. There she rekindled a love for drawing and painting. Now, utilizing both skill sets, she is passionate about crafting beautiful stories in both the film and kidlit worlds. We spoke to Vashti about being a creator and her book Little Leaders, which comes out on December 5th, 2017.

Black Girls Create: What do you create?

Everything. I definitely categorize myself as a maker and storyteller. My background is in filmmaking so for a long time I was making 16mm experimental films and documentaries. But I also have a true passion for narrative screenwriting. Drawing and painting are old loves that I picked up again after film school. Over the last two years I’ve made the transition to author/illustrator, so I've mainly been focusing on making books for children! In my spare time I’ve always loved making jewelry and handmade books.

BGC: Why do you create?

I’m definitely at my happiest when I’m making things. I get inspired by things all the time, when I walk down the street or see something lit beautifully. For me to make a drawing, a film, or a piece of jewelry is to process the beautiful feelings and moments I encounter every day and turn them into something tangible.

BGC: When did you start making art?

As a child I always liked to draw. It was what I did through high school and even college, but I feel like I truly started making art when I started making films in undergrad. As a “drawer” I was very good at replicating things, but I was never really expressing anything with my drawings. Things finally clicked, though, when I started making films. It was kismet that the only filmmaking professor at the University of Virginia taught experimental art cinema. This way of filmmaking taught me to approach cinema as an artist. It was a pure form of experimentation that allowed me to learn how to tell stories and make meaning with images in a thoughtful and conceptual way. I later went on to get my MFA in Film/Video at CalArts. There, I took some drawing classes and it sparked this passion for drawing again. This time though, it was different. I brought to it this love for storytelling that I hadn’t developed before.

BGC: How did the Little Leaders project come about?

During Black History Month in 2017, I started a drawing project for myself. I wanted to illustrate one Black woman from American History every day for the month of February and post a short bio about her life. By the first one, I knew it was a project that would mean a lot to me and other people. I was very affected by reading the stories of these women, I felt their passion and boldness in a deeply emotional way that I hadn’t expected. The posts got very popular on Instagram, so I asked my agent if she thought there was potential for a book here. We pitched the idea to several publishers and ended up with a deal from LittleBrown Books for Young Readers.

BGC: Who is your audience?

Little Leaders was definitely created with young Black girls in mind. When I was just beginning the project, I couldn’t help thinking how amazing it would have been if I had known about famous women artists and filmmakers as a child. I might not have doubted myself so much. So the book in many ways is a love letter to little Black girls, to share with them the many opportunities that are out there. It is also a celebration of bold Black women, so it is very much a book created with them in mind as well. But mostly I believe this is a book for anyone. You don’t have to be Black or be a woman to be inspired by these amazing leaders from American history. Any artist can read Alma Woodsey Thomas’ story and be inspired. Any science lover can identify with the passion behind Alice Balls story. I hope every person can see a little bit of themselves in the stories within my book.

BGC: What has been the response from the community/audience?

It's been very exciting to see how much buzz has been stirring around the book. There was a day after one of my posts went viral that it got boosted into the top 30 on Amazon! People are very very supportive and write to me every day thanking me for creating work like this. I cannot wait until it's out in the world and I can share it with everyone.

BGC: Who/what inspired you to do what you do? Who/what continues to inspire you?

I am consistently inspired by other artists, so I am an active consumer of content. I especially love going to film festivals.

BGC: Why is it important as a Black person to create?

I get messages from people every day who write to me to tell me they are inspired by what I am doing, and that my work means something to them. I think people are hungry to see more creative content that represents people of color in multifaceted ways. There is a lot of homogeneity in the mainstream, because people of color have rarely had the opportunity to tell their own stories and create their own images. People are ravenous for something new so I think if you are a creator with a new perspective to share now is the time to unleash it.

BGC: How do you balance creating with the rest of your life?

Balance is hard. For me, my life is my art. I’m a workaholic. I work from home, so there is no end to my workday. I’m hoping to structure it more, but honestly, I am truly excited to be where I am so I wouldn’t change much. I am so passionate about what I am doing. I am constantly inspired and only wish I had more time in the day to do all of the things I want to do.

BGC: Do you have any support systems that hold you up?

My family is constantly supportive. My mom helps me run my Etsy shop and my dad is constantly coming up with ideas for Little Leaders. Before I signed any book deals, they were there. I lost my job working on a TV show in 2015 and had to move back in with them. I left and came back a couple times hoping to find work in the city. They provided the support I needed to pursue a career in illustration and from that foundation was able to build up the idea for Little Leaders.

BGC: Advice for young creators/ones just starting?

Practice, experiment, and don’t feel like you have to make a choice right away. For me, it was really important to try out so many things. I went to the University of Virginia for undergrad - a huge school known for its academics and not so much its art program. I truly learned to value art when I was away from it. And when I discovered the passion I had for cinema, I brought to it the knowledge I had gained from studying Art History, Psychology, and Economics. It all worked together to build a consciousness that I believe to be integral to my creative process.

BGC: Future projects?

I’m working on Little Leaders Book 2, and am illustrating a couple different picture books for other publishers. I’ve been throwing ideas around for a screenplay for a short film that I want to make with a buddy from film school, as well as a graphic novel.

BGC: Any dream projects?

I really really really want to have the time to work on an illustrated middle grade novel I’ve had in my head for a while. It will just take time so it will have to wait until I have no other distractions. I really look forward to being able to work on that!

#Black Woman Creator

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janeaddamspeace · 7 years ago

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Children's Books About Fascism and Racism Build Resilience and Understanding #JACBA Newsletter 25Aug2017

11 Kids' Books That Will Help Them Understand the Struggle for Racial Equality

"That's why I was happy to come across this list of books to help kids understand the fight for racial equality from ReadBrightly. Olugbemisola Rhuday-Perkovich offers 11 suggestions, divided by age, beginning with The Other Side, by Jacqueline Woodson, about segregation, and We March, by Shane W. Evans, about the 1963 March on Washington. I'm going to start with Separate Is Never Equal by Duncan Tonatiuh, because my son and I have already been talking about school segregation, and Lillian's Right to Vote by Jonah Winter, illustrated by Shane W. Evans, because we've also talked about voting and the Voting Rights Act. There are also books for older tweens and teens and a graphic novel by Congressman John Lewis."

Each Kindness written by Jacqueline Woodson, illustrated by E.B. Lewis 2013 Awardee

From the Notebooks of Melanin Sun by Jacqueline Woodson 1996 Awardee

I Hadn't Meant to Tell You This by Jacqueline Woodson 1995 Awardee

Lillian's Right to Vote: A Celebration of the Voting Rights Act of 1965 by Jonah Winter, illustrated by Shane W. Evans 2016 Awardee

We March written and illustrated by Shane W. Evans 2013 Awardee

Separate is Never Equal: Sylvia Mendez and her family's fight for desegregation, written and illustrated by Duncan Tonatiuh 2015 Awardee

How to Talk to Your Kids About Charlottesville

American Anti-Racism

THE YOUNGEST MARCHER By Cynthia Levinson Illustrated by Vanessa Brantley Newton (Picture book; ages 5-9)

This picture book about Audrey Faye Hendricks, a 9-year-old girl who marched in Dr. Martin Luther King's Children's March and was jailed for a week, shows how one child overcame fear and joined in the fight for justice. In my original review, I wrote, "Levinson and Newton keep her story bright and snappy, emphasizing the girl's eagerness to make a difference and her proud place in her community."

The Fight Against Anti-Semitism and Nazis

THE WHISPERING TOWN By Jennifer Elvgren. Illustrated by Fabio Santomauro. (Picture book; ages 5-8)

This picture book with a graphic novel sensibility tells the story of a young girl, Anett, whose family is harboring Jewish refugees in a Danish fishing village. Anett brings food to the mother and child hidden in her cellar, and helps guide them to boats on one moonless night. The title is derived from her suggestion that the whole town whisper directions to the pair to ensure they don't get lost. Though the book was originally suggested for the 7 to 11 age range, our reviewer, Elizabeth Wein, said it felt appropriate as an introduction to the Holocaust for younger children.

NUMBER THE STARS By Lois Lowry (Ages 8-12)

This Newbury Medal-winning novel, told from the perspective of 10-year-old Annemarie Johansen, tells the story of the Jews who escaped certain death in Denmark in 1943. When word gets out that the Nazis intend to round up all the Jewish people in the country, Annemarie and her family save her best friend, Ellen Rosen, by pretending she is Annemarie's sister and helping her make it to a fishing boat that will bring her and her family to safety in neutral Sweden. It's a novel grounded in dark historical truth and yet full of hope.

WE WILL NOT BE SILENT The White Rose Student Resistance Movement that Defied Adolf Hitler By Russell Freedman (Ages 10-14)

This nonfiction account, aided by many archival photos and materials, tells the story of the German teenagers who banded together to fight secretly against the Nazis, rallying their fellow citizens by writing and distributing thousands of leaflets denouncing Nazi atrocities. "We are your bad conscience," they said to the Nazi leaders. Freedman tells their story of resisting with words effectively and concisely.

We've Got a Job: The 1963 Birmingham Children's March by Cynthia Levinson 2013 Awardee

We Shall Overcome: The Story of a Song written by Debbie Levy, illustrated by Vanessa Brantley-Newton 2014 Awardee

Whispering Town written by Jennifer Elvgren and illustrated by Fabio Santomauro 2015 Awardee

Number the Stars by Lois Lowry 1990 Awardee

We Will Not Be Silent: The White Rose Student Resistance Movement That Defied Adolf Hitler by Russell Freedman 2017 Awardee

Freedom Walkers by Russell Freedman 2007 Awardee

Kids at Work: Lewis Hine and the Crusade Against Child Labor by Russell Freedman 1995 Awardee

Eleanor Roosevelt: A Life of Discovery by Russell Freedman 1994 Awardee

Not Just Stories: Six Children's Books For Fighting Fascism

Terrible Things: An Allegory of the Holocaust, Eve Bunting: As difficult as it is to talk to kids about genocide, this book makes a case for speaking up when it looks like neighbors are in danger.

The Wednesday Surprise by Eve Bunting 1990 Awardee

Enlisting young adult fiction in the battle against racism

Book Riot editor and "Here We Are" author Kelly Jensen posted a request on Twitter last Friday: "My 33rd birthday is next month, and between now and then, I'd love to see 33 classroom literacy projects completed. Up for the challenge?"

Many of the teachers Jensen highlights write about their desire to create diverse classroom libraries. They've asked for funding to buy "The Hate U Give" by Angie Thomas, "When Dimple Met Rishi" by Sandhya Menon, "Brown Girl Dreaming" by Jacqueline Woodson, books from Scholastic's "Dear America" series.

"It makes a huge difference when students have books that let them know they're being seen - that their perspectives and voices matter," Jensen said. "It's huge what kids will take with them from that."

The New Uniform of White Supremacy: Interview with Susan Campbell Bartoletti

"What we see in a lot of images coming out of Charlottesville are these very clean-cut-looking young men," says Susan Campbell Bartoletti, the author of They Called Themselves the K.K.K.: The Birth of an American Terrorist Group and Hitler Youth: Growing Up in Hitler's Shadow. "They're putting the face of a gentleman on values that are, in my opinion, anything but gentlemanly."

Toward the end of our conversation, Bartoletti points out a particularly chilling antecedent to the uniforms seen in Charlottesville. She directs me to Nazi propaganda: posters of clean-cut white men towering over people and, in one, shoveling aside presumably Jewish and black men. Several posters show the Nazis dressed in white button-ups and khakis. The resemblance is haunting. "And they didn't hide their faces either, did they?" Bartoletti asks rhetorically.

Kids on Strike! by Susan Campbell Bartoletti 2000 Awardee

Growing Up In Coal County by Susan Campbell Bartoletti 1997 Awardee

11 books to help you talk to your kids about race and racism

Books you can read with your kids to start the conversation on race and racism

-A Chair for My Mother by Vera B. Williams - After their home is destroyed in a fire, Rosa, her mother and grandmother save up to buy a comfortable chair for all of them to enjoy. A heart-warming celebration of a loving family.

-One Green Apple by Eve Bunting - Farah feels alone at school, even around all her classmates. She listens and nods but doesn't speak... because she doesn't know the language. But on a field trip to an apple orchard, she discovers that many things make the same noises they did at home. As the class combines all their apples in the cider press they discover that mixing all those different things together makes one delicious drink.

-Sweet Clara and the Freedom Quilt by Deborah Hopkinson - Clara is a seamstress in the Big House, and dreams of a reunion with her Momma who lives on another plantation. Then she hears two slaves talking about the Underground Railroad, and she figures out how to use the cloth in her scrap bag to hide a map of the land - a freedom quilt to guide the way.

-Brown Girl Dreaming by Jacqueline Woodson - I put this on every book list I possibly can because it is beautiful and insightful and eminently readable. I read it as an adult, but I'd say it's suitable for anyone from fourth grade up. Woodson write about growing up in South Caroline and New York in the 1960s and 70s. She talks of the remnants of Jim Crow laws, and her growing awareness of the civil rights movement.

-The Whispering Town by Jennifer Elvgren - When people in a small Danish fishing village shelter a Jewish family during the Holocaust, they must get the family safely to the harbor to board a fishing boat and get to neutral Sweden. They devise a plan to communicate without attracting attention and risking the family's safety.

-Number the Stars by Lois Lowry - When the German troops begin their plan to "relocate" all the Jews in Denmark, Annemarie Johansen's family takes in her best friend and hides her in plain sight as part of their family. The book shows how the Danish Resistance smuggled almost the entire Jewish population of Denmark - close to 7,000 people - across the water to Sweden. It deals with an unimaginable tragedy but the hope and love of the people in the story make it a good book for middle-to-older elementary schoolers. It's one of our favorites.

Amber Was Brave, Essie Was Smart written and illustrated by Vera B. Williams 2002 Awardee

Music, Music for Everyone written by Vera B. Williams 1985 Awardee

Steamboat School, written by Deborah Hopkinson, illustrated by Ron Husband, 2017 Awardee

Girl Wonder: A Baseball Story in Nine Innings by Deborah Hopkinson, illustrated by Terry Wideners, 2004 Awardee

Shutting Out the Sky: Life in the Tenements of New York 1880-1924 by Deborah Hopkinson 2004 Awardee

A Band of Angels: A Story Inspired written by the Jubilee Singers by Deborah Hopkinson, illustrated by Raúl Colón, 2000 Awardee

Hundreds Rally in Lexington Vigil in Solidarity With Charlottesville

"You realize that you don't have a choice sometimes. You've just got to speak out. You've got to stand up and speak out," noted Lexington Mayor Jim Gray.

Kentucky Author George Ella Lyon sang a song during her time at the microphone.

You and Me and Home Sweet Home by George Ella Lyon and Stephanie Anderson 2010 Awardee

10th National Conference of African American Librarians

The 10th National Conference of African American Librarians is hosting an array of children's authors now until August 13 at the Grand Hyatt Atlanta. Headlining the group are authors/publishers Wade and Cheryl Hudson.

Also confirmed are Kelly Staring Lyons (Ellen's Broom & One Million Men and Me) and Atlanta's own, illustrator R. Gregory Christie, a recent Coretta Scott King Book Award recipient and Caldecott "Honor Winner" for the book (Freedom in Congo Square).

The Book Itch: Freedom, Truth & Harlem's Greatest Bookstore by Vaunda Micheaux Nelson, illustrated by R. Gregory Christie 2016 Awardee

Angelina Jolie animated by Taliban tale made in Ireland

Based on the bestselling children's novel by Deborah Ellis, The Breadwinner tells the story of Parvana, an 11-year-old girl living under the Taliban who gives up her identity to provide for her family.

Nora Twomey, of Cartoon Saloon, directed the film, which was co-produced by Aircraft Pictures Canada, Melusine Productions and Jolie Pas Productions. It also received funding from the Irish Film Board.

Cartoon Saloon is Ireland's most successful animation company, having been twice-nominated for Oscars for The Secret of Kells (2010) and Song of the Sea (2015).

I Dissent: Ruth Bader Ginsburg Makes Her Mark, written by Debbie Levy, illustrated by Elizabeth Baddeley, 2017 Awardee

We Shall Overcome: The Story of a Song written by Debbie Levy and illustrated by Vanessa Brantley-Newton 2014 Awardee

Live Event: Big City Book Club at the Billie Holiday Theatre

This special Bed-Stuy edition, at the recently renovated Billie Holiday Theatre, will feature a discussion of "Another Brooklyn," the best-selling novel about coming of age in Kings County in the 1970s. Ginia Bellafante, the Big City columnist, will be joined by Jacqueline Woodson, the book's author, for a lively conversation.

Each Kindness written by Jacqueline Woodson, illustrated by E.B. Lewis 2013 Awardee

From the Notebooks of Melanin Sun by Jacqueline Woodson 1996 Awardee

I Hadn't Meant to Tell You This by Jacqueline Woodson 1995 Awardee

Abenaki expert to make Plattsburgh stop Adirondack author will host storytelling session at Plattsburgh Public Library

Author Joseph Bruchac is coming to Plattsburgh on Aug. 22, bringing with him stories from a culture that dates back to the 1600s.

Bruchac will visit the Plattsburgh Public Library on Tuesday to sign copies of his books, sing traditional American Indian songs and tell stories from Abenaki culture.

The Heart of a Chief by Joseph Bruchac 1999 Awardee

Library Chat: Grab some books and find out why world's social problems are happening

Your public library has materials for all ages, including materials that will help you start a conversation with children and open the door for them to understand any kind of difficult issue at a level that is comfortable for them and for you.

The award winning free verse work "Brown Girl Dreaming," by Jacqueline Woodson, suitable for adults and children, might be a good place to start.

"Separate is Never Equal" by Duncan Tonatiuh is available as an audiobook and as a short video of the book. This picture book work discusses the fight to end school segregation for agricultural workers in California in the 1940s. Or, for a more regional experience, or introduce a piece of family history, you could pick up "Baseball Saved Us," about Japanese internment, by Ken Mochizuki.

If you are embarking on a road trip you might download the audiobook "Heart and Soul: The Story of America and African Americans" by Kadir Nelson, who also penned a number of works for a variety of ages.

Heart and Soul: The Story of America and African Americans written and illustrated by Kadir Nelson 2012 Awardee

The Village That Vanished written by Ann Grifalconi and illustrated by Kadir Nelson 2003 Awardee

Separate is Never Equal: Sylvia Mendez and her family's fight for desegregation, written and illustrated by Duncan Tonatiuh 2015 Awardee

Hear author Francisco Jimenez speak on 'Migrant Experience' in Redlands

The Redlands Adult Literacy Program at the A.K. Smiley Public Library invites you to hear Francisco Jimenez, who wrote the autobiographical book "The Circuit: Stories from the Life of a Migrant Child."

This year, more than 150 local literacy tutors, learners and community members have read Jimenez's book and were moved by reading of the obstacles Jimenez overcame in his quest for an education.

Jimenez will speak on "The Migrant Experience: A Personal Story" at 6 p.m. Sept. 7.

The Circuit: Stories from the Life of a Migrant Child by Francisco Jiménez 1998 Awardee

Detroit Museums Examine the Riots That Changed the City

The story of Detroit's July 1967 riots is, in some ways, a tale of two cities, one black and one white. Now, 50 years later, three neighboring museums here are revisiting that fateful summer with exhibitions that portray and explore the riots in sharply different ways.

Erin Falker, an assistant curator at the museum, said that they chose to place "Flag for the Moon: Die Nigger" by Faith Ringgold, a distortion of the United States flag from 1969 that spells out the racial epithet in its stripes, across from the khaki-colored "Patriot" by Jeff Donaldson, from 1975, and "Weight" by Mr. Phillips, from 2001. Ms. Falker said the grouping highlighted the remembrance that, on the night of the raid that sparked the riots, the club was having a party for African-American soldiers returning from Vietnam.

Another goal at all the museums is teaching millennials and other young people to make connections between the past and present. The Wright's curator of exhibitions, Patrina Chatman, a Detroit native who was a teenager during the riots, said art with Black Lives Matter elements mixed with earlier civil rights references reminds young people that "history is repeating itself."

Aunt Harriet's Underground Railroad in the Sky by Faith Ringgold 1993 Awardee

Protest Art: What Is It Good For?

As Jerry Saltz has noted, there have been a number of exciting politically engaged exhibitions around New York City right now, and more coming soon. The curators at the Whitney Museum dug around in its archive to put together "An Incomplete History of Protest," from which this slideshow is drawn. It opens August 18.

Faith Ringgold (b. 1930), Hate Is a Sin Flag, 2007.

Aunt Harriet's Underground Railroad in the Sky by Faith Ringgold 1993 Awardee

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The Jane Addams Children's Book Award annually recognizes children's books of literary and aesthetic excellence that effectively engage children in thinking about peace, social justice, global community, and equity for all people.