A lyrical picture-book introduction to the life of a feminist artistic genius.
Born to a Hungarian mother and an Indian father, Amrita Sher-Gil spent her early childhood in her mother’s homeland, creating fanciful art inspired by the world around her.
When she was 8, the family moved to India, where her art matured considerably. Noticing her talent, her family insisted that she take formal lessons to hone her craft. At first, Amrita obliged, but soon she chafed against the restrictions and the structure, preferring to rely instead on her own instincts and imagination. Following her own path, Amrita created art that blended Eastern and Western traditions and that celebrated womanhood. Eventually, her family returned to Europe specifically so Amrita could study art in Paris. Although she learned a great deal, after a few years, Amrita found Europe stifling, and she returned to India. There, her practice blossomed as she pioneered new visual traditions, pushing the boundaries of the Western-centric artistic world. Unfortunately, her genius was cut short by her untimely death at the age of 28. This lyrical picture-book biography not only celebrates Sher-Gil’s rebellious brilliance, it also frankly examines the challenges and opportunities presented by having a mixed heritage. While much of Sher-Gil’s life and work involved highly adult themes, this book addresses these issues in a child-friendly manner without hiding the truth. The innovative illustrations include more than a few touches of surrealism to evoke the inner life of the artist and present at least one topless female figure, reflecting Sher-Gil’s style.
A lyrical picture-book introduction to the life of a feminist artistic genius. (biographical note, bibliography) (Picture book/biography. 7-11)Pub Date: Sept. 21, 2021
ISBN: 978-1-7342259-4-5
Page Count: 40
Publisher: Penny Candy
Review Posted Online: Sept. 28, 2021
PERSPECTIVES
Well-informed and much-idealized if not entirely simplistic pictures of both the great man and his bustling estate.
Stepping carefully around the controversies, a former curator at Monticello reconstructs the septuagenarian Jefferson’s active daily round.
Jefferson’s fixed routine begins with a faithful recording of temperature and weather at first rising and ends with a final period of solitary reading by candlelight in his unusual alcove bed. In between, the author describes in often fussy detail the range of his interests and enterprises. There’s not only his “polygraph” and other beloved gadgets, but also meals, family members, visitors, and excursions to Monticello’s diverse gardens, workshops and outbuildings. Like the dialogue, which mixes inventions with historical utterances, the generous suite of visuals includes photos of furnishings and artifacts as well as stodgy full-page tableaux and vignettes painted by Elliott. The “slaves” or “enslaved” workers (the author uses the terms interchangeably) that Jefferson encounters through the day are all historical and named—but Sally Hemings and her Jeffersonian offspring are conspicuously absent (aside from a brief name check buried in the closing timeline). Jefferson adroitly sidesteps a pointed question from his grandson, who accompanies him on his rounds, by pleading his age: “The work of ending slavery is for the young.”
Well-informed and much-idealized if not entirely simplistic pictures of both the great man and his bustling estate. (sidebars, endnotes, bibliography) (Nonfiction. 9-11)Pub Date: Feb. 4, 2014
ISBN: 978-1-4197-0541-0
Page Count: 56
Publisher: Abrams
Review Posted Online: Dec. 23, 2013
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Jan. 15, 2014
Routine assignment fodder.
A standard-issue profile of the renowned activist—one of a spate launched by his death in December 2013.
Doeden opens with Mandela on trial for treason in 1964, closes with a quote from Barack Obama’s eulogy and in between covers the civil rights leader’s long career from childhood to final illness. Small news photos and boxed discussions of apartheid and Steve Biko’s brief life accompany a narrative that reads like a term paper—though, looking at the paltry lists of notes and sources at the end, an inadequately documented one. Along with plenty of similar bio-trivia, readers will find out that Mandela moved from village schools in Qunu and Mqhekezweni to Clarkebury Boarding Institute, Healdtown and the University of Fort Hare before getting a correspondence-course law degree from the University of South Africa…but not why any of that is worth knowing or what light it sheds on his character, achievements and historical significance. Yona Zeldis McDonough’s Peaceful Protest (illustrated by Malcah Zeldis, 2002) or Kadir Nelson’s terse but masterful Nelson Mandela (2013) supply clearer, more cogent tributes.
Routine assignment fodder. (further reading, websites, index) (Biography. 8-11)Pub Date: Aug. 1, 2014
ISBN: 978-1-4677-5197-1
Page Count: 48
Publisher: Lerner
Review Posted Online: April 29, 2014
Kirkus Reviews Issue: May 15, 2014
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