Sunday Safari - Taiga

Diana Sudyka, Taiga

Today's post was inspired by the chilly northern winds sweeping through Florence,

and by Werner Herzog's documentary Happy People: A Year in the Taiga, about a group

 of fearless and resourceful people who really know how to survive in the cold.

Just like these wonderful animals...

Feodor Rojankovsky, Panache l'ecureil, 1939, thanks to The Visual Telling of Stories

T. Kapustin, The first sun, 1987, thanks to polny_shkaf's amazing visual library 

Nathalie Lete, Le Jaseur

Kate McLelland, thanks to Kickcan & Conkers 

Mikhail Belomlinsky, Wonders under the feet, 1967, thanks to bookvart

Ene Pikk, Kärp, 1981, thanks to vaula

V. Kanevsky, Winter Poems, 1984, via Hanna Rivka

Nikolai Tyrsa, Snezhnaya kniga, 1926

Gwen Keraval, Le fils qui sauva son père

Georgy Nikolsky, Year in the woods, 1978 and

Nikita Charushin, My first zoology book, 1984, thanks to Book Graphics

Animalsleepstories, The Old Caribou

Lithuanian Spring

I am still sorting through the Bologna photos, materials, discoveries and encounters.

This first post is dedicated to the first thing that caught my eye at the fair: 

the beautiful exhibition of Lithuanian children's books Illustrarium.

At first I was dismayed by the poor quality of my photos, but luckily

I found their great website with plenty of pictures and information!

Congratulations to Lithuania also for the nice design of

the exhibition and promotional materials...

Lina Eitmantyte-Valužiene, three illustrations from Hello, How Are You?

"Lithuania started visiting the Bologna Children’s Book Fair in 1989, the year before its independence. 

Then a fledgling democracy, it brought to Bologna a rich and deep creative experience from its years 

of oppression. The limitations of stringent censorship had failed to restrain its illustrators’ imaginations. 

Their creative power in producing illustrations that were pregnant with allusions, 

and their technically exquisite and ingenious images proved to be a potent form of defiance.

The fine illustrators’ work from the years of the Soviet occupation not only made famous the older generation

of artists and illustrators, they also laid a solid foundation for a unique and demanding Lithuanian school of illustration.

It is marked by a diversity of styles and forms of expression, and artists are expected to speak in their own voices, 

to discover and to become discovered for something new and unusual. The middle generation of illustrators, 

who faced the challenge of creating a new Lithuania, showed a special resilience, as they had to forge a creative 

path through the hardships suffered in rebuilding the economy. The youngest illustrators are now committed 

to emulating their teachers. Their creative potential is no longer hindered by obstacles;

they have come to meet the challenge posed by the world that is opening out in front of them, 

and to embrace the abundance of new techniques, mixed media and different cultures."

from the Illustrarium website

Rena Žviliuviene, three illustrations from Kilipštukas the Elf

 Šarūnas Leonavicius, three illustrations from Human Star

Sigutė Chlebinskaitė, two illustrations from What’s Happening in the Yard

Leonardas Gutauskas, two illustrations from The Residents of the Old Tower

stay tuned for more...

Sunday Safari - A Walk in the Woods

 Camilla Engman, Morran in the woods

 Diana Sudyka

  from Nurseryland Annual 1969 (illustrator?), thanks to buglady 1104

 Petr Poš, Zvirata V Lese, 1969, at terryposters

 T. Zebrova, Lullaby at Library Things

 Celestino Piatti, The Happy Owls, 1963, thanks to art.crazed

Adelheid Schait, Nikolaus und der dumme Nuck, 1987, thanks to Natalie Birkle

 Elizabeth and Gerald Rose, The Great Oak, thanks to Faber Books

 Mirko Hanák, Bambi, 1967, 

thanks to a billion tastes and tunes

Barbara Cooney, Bambi, a life in the woods, 1970

Who lives in the forest and what grows in the forest, (author/year?)

 Jenny Williams, The SIlver Wood, 1966, thanks to try-whistling-this

Iela Mari returns

My, how time flies! 

It's been almost a year since Animalarium's first post about Iela Mari, 

and four months since I grabbed the beautiful catalogue of her exhibition 

at the Bologna Book Fair with the intention of sharing it here.

First edition of The apple and the butterfly, 

published by Bompiani in 1960 with case and spiral binding

prototype and original illustration for The apple and the butterfly

This was the first Italian monographic exhibition dedicated to Iela Mari's works,

and the catalogue, published by Babalibri, contains the reproductions of many 

original illustrations, preparatory studies and prototypes from the artist's personal archives.

Various essays and a rare recent interview with Iela complete this precious volume,

offering new insights into the work process and very private personality of 

this highly innovative and influential but still understudied author. 

 

illustrations from Animali nel prato, late 1970s.

"This book doesn't tell a story in words. It tells as many stories, through pictures,as there are 

animals in a meadow. Stories of races and games, struggles and traps, colors and smells."

Animali nel prato originated from the design for a fabric for children's pillows.

This is a detail from the print reproducing the entire drawing (cm.176x95).

The book has not been reprinted and is difficult to find, even in libraries.

Prototype with case and spiral binding of Mangia che ti mangio, 1980. 

Every spread shows a predator chasing its prey, which in turn becomes a predator when you turn the page.

Giusi Quarenghi describes it in the catalogue as "a mortal Ring Around the Rosy of hunger and satiety..."

Printed spread and prototype from Mangia che ti mangio

cover and original illustrations for C'era una volta il riccio di mare

An associative chain of shapes and figures that in the end, like a circle, returns to the original idea. 

Iela Mari's last published work Il paesaggio infinito (The infinite landscape), 1988,

consists of 16 cards that can be mixed and matched to create many different sequences and stories.