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Archives and Special Collections Blog
The Katie Davis exhibit is up and running in the Dodd Center Gallery. Original materials from the Davis Papers for her books The Curse of Addy McMahon, Party Animals, Mabel the Tooth Fairy, Who Hoots and Who Hops are featured as well as books and some great “Scared Guy” items. The exhibit runs from October 29, 2012 to February 22, 2013. There will be a reception and gallery talk by Katie on Saturday, Nov. 10, from 2-4 in the Dodd Center. Her books will be for sale at the Book Fair. For more information to go bookfair.uconn.edu.
Katie Davis exhibit, Northeast Children’s Literature Collection
Congratulations, Tomie! According to the Society’s home page, “The Lifetime Achievement Awards were established in 2005 by past chairs of The Original Art. Nominees must be judged to have a body of work that documents an innovative and pioneering contribution to the field of children’s book illustration, and final selection is made by artists whose work has been juried into the previous year’s show. ”
From an early age, Tomie and his parents knew he would be an artist. He received his Bachelor of Fine Arts degree from the Pratt Institute in Brooklyn, New York where he studied Art. His Master of Fine Arts degree was received from the California College of Arts and Crafts in Oakland, California. He has also been awarded three honorary Doctorate degrees from separate Universities and Colleges.
Tomie’s career as a professional artist and designer, former teacher of art, children’s author and illustrator is expansive. He has designed greeting cards, posters, magazine and catalogue covers, record album covers, and theater costumes and sets. He has illustrated over two hundred books, and written over seventy. Tomie has won numerous awards, including the prestigious American Library Association’s Caldecott Honor Award for Strega Nona (1976), the University of Minnesota’s Kerlan Award (1981), the Catholic Library Association’s Regina Medal (1983), and the Smithsonian Institution’s Smithson Medal (1990).
Tomie’s books have been published world-wide in fifteen different languages and he has over five million copies in print. Many of his books are largely autobiographical such as Nana Upstairs, Nana Downstairs, Tom, and The Art Lesson. Tomie currently resides in New Hampshire.
The Tomie dePaola Collection contains artwork, sketch books and paintings from the beginning of his career, as well as many different editions from each book he wrote or illustrated, including foreign editions. Some of the languages represented are Portuguese, Swedish, Finnish, French Canadian, German, Afrikaans, and even Zulu. Original illustrations from books, as well as paintings and other art work spanning from his childhood years are included. The Collection also contains marketing items from his books, such as towels, porcelain jewelry containers, music boxes, paper goods (wrapping paper, cups & plates), quilts from schools, and a large selection of Christmas tree ornaments designed by Tomie for the Marshall Fields Christmas trees in Chicago.
Well done, Tomie!
–Terri J. Goldich, Curator
Ms. A. Siegel of Illinois has donated four illustrations for greeting cards created in the 1960s by Paul Galdone. Galdone was born in 1907 in Budapest, Austria-Hungary and immigrated to the United States in 1921. He studied art at the Art Student’s League and New York School for Industrial Design. After serving in World War II in the U.S. Army, Engineers, the author and illustrator of children’s books worked as a bus boy, electrician’s helper, and fur dryer, in addition to four years in the art department at Doubleday (NY). His work was awarded runner-up for the Caldecott Medal (Eve Titus, Anatole, 1957 and Anatole and the Cat, 1958) and was selected by the American Library Association for its Notable Books program (The Little Red Hen, Winter Danger, and Flaming Arrows). He died of a heart attack on 7 November 1986, in Nyack, NY.
My favorite memory of Mr. Sendak comes from a dinner at Dean Emeritus Dr. David Woods’ house. Dean Woods had invited a few folks over following Sendak’s visit to UConn to deliver the inaugural Robert Gray Memorial Lecture. Another of the guests was Etienne Delessert, also a well-known children’s illustrator from western Connecticut. They discussed politics.
The NCLC holds original Sendak illustrations from the book he did with Ruth Krauss in 1952, A hole is to dig. It was one of his first major books arranged by Ursula Nordstrom. The NCLC also hold a few illustrations for Somebody else’s nut tree by Krauss, published in 1958.
What a wonderful, scary, brilliant man.
–Terri J. Goldich, Curator
Suzy Staubach and I were invited to attend a lovely brunch at Tomie’s house to celebrate his being awarded the Laura Ingalls Wilder Award, given by the American Library Association which “…“honors an author or illustrator whose books, published in the United States, have made, over a period of years, a substantial and lasting contribution to literature for children.” The dePaola house is absolutely charming, with room after room where wonderful sculptures, artwork, toys, candles, antiques, and dePaola creations abound. One piece of artwork in particular caught my eye: a pencil and ink drawing of Tomie as a Saint, with a drink in one hand and a paintbrush in the other, surrounded by children holding their hands out in begging posture. Trina Schart Hyman, one of Tomie’s dear friends, was working on the drawing when she left for the hospice care where she later passed away. The drawing was still on her drawing table. She didn’t have time to ink in the entire piece but she did get the drink glass done!
Check out Suzy’s blog at www.willowtreepottery.us/Willow_Tree_Pottery/BiblioPotter/Entries/2011/8/1_Tomie_dePaola_Pot_Collector.html and Elizabeth Bluemle’s post with lots of photos at http://blogs.publishersweekly.com/blogs/shelftalker/.
Tomie’s home is surrounded by elegant gardens, with benches in strategic places to best view the grounds. There is a small hidden garden outside of a sliding glass door and a very inviting swimming pool. Almost heaven, New Hampshire.
l to r: Suzy Staubach, General Books Manager, UConn Co-op; Tomie dePaola, Wilder Award recipient for 2011; Terri J. Goldich, Curator, Northeast Children's Literature Collection
The family of the late Coleen Salley have donated James Marshall’s book dummy for his “The Cut-ups cut loose” to the NCLC. The charming, 32-page dummy is accompanied by a letter from Mr. Marshall to Ms. Salley with a note about “our little book.” The dummy is black and white with some color on the title page. The book was published in 1987 by Viking Kestrel and is dedicated to Ms. Salley. This piece is the only item in the Marshall Papers for this title. Thank you, Salley Family, for this important addition to the NCLC.
