"There were all the colors of the world and the color kittens had made them" - Margaret Wise Brown
I have been trying to figure out what to name the collection of neon drawings while I was redoing my website. While I ambled around in the world of Mid-Century Modern illustrations, I came across one of my most treasured children's books. The Color Kittens by Margaret Wise Brown as illustrated by Alice and Martin Provensen. It seems only fitting to name this collection after something that has resonated with me well into my adult life.
Reading and absorbing children's books has shaped my own art and my deep love for poetry. There are books like The Rainbow Goblins by Ul de Rico whose illustrations have shaped the way that I paint landscapes and more fantasy arts books than I can recall have shaped the way I think about realistic figure drawings. Certainly I have read books and bathed in art that has shaped the way I view and experience the world beyond the preschool level, however it is the books I read in my most formative years that have laid the foundtation for the person I am now.
It was my love of those books that encouraged hours upon hours of drawing my own children into my lap to read and allowed me to experience them in an entirely new way. It was looking at these books again that let me see how they influenced me as a creative.
My children have now out grown the desire to curl up in my lap and listen to me read, which is a shame because I have not outgrown the desire to read alloud to them. My oldest child is getting into poetry so, while I'm pretty sure she would rather die than sit in a room with me and hear a story, its still something we can share. Sort of, in the only ways you can share something with a tween. I wonder which ways books and reading will effect them as they grow and if they'll ever notice.
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