Children's Nonfiction Sculpture
Cloth Lullaby
The Woven Life of Louise Bourgeois
- Publisher
- Abrams Books for Young Readers
- Initial publish date
- Mar 2016
- Category
- Sculpture, 20th Century, Art
-
Hardback
- ISBN
- 9781419718816
- Publish Date
- Mar 2016
- List Price
- $24.99
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Where to buy it
Recommended Age, Grade, and Reading Levels
- Age: 5 to 7
- Grade: k to 2
Description
Award-winning creators, Amy Novesky and Isabelle Arsenault, present a picture book biography of a beloved artist in Cloth Lullaby: The Woven Life of Louise Bourgeois.
Louise Bourgeois (1911–2010) was a world-renowned modern artist noted for her sculptures made of wood, steel, stone, and cast rubber. Her most famous spider sculpture, Maman, stands more than 30 feet high.
Just as spiders spin and repair their webs, Louise’s own mother was a weaver of tapestries. Louise spent her childhood in France as an apprentice to her mother before she became a tapestry artist herself. She worked with fabric throughout her career, and this biographical picture book shows how Bourgeois’s childhood experiences weaving with her loving, nurturing mother provided the inspiration for her most famous works.
With a beautifully nuanced and poetic story, this book stunningly captures the relationship between mother and daughter and illuminates how memories are woven into us all.
“With evocative, gorgeous illustrations and an inspirational story of an artist not often covered in children’s literature, this arresting volume is an excellent addition to nonfiction picture book collections, particularly those lacking titles about women artists.” —Booklist, starred review
About the authors
Amy Novesky is an award–winning children’s book author. Her books include Imogen, the Mother of Modernism and Three Boys, also published by Cameron Kids. She lives with her family just north of San Francisco.
Isabelle Arsenault is a very talented Quebec illustrator who has won an impressive number of awards and has achieved international recognition. She has illustrated Migrant by Maxine Trottier, a New York Times Best Illustrated Book and a finalist for the Governor General’s Award; Virginia Wolf by Kyo Maclear, winner of the Governor General’s Award; Le coeur de monsieur Gauguin by Marie-Danielle Croteau, winner of the Governor General’s Award; and My Letter to the World and Other Poems by Emily Dickinson, a finalist for the Governor General’s Award. She has also illustrated Once Upon a Northern Night by Jean Pendziwol and Jane, the Fox and Me by Fanny Britt, forthcoming from Groundwood. Isabelle has won the Grand Prix for illustration (Magazines du Québec) for six years running. She lives with her family in Montreal.
Editorial Reviews
**STARRED REVIEW**
"The evocative, hand-lettered text, peppered with quotations in red ink, provides an impressionistic portrait of the memories, colors, sounds, and images propelling Louise's art. These motifs connect the imaginative ink, pencil, pastel, and watercolor illustrations, done in a palette of indigo, red, and gray. Bold, repetitive patterns of stylized flowers, woven crosshatches, spirals, giant spiders, and musical notes form the perfect background for the cloth lullaby Louise weaves for herself. Splendid visual and verbal introduction to little-known artist Louise Bourgeois."
Kirkus
**STARRED REVIEW**
"With evocative, gorgeous illustrations and an inspirational story of an artist not often covered in children’s literature, this arresting volume is an excellent addition to nonfiction picture book collections, particularly those lacking titles about women artists."
Booklist
"An inventive introduction to the work of a celebrated artist and a useful mentor text for exploring how language and imaginative, varied illustrations can work together to convey an idea."
School Library Journal
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