As you can see, the figures are drawn, then cut out and collaged onto the photo backgrounds. I wanted to create a sense of Warhol’s work, so I started with black and white photos which I collaged.

(Christy Ottaviano Books/Henry Holt, May 2011)īonnie: The artwork was a complicated process. They told how badly prisoners were treated in jail: ‘We have no blankets,’ Beard Palmer wrote, The letters were to the editor of the local newspaper. Beard Palmer gave him letters to carry out under the crumpled napkins. Thomas carried his papa’s suppers to jail in a wooden bucket. The attackers ran off without cutting a single hair.” He overturned the water basin, broke the shears, and flung the razor in the grass. ‘We’re going to give you a shave, or else!’ they shouted. Four neighbors blocked his way, brandishing barber’s shears, a water basin, soap for lather, and a razor. Suddenly, tall shadows fell across his path. “Early one weekday morning, when the sun was just winking over nearby Bald Hill, Beard Palmer left his farm and walked on foot to the market with a basketful of cucumbers. (Click on image to see entire spread from which it comes.) He knew every one of the two hundred and three Bible verses about beards by heart…” The preacher scolded Beard Palmer from the pulpit: ‘Why do you go around looking like the Devil? You must shave and cut your hair.’ ‘No, I will not!’ said Beard Palmer.

The Quite Contrary Man: A True American Tale , Incidentally, Bonnie also had the opportunity years ago, while working in New York theatre, to perform with Warhol “superstars” Taylor Mead, Viva, and Ultra Violet in The Rites of Spring, written and directed by Taylor Mead, at the Actors Studio. Oh! But also: Bonnie Christensen, who visited me for breakfast here in 2009, not only shares some artwork below from her picture book biography of Andy Warhol, but she talks a bit about it, as well as discusses her process for creating the art. Remember, to read about them, hit last week’s Kirkus column. More on that in a moment.īut, first, here are some illustrations to pore over. Today is when I show you some artwork from each of those titles here at 7-Imp, and I’m going to throw in, at the bottom, some spreads from a book I wanted to mention last week, yet didn’t have the room to mention: Marissa Moss’s Nurse, Soldier, Spy: The Story of Sarah Edmonds, a Civil War Hero (Abrams, March 2011), illustrated by John Hendrix. Last week, I talked about some new picture book biographies. There are two new 2011 TOON titles, and this morning I briefly discuss the latest one. This morning over at Kirkus I will be discussing the wonderful beginning reader series from TOON Books (a Candlewick imprint), which has been going strong since 2008.

That’s one of my favorite picture book spreads from 2011. Illustrated by Kathryn Brown (Abrams, May 2011) From Patricia Rusch Hyatt’s The Quite Contrary Man ,

Fabulous by Bonnie Christensen