Category Archives: Exhibit

CSK Legends, Exhibit, Past Events and Important People

CSK Comes to the Bologna Children’s Book Fair

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Black Books Matter Panel Speakers and Moderator.
Photo credit Sylvia Vardell.

The Coretta Scott King Book (CSK) Awards Committee/Community was well represented at the 56th edition of the Bologna Children’s Book Fair in Bologna, Italy, April 1-4, 2019. The CSK Community was invited to present at a flagship event titled: Black Books Matter: African American Words and Colors. The goal of the presentation was to promote the importance of diversity in children’s books at this international festival, with a special focus on African American literature and illustration.

Dr. Claudette McLinn; Chris Myers; Dr. Rudine Sims Bishop; Nikki Grimes; Ilaria Dall’Olio (host); Joshunda Sanders. Photo credit: Mike McLinn.

The distinguished panel included: Dr. Claudette S. McLinn, Chair of the Coretta Scott King Book Awards Committee; Dr. Rudine Sims Bishop, Author and Professor Emerita at The Ohio State University; Christopher “Chris” Myers, CSK Award-winning author and illustrator; Nikki Grimes, CSK Award-winning poet and author; and Joshunda Sanders, author and journalist. Leonard S. Marcus, critic and historian of children’s literature was the moderator.

The thought-provoking discussion centered on the various representations of African American life and culture. It also focused on the Coretta Scott King Books Awards, one of the most important prizes in children’s literature. Many questions were generated from the packed meeting room with varying viewpoints from the international attendees.

OUR VOICE art exhibit. Photo credit: Mike McLinn

The event was paired with the art exhibition Our Voice: Celebrating the Coretta Scott King Illustrator Award, which showcased the work of over 30 major picture book illustrators and their representation of life, history, and culture of African Americans. This exhibition was organized by the National Center for Children’s Illustrated Literature (NCCIL) in Abilene, Texas, to celebrate the 50th anniversary of the award.

OUR VOICE art exhibit. Photo credit: Mike McLinn.

CSK members who attended the Bologna Children’s Book Fair events were Therese Bigelow, Mary Beth Dunhouse, Dr. Elizabeth Poe, and Barbara Scotto.

This panel presentation and art exhibition was a true excursion into the African American experience, which was intensified by the lively exchange between the panel members and audience. In the words of Therese Bigelow, “What an amazing experience!”

Dr. Claudette McLinn is Chair of the Coretta Scott King Book Awards Committee. She is the Executive Director of the Center for the Study of Multicultural Children’s Literature.

CSK Award Winners, Exhibit, Illustrator Award, Illustrator Honor, Past Events and Important People

Our Voice: Celebrating the Coretta Scott King Illustrator Awards Opens at the Eric Carle Museum

Our Voice Exhibit at the Eric Carle Museum of Picture Book Art.
Photo credit: Dr. McLinn

Saturday, October 20, 2018, was the special opening reception of Our Voice: Celebrating the Coretta Scott King Illustrator Awards at the Eric Carle Museum of Picture Book Art in Amherst, Massachusetts. This traveling art exhibition was assembled through the collaboration of the American Library Association and the National Center for Children’s Illustrated Literature (NCCIL). This exhibition features 100 works of art from 38 CSK winners and honor illustrators and remains on view through January 27, 2019. Our Voice is the largest and most comprehensive presentation of CSK illustrator winners and honors ever assembled since the illustrator award was established in 1974.

Ellen Keiter, Reynolds Ruffin, Ekua Holmes, Gordon C. James, Jerry Pinkney, and George C. Ford from left to right.
Photo credit: Dr. McLinn

Several of the CSK illustrator winner and honor award recipients were present at the opening reception. The illustrators include George C. Ford, the first recipient and winner of the CSK Illustrator Award in 1974; Reynolds Ruffin, 1997 honor awardee; JoeSam, 1988 honor awardee; Charles R. Smith, Jr., 2010 award winner; Gordon C. James, 2018 honor awardee; and Ekua Holmes, 2018 award winner. A special one-hour program in the auditorium featured Ekua Holmes and Gordon C. James in conversation with Jerry Pinkney.

Ekua Holmes and Gordon C. James, in conversation with Jerry Pinkney.
Photo credit: Dr. McLinn

This exhibition was curated by Ellen Keiter, chief curator at The Eric Carle Museum, and her super creative staff. iPad stations were provided where visitors had the opportunity to listen to audio clips of many of the artists speaking about their work in their own voice. In addition, small cards with quotations by Coretta Scott King were provided free for guests to take home.

This is a remarkable exhibition. If you are in the greater Boston area, please visit and make the trip with family or colleagues.

Dr. Claudette McLinn is Chair of the Coretta Scott King Book Awards Committee. She is the Executive Director of the Center for the Study of Multicultural Children’s Literature.

Exhibit, Illustrator Award, Past Events and Important People

Painter and Poet: The Art of Ashley Bryan

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Ashley Bryan
Let It Shine Book book cover and artwork (2008)

Painter and Poet: The Art of Ashley Bryan is an extraordinary exhibit* at the Portland Museum of Art (PMA) in Portland, Maine, honoring the work of 2012 Coretta Scott King-Virginia Hamilton Lifetime Achievement winner Ashley Bryan. The exhibit consists of original artwork from 14 of Bryan’s books, including two that won the Coretta Scott King Award for Illustration: Let It Shine (2008) and Beautiful Blackbird (2004), as well as several CSK Honor award-winning books, including Freedom Over Me: Eleven Slaves, Their Lives and Dreams Brought to Life (2017) and Ashley Bryan’s ABC of African American Poetry (1998).

Beautiful Blackbird book cover and artwork (2004)

For Bryan, a renowned artist, writer, and storyteller, rhythm is essential to life, and this idea carries into the art he creates for every book.

His use of vibrant colors along with rich language gives each book a sense of movement. His illustrations offer a visual lyricism.

A perfect complement to this exhibition is the addition of a film in Bryan’s own expressive voice describing his childhood and the influences that led him to a life of sharing African American spirituals, poetry, and stories.

Freedom Over Me book cover and artwork (2017)

To make the experience even better is the addition of colorful, moveable seating at the perfect height for children, set among wooden bins filled with his books at their fingertips.

One could spend quite a bit of time just sitting, slowly turning the pages of his books while listening to his familiar cadence and resonant voice.

Ashley Bryan creates beautiful books that beg to be read aloud and shared over and over and over again.

*This exhibition, organized by The Eric Carle Museum of Picture Book Art in Amherst, Massachusetts, is on view through November 25, 2018.

Photos of Ashley Bryan’s art were taken at the exhibit with permission from the museum.

Louise Capizzo is a Teen and Youth Services Librarian for a public library in Scarborough, ME. A member of the CSK Technology Committee, Louise is also a blogger for The Nonfiction Detectives.

CSK Award Winners, Exhibit, Illustrator Award, Illustrator Honor, Past Events and Important People

Telling a People’s Story: Art Exhibition and Conference

The Miami University Art Museum (MUAM) in Oxford, Ohio, currently boasts a treasure trove of original artwork from African American children’s book illustrators. This picture book gold can be found in Telling a People’s Story: African American Children’s Illustrated Literature, an exhibition of approximately 130 works by 33 artists from 88 books, which runs at MUAM through June 30.

Courtesy of the Miami University Art Museum

Among the artwork on display are pieces from Coretta Scott King Illustrator Awardees past and present, from Tom Feelings and John Steptoe to Ekua Holmes and Kadir Nelson. And, in a nice touch that one doesn’t often see at art galleries, visitors can find and read the books the art came from below each piece while browsing the exhibit.

A conference will take place in conjunction with the art exhibition from April 20-21 at MUAM. Among the CSK alums presenting at the conference are R. Gregory Christie, Ekua Holmes, E.B. Lewis, Jerry Pinkney, Javaka Steptoe, and Shadra Strickland.

Jason Shaiman, Curator of Exhibitions at MUAM, said of this conference: “I’m so excited to be able to bring several major illustrators together in one place, and to hear their perspectives…. [In a picture book], we hear the words of the author through their words, and we see the voice of the illustrator through their illustrations, but [the conference] is an opportunity to actually hear the words of the illustrators.”

Courtesy of the Miami University Art Museum

For more information on the exhibit and conference, please visit http://blogs.miamioh.edu/tellingapeoplesstory/. In addition, local radio profiled the exhibit here and here.

Sam Bloom is Senior Children’s Librarian at the Blue Ash branch of the Public Library of Cincinnati and Hamilton County. He is the Chair of the CSK Book Awards Jury.

CSK Award Winners, CSK Legends, Exhibit, Illustrator Award, Past Events and Important People, Virginia Hamilton Award

Ashley Bryan’s Stories Are Alive in Atlanta!

Anything you can do that can stimulate the imagination of another…is the most exciting thing you can do as an artist.  ~Ashley Bryan

With 50 books to his credit, Coretta Scott King-Virginia Hamilton Lifetime Achievement Award winner Ashley Bryan creates beautiful mindscapes for children.  Full of love of life and humanity, his body of work shares the stories of people of the African Diaspora as preserved in songs, poems, and folktales.  

In tribute to his longevity, Atlanta’s Alliance Theatre has staged two plays based on the works of the beloved artist, teacher, and scholar.  Dancing Granny and Beautiful Blackbird, winner of the 2004 Coretta Scott King Illustrator Award, are the books selected for production by the Alliance’s Theatre for the Very Young. The plays complement the exhibit Painter and Poet: The Wonderful World of Ashley Bryan on view at the city’s High Museum of Art until January 21, 2018.  


The opening voice of  The Dancing Granny is a character patterned after Ashley Bryan himself.  He is the tale weaver and griot whose narration and fancy footwork bookend this tale inspired by Mr. Bryan’s memories of his grandmother.   

Elaborate lighting and vibrant costumes along with Afro-Caribbean choreography and a range of percussion instruments– some made by the children in the audience as a pre-show activity– all come together to set the joyful tone of this show which encourages children’s expressive engagement. 

From the Alliance Theatre website Breanna Ross, Benjamin Sims, Chani Maisonet, Akumba Bynum-Roberson, and Ameenah Kaplan in the Alliance Theatre’s 2017/18 production of The Dancing Granny.  Photo by Greg Mooney.

Beautiful Blackbird is more understated than The Dancing Granny.  Arranged like an interactive playground for babies and toddlers, children sit on felt sun patches that encircle a chuppah-style canopy.   Bold quilts depicting night and day serve as backdrops for live electric guitarists who strum jazzy lines while the young ones roam and play.  

The audience hears Blackbird before they see him.  When he emerges, with rhinestones glimmering like dewdrops from his dark wings, he glides about the set, coaxing rhythm from his djembe.  The little ones play along on miniature African drums as Blackbird shares his musical gifts with the multi-colored members of his flock.  The message: know your beauty, find your unique groove.

Eugene Russell IV, who played the griot-tale weaver Ashley Bryan in The Dancing Granny and composed the music for Beautiful Blackbird, says: “The story is an unapologetic celebration of blackness which at the same time encourages all kids to be who they are, that who they are is beautiful, and enough. I think that’s a beautiful combination.” He goes on to say that stepping into the world of Ashley Bryan “really did change me life in a wonderful and beautiful way. I’m a forever fan. It will always be a part of my family’s life.”

To learn more:

Ashley Bryan Teacher Resource

Ashley Bryan Speaking About the Coretta Scott King Award

Post by Jené Watson

Jené Watson works as a public librarian at a system in suburban Atlanta, where she coordinates Books in the Barbershop community outreach and Mindful Monday, a family meditation program.  She is also the author of The Spirit That Dreams: Conversations with Women Artists of Color (indigopen.com).