An Eye For Truth

Our view of the world, at a personal, local, state, national, and global level, is determined by more than one thing.  We are shaped by the people who are our family, our closest friends, our colleagues and even those who wish us harm.  We respond to small and large events and those things which register in our minds subconsciously. As whole people, we are comprised of many parts and their particular influences.

When we look back at our lives, we can see this is true.  When we are presented with the facts of prominent people's lives, we understand why they took the direction they did.  The People's Painter: How Ben Shahn Fought For Justice With Art (Abrams Books for Young Readers, April 20, 2021) written by Cynthia Levinson with pictures by Evan Turk is a luminous exploration in words and art of a man who urged others through his creativity to look around and to make what they saw wrong, right.

"The first thing I can remember," Ben said, "I drew."

As a young boy Ben lived in a village in Lithuania.  He drew what he saw; his parents and grandfather making their own kind of art.  Paper was a rarity, so Ben would draw in the margins of Bible story books.  Ben was known for speaking his mind in the classroom.

When he was very young, his father was taken from their home to Siberia.  His father managed to escape to America, asking his family to come there, too.  Ben was only eight.  He, his mother and younger siblings made the journey leaving his grandfather behind.  Already in his young life, change was tarnished with sadness.

Five people in a two-room apartment in a crowded building in a crowded city was difficult, as was the new language, and bullies at school.  Guess what made the bullies stop their taunting?  Several teachers noticed Ben's artistic skills and offered encouragement.  At fourteen his dreams of finishing school and becoming an artist were dashed.  His father lost his job, forcing Ben to quit school and go to work.  Fourteen.

As years passed Ben perfected one form of art during the day and studied at art school at night. The problem was he wanted to paint people and tell their stories.  He left America, traveling to Europe and Africa, finding what would become his signature style.  His first outstanding work was twenty-three pictures telling the story of Nicola Sacco and Bartolomeo Vanzetti.

His depictions of people and injustice were so effective, he was hired in 1935 and again in 1937 by the United States government.  But it was not always smooth for Ben.  There were others who thought his artwork was anti-American.  Ben persevered, bringing inequality into the light.  He was and is remembered as a champion for those whose voices needed to be heard.  (The final three sentences and accompanying double-page image are a breathtaking portrait of a life lived to its fullest, a life lived in the service of others and those yet to be born.)

Even without the extensive back matter, readers are well-aware of the meticulous research employed by author Cynthia Levinson in the writing of this book.  Carefully selected and specific information with the insertion of quotations form, piece by piece, a powerful explanation of this man.  
Cynthia Levinson also chooses the right words to not only inform, but to give readers a very real sense of place, time, and emotional impact.  It is as if we are walking next to Ben Shahn.  Here is a passage.

Ben didn't know yet how to draw his outrage.  But, feeling his father's boldness

inside himself, he marched up to the sentry at the end of the street and shouted,

"Down with the Czar!"

The soldier chased after him, but Ben escaped.

(Ben was four.  This was after his father was taken to Siberia.)

There is strength in the double-page artwork shown on the open dust jacket.  The white doves, a sign of peace amid the pastel background on both sides of the spine, are significant.  On the right, front, Ben and the text are varnished drawing our eyes to him.  To the left, on the back, there is a childlike depiction of Ben's family, his grandfather, parents, and younger siblings done in black.  The doves fan out around them.

For the book case, artist Evan Turk has used the space as a single piece of paper.  Its texture is like whitewash on brown paper.  On the left side, one of Ben's hands holds the paper in place.  On the right side, his other hand, grasping a large pencil, is completing a self-portrait.  Across the top of the left side and continuing to the right of the spine is the outline of a dove in flight.  (This is also a near replica of the first image in the book.)

The opening and closing endpapers are covered in the same color seen on Ben's shirt on the dust jacket.  The initial title page uses the same font as shown on the dust jacket, stating the first three-word title.  On the formal title page, between the text, Ben's hands are releasing the dove so it can fly.  This is done in black outline drawings.

The illustrations for this book were made with gouache, acrylic, pencil, chalk, and linoleum block prints.

All of the pictures, double-page pictures with four full-page images, are full of emotion.  They are bold in color, composition, and their lines.  You can feel the passion which fueled this man and his work.  You know of child Ben's pride in his parent's and grandfather's workmanship.  In this visual, Ben is off to the side with a book.  With a page turn, Ben and the book are enlarged so we can see him drawing in the margins.  The heartbreak at leaving his grandfather is a single page showing the grandfather's hand clasping little Ben's hand.  They don't want to break this connection.  But this is followed by a wordless double-page, three panel depiction of the family's arrival in New York, going through Ellis Island with other immigrants, and embracing a waiting father.

One of my many, many favorite pictures is a double-page image.  It seems to be designed like an open book with the left page smaller in the lower, left hand corner and enlarging as it spreads to and across the gutter filling the entire right side.  Above where the left page begins is black space for the white text.  In that lower, left-hand corner is Ben painting a series of portraits, first in black outlines.  As faces, eyes, hands, and certain circumstances are collaged together, we see a breadth of people forgotten and needing someone to speak for them. Ben does this through his art.  The rich colors accent each individual element. 

One word comes to mind after every reading of this book, gratitude.  There is gratitude for people like Ben Shahn. There is gratitude for people like author Cynthia Levinson and illustrator Evan Turk for making an exquisite book titled The People's Painter: How Ben Shahn Fought For Justice With Art.  At the close of the book are an author's note, an illustrator's note, a timeline with dual columns (Snapshots of Ben Shahn's Life and The Bigger Picture), a selected bibliography including books, personal interviews, site visits, and websites and source notes.  I highly recommend you read this title and place a copy in your personal and professional collections.

To learn more about Cynthia Levinson and Evan Turk and their other work, please follow the link attached to their names to access their respective websites.  Cynthia Levinson has accounts on Facebook, Instagram, Twitter, and YouTube.  Evan Turk has accounts on Facebook, Instagram, and Twitter.  At Evan's website there are interior images in addition to those available at the publisher's website.  Cynthia Levinson and Evan Turk are interviewed at The Horn Book, Publishers Weekly, and School Library Journal, A Fuse #8 Production about this title.  Scholastic's Ambassador of School Libraries, John Schumacher, interviews Cynthia Levinson for the cover reveal on his site, Watch. Connect. Read.

Defending Your Passion

Some people demonstrate a talent early in their lives for what will become their life's work, though it's rarely a straight path.  For too many the trail is fraught with major obstructions, obstructions sometimes decades in the making.  Whether it's of their own choosing or not, a detour is offered and taken.

In fact, this detour seems to be in direct opposition to the earlier displayed ability.  Between the Lines: How Ernie Barnes Went from the Football Field to the Art Gallery (A Paula Wiseman Book, Simon & Schuster Books For Young Readers, January 28, 2018) written by Sandra Neil Wallace with illustrations by Bryan Collier (Hey Black Child Little, Brown And Company, November 14, 2017) describes the remarkable story of a childhood longing realized through perseverance.  If you hold onto a dream with both hands, you'll have a better chance of making it come true.  This is what Ernie Barnes did.

ERNEST LOVED THE NORTH CAROLINA RAIN.
He waited for the backyard to turn into mud.
Painting mud.  Then Ernest found a stick and painted in the slippery soil.

Believe me, this grabbed ahold of his neighbors' curiosity.  It also garnered the attention of his mother.  She worked as a housekeeper for Mr. Fuller, an attorney in Durham's white section.  When Ernest saw the artwork on the walls of Mr. Fuller's library he knew painting was what he wanted to do.

By the time he was thirteen Ernest was carrying a sketchbook and drawing what he saw in the neighborhood.  Even though the coach at Hillside High wanted him to play football, Ernest wanted to use his hands for making art.  This coach got his way and Ernest became a star player earning him scholarships to more than twenty colleges.  At North Carolina College near Hillside High Ernest studied football and art.

When he wondered what to paint his teacher helped him to focus.

"Art is all around you," Mr. Wilson told Ernest.  "Use what you see.  You catch my drift?"

Ernest was drafted to play professional football in 1959.  After watching the Baltimore Colts play, Ernest went home and painted.  He named it The Bench. Ernest was named Ernie by a news reporter after seeing The Bench which he carried everywhere.  Ernie moved from the Colts to the New American Football League that first year but was cut due to an injury.

Ernie kept his desire to paint alive by working as a door to door salesman and chatting with his customers.  When his hand healed he started to play again but this time he took a sketch pad (small) and pencil with him.  The coach did not appreciate this and fined him.  Did Ernie stop sketching? No, he did not.

By 1964 Ernie knew football needed to be replaced with painting full time.  Ernie's plan for success was a marvel.  He never forgot where he started as evidenced by how he framed his work.  His accomplishments are a beacon and an inspiration for us all but certainly for the children who view his work and read this book.


Sharing pertinent details with readers found through her painstaking research, Sandra Neil Wallace takes us into the world of Ernie Barnes's childhood, teen years, college and adulthood.  With each page turn, by selecting and placing direct quotations within her narrative, Sandra Neil Wallace increases our understanding of this man.  Her carefully chosen words breathe life into every depicted situation.  It's as if we are there with Ernie Barnes.  Here is a passage.

Back home the sideline images still swirled in Ernest's mind.  Jersey numbers, bruising cobalt blue.  Referee calls, roaring crimson red.  Sharp shoulders draped in goalpost white.  Everything was so clear that Ernest didn't draw it in his sketchbook.  He stretched out a canvas, reached for a palette knife, and painted.  Quickly. Before the image had disappeared from his mind, he'd created his first football painting.  He called it The Bench.  Ernest decided that he'd never part with it.


Those piercing, sincere eyes of Ernie Barnes looking right at readers surely get your attention.  Upon closer inspection of the matching, opened dust jacket and book case, you can see portions of his life and his framed art above his left and right shoulders.  To the left, on the back, framed in wooden fencing on the top and bottom is a close-up of Ernie's hands holding paint brushes in front of stretched canvases.  In the right-hand, lower corner is a yellow football helmet resting on its top.

The opening and closing endpapers are a lively, spring green.  With the first turn of the pages we come to the initial title page.  Now those paint brushes are being held together inside the helmet.  The fencing is used as a background here and on the formal title and verso pages for the text.

Eighteen moving, stunning illustrations spanning two pages each, rendered in watercolor and collage by Bryan Collier, envelope you in the life of Ernie Barnes.  It's like walking through a gallery, hushed voices speaking in admiration at what is revealed.  Bryan Collier's color choices and his perspectives represent and elevate each scene described by Sandra Neil Wallace.  With his placement of the elements in his illustrations we are drawn to a focal point.

Mr. Collier's use of light and shadow is excellent, especially in the facial features of the people.  Each picture is emotionally charged.  We feel longing, desire, acceptance, determination, understanding and victory.  We are uplifted.

One of my many favorite illustrations is when Ernest returns home after viewing the Colts game prior to the beginning of training.  It is a brilliant blend of the stadium filled with people, players moving and bending with each play like ballet dancers, and a referee standing guard.  Within this collage Bryan Collier has put Ernest on the right, his hands outstretched holding a canvas and palette.  His right elbow crosses the gutter.  It's a mix of artistic calm and measured tumult.


You will be unable to read Between the Lines:  How Ernie Barnes Went from the Football Field to the Art Gallery written by Sandra Neil Wallace with illustrations by Bryan Collier only once.  It invites you to revisit each page absorbing the truth of the words and the beauty of the illustrations.  I highly recommend this outstanding picture book biography for your professional and personal collections.  At the close of the book are an author's note, an illustrator's note, an extensive bibliography, quote sources and additional resources.

To learn more about Sandra Neil Wallace and Bryan Collier and their other work, please visit their websites by following the links attached to their names.  At the publisher's website you can view six interior illustrations. Please enjoy this video with Bryan Collier speaking about the process for this book.



Don't miss visiting Kid Lit Frenzy hosted by educator Alyson Beecher, this past week.  There you can view the other titles selected by those participating in the 2018 Nonfiction Picture Book Challenge.

Painting Perceptions

When reading good nonfiction, besides providing you with intriguing information, it challenges you.  You are asked to think about how you view your world.  Perhaps you need to look at things through the eyes of the author, illustrator or, if it's a biography, the way the person made choices or followed a dream.  With each book I find myself taking extra hours and days to discover more about the topic.

Having had an interest in art and artists for most of my life, I was thrilled to be able to take an art appreciation class during college.  It enlarged my knowledge of art history and gave me the ability to recognize a specific artist's work.  For me, those like myself, those who have no understanding of a particular artist and people needing to understand the joy of pursuing your passion, Edward Hopper Paints His World (Christy Ottaviano Books, Henry Holt and Company, August 19, 2014) written by Robert Burleigh with paintings by Wendell Minor is an unexpected gift.

Little Edward Hopper had many dreams.  But one dream was biggest of all---he was going to be a painter when he grew up.

Even at an early age Edward was committed; drawing day after day and placing his signature on his work as an artist would do. With his high school education completed he set his sights on New York City.  Taking classes there made him feel as though he was on the right track.  To enhance his skills as a painter, he left the city he loved to spend time in Paris studying and painting outside.

After Paris he came back to New York City working as an illustrator for periodical publications.  He lived economically, working by day to make money, painting what he desired by night and in his spare time.  Despite receiving no recognition for his work, he continued.

Houses and lighthouses, the way the light fell on each portion, fascinated him.  When he was forty-two, a woman he had met previously in art school, Jo Nivison, became his wife.  In her, Edward had a champion.  The two would travel the countryside finding bits and pieces of Americana for Edward to paint.

Though they eventually built a small cottage on Cape Cod, Massachusetts, Edward was always drawn back to the city for inspiration.  He had a unique way of depicting what he saw focusing on items others would not choose or miss entirely.  Sometimes he would combine details from various scenes creating from his marvelous mind a place of fiction.

Over time Edward Hopper's work was noticed for the genius it was and still is today.  He and Jo maintained their life style moving between the city and shore with the seasons.  He was a man who lived the

biggest of all

his dreams,

to be a painter. 


One word comes to mind upon repeated readings of this book, inspiration.  Robert Burleigh has combined his painstaking research with his remarkable skills as a writer to give readers a picture of Edward Hopper's life from boyhood to old age; one spent living that which he imagined, never faltering.  Burleigh includes personal information which binds readers to this man; writing "WOULD BE ARTIST" on his pencil box, his nickname of "Grasshopper", statements made by Hopper about his work and the relationship he had with his wife, Jo.  We can't help but feel we know this man after reading this book.  Here is a portion of a passage from a single page.

There, a couple reading in their living room.  There, a man working late in a dim office.  There, a lonely stroller on a dark street.  Often, the people were serious. They seemed slightly sad.  What had happened to them?  What was about to happen?  These small mysteries became the subjects for many of Edward Hopper's paintings.  


Accompanying the narrative work of Robert Burleigh is the paintings of Wendell Minor.  When I (every reader really) hold this book in my hands, it's like holding a museum.  Each visual, each portrayal is splendid.  Minor begins with his interpretation of one of Hopper's most famous paintings, Nighthawks, on the matching front dust jacket and book case.  On the back we see a close up of a piece from the interior of the book, young Edward painting a sailboat while sitting on a dock. The opening and closing endpapers are a gorgeous picture of Edward rowing across the water with a sailboat towing a smaller boat in the background.  It is done in shades of blue looking like a drawing.

Wendell Minor using a full color palette presents double page and single page spreads historically accurate as to time and place with lighting and shading which will take your breath away.  Opposite most of the single pages on the right, he has placed a smaller illustration done in a single color to again look like an artist's sketch.  On two of the double page illustrations he has used this same approach.  This mixture of illustrative techniques compliments the pacing of the text perfectly.

One of my favorite illustrations is his depiction of Edward Hopper's Gas.  In my mind Minor is showing how Edward and Jo might have been driving one evening, coming upon the station as the sun is setting.  Minor's use of color, his brush strokes and choice of details take you right into the moment.


Edward Hopper Paints His World written by Robert Burleigh with paintings by Wendell Minor is a triumphant tribute, a passionate portrayal, of not only a significant American artist but a memorable man.  In the Afterward Burleigh asks readers to think about whether an artist could be a hero or an explorer.  He highlights three important quotations of Hopper explaining their meanings.  Four Hopper Paintings are highlighted further.  On the third page at the back we find important dates, author and artist references and web sources.  Wendell Minor's Artist's Note On Images In This Book is well worth a read.  This book has my highest recommendation.

Please follow the links embedded in the author's name, illustrator's name and the book title to access their personal websites.  You will get a peek at interior illustrations from the book.  Don't miss them.


Each week I consider myself fortunate to be participating in Alyson Beecher's 2014 Nonfiction Picture Book Challenge at her website, Kid Lit Frenzy.  Please stop by to see the other posts.  There are fantastic nonfiction titles listed there by other bloggers.