Revisiting starred review (paraphrased) from The Horn Book Magazine for Maya Lin: Artist-Architect of Light and Lines (published in July/August 2017 issue) and visiting the wonderful Library of Congress.
Written by Jeanne Walker Harvey, illustrated by Dow Phumiruk
In its early pages, this quiet and contemplative picture-book biography sets up artist-architect Maya Lin’s fascination with spaces, natural and human-made, and their dynamic relationship with phenomena such as light.
The daughter of two Chinese-immigrant artists, a potter and a poet who “never told Maya what to be or how to think,” Maya honed both her creativity and her intellect as a child. She went on to study architecture, a fusion of “art, science, and math,” in college.
During her senior year at Yale, Maya entered a national contest to design the Vietnam Veterans Memorial, inspired by its guideline that the design must blend with the park setting.
That a twenty-one-year-old novice beat out 1,420 other candidates, many of them famous architects, is intrinsically captivating fodder for a picture book, and Lin’s conviction about her own design in the face of public backlash is a built-in lesson in perseverance. Appropriately, the book’s muted art has the fine lines, precision, and spatial astuteness of architectural drawings, and Phumiruk’s use of perspective is often striking. A wide double-page spread of the finished memorial, for instance, impressively captures its length as the wall of fallen soldiers’ names stretches diagonally toward the horizon.
Harvey’s text makes thoughtful, relatable connections between Lin’s work and the themes of her life; an author’s note adds supplementary details on the memorial’s design and touches on Lin’s later work
A TRUE TALE WITH
A CHERRY ON TOP
Calkins Creek
(Astra Books for Young Readers)
(pub. 2.25.2025)
40 pages
Ages 7 - 10
Author: Lisa Rogers
Illustrator: Stacy Innerst
Character: Joan Mitchell
Overview:
" It’s 1983, and American artist Joan Mitchell is in her studio outside Paris, transforming her emotions and memories into a symphony of colors and shapes. Inspired by her friend’s description of an idyllic hidden valley in France, Mitchell creates 21 massive paintings—her Grande Vallée series —bursting with vibrant, energizing hues.
But she doesn’t paint the valley’s flowers and meadows. She paints a feeling about them—abundance, freedom, liveliness—creating a harmonious blend of drips, splashes, and brushstrokes in rainbow colors. When the paint dries, it's time to share her valley with the world."
Tantalizing taste:
"Joan envisions the valley as it springs to life
in its fresh greens, vibrant pinks, bright blues.
In its textures -
unfurling fern, rambling vines,
prickly leaves, soft grasses.
In its slow decay
as radiant summer
turns to muted fall.
She senses it, smells it, hears, feels it...
In Joan's La Grande Vallée
you cannot glimpse butterflies,
hear frog's splish and squeak,
or sense warm sunbeams on your skin.
But as you explore
her great, grand valley,
you might imagine you can."
And something more: Lisa Rogers, shared in the Author's Note in Joan Mitchell Paints a Symphony: "I was drawn to Joan's Grande Vallée paintings by their vivid colors and limitless energy, and when I learned of her inspiration, I wanted to know more. These massive abstract paintings somehow feel personal. Each stroke was created with intent, yet the paintings allow space for viewers to imagine and explore on their own."
- Apr 28
The Brilliant, Resilient Life of Artist Ruth Asawa
A TRUE TALE WITH
A CHERRY ON TOP
Roaring Brook Press
(pub. 2.25.2025)
40 pages
Ages 5 - 8
Author: Caroline McAlister
Illustrator: Jamie Green
Character: Ruth Asawa
Overview:
" Growing up on a dusty farm in Southern California, Ruth Aiko Asawa lived between two worlds. She was Aiko to some and Ruth to others, an invisible line she balanced on every day.
But when Japan bombed Pearl Harbor, suddenly she was only Aiko, no matter how much her family tried to cut the lines that connected them to Japan. Like many other Japanese Americans, Ruth and her family were sent to incarceration camps.
At the Santa Anita racetrack, Ruth ran her fingers over the lines of horsehair in the stable stalls the family had moved into. At the Rohwer Relocation Center in Arkansas, she drew what she saw―bayous, guard towers, and the barbed wire that separated her from her old life.
That same barbed wire would inspire Ruth’s art for decades, as she grew into one of the most influential artists of the twentieth century. Throughout her career, she created enchanting twisting sculptures and curving shapes that connected, divided, and intersected."
Tantalizing taste:
"RUTH AIKO ASAWA
drew her first lines in the dry California dirt.
She watched her lines narrow and widen.
They curved gently like the rounded hills to the east,
like the ocean waves to the west,
and like the fat melons and cabbages
her family grew on their farm...
Ruth's life curved and twisted, looped and doubled back. Lines divided
and met.
Look at how her sculptures curve and curl, with lines that overlap and
intersect, connect and divide. They move in the breeze and cast shadows that
change with the light. Her art is for everyone and for all of time - graceful,
breathtaking, mysterious.
Look and then look again. Do you see
something new? Where do the lines lead?
What do they mean to you?"
And something more: Caroline McAlister in the Author's Note in A Line Can Go Anywhere shares: "As well as being an artist, Ruth was an activist for arts education... She began a program to bring working artists into public schools... Ruth famously said, 'Sculpture is like farming. If you just keep at it, you can get quite a lot done.'"
