New York Library’s Donnell Branch Closing

| kirsti

Winnie-the-Pooh & Piglet at the New York Pubic Library’s Donnell Library Center Central Children’s Room.

I just read on 7-Imp, where there’s a much more in depth and eloquent summary than I can attempt here, that the New York Public Libaries Donnell Branch will be closing in May. This branch houses the Central Children’s Room, home to, among other things, the original Winnie-the-Pooh toys (sans Roo who, being small, must have been lost along the way), Mary Poppin’s umbrella and, during the time of my visit, original N.C Wyeth Robin Hood illustrations. With the closure of the branch the future of the Children’s Room seems uncertain and many are worried it will disappear all together.

The photographs here are from our visit to New York in January of 2006. We were told about the Children’s Room by a New York aquaintence who we had hit up for tips on New York must-sees – especially those that involved art, books or food. We didn’t have a lot of time to spend at the library – it was more of a quick pilgrimage to see the toys so it was an extra bonus to see the Wyeth illustrations. I would have loved to had more time to explore more of the library and to have gone through the collection of reference books. I can only imagine how wonderful it would have been to have access to a library like this when I was little, not only for the books but for the chance to see original, classic illustrations. Here’s to hoping that the Children’s Room reopens in a brand spanking new location (with better lighting) and that for many years to come, kids will have access to literature in this way.

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I love Winnie-the-Pooh – the proper A.A Milne original book versions with the lovely E. H. Shepard illustrations – not what’s become of it now, so it was kind of sad to see this – not a Milne in sight – completely obliterated (at least on Flickr) by the ‘D’ word:

Making Child Literacy a Priority in B.C

| kirsti

(cross-posted from the CWILL BC blog)

B.C.’s new lieutenant-governor, who credits a single book with changing his life, has designated literacy as one of the major themes of his term at Government House.

Steven Point plans to concentrate on early childhood literacy and to do what he can to ensure that more reading material for preschoolers makes its way into B.C.’s most remote communities.

-Jeff Rud, Times Colonist
Published: Sunday, January 13, 2008 (full article)


In Praise of Comprehensive Collections of Dead Things

| kirsti

prehistoric pig skull | acrylic & pencil on paper

I updated the page for the classroom reader, Joe’s Big Surprise. I’ve added a few of the spot illustrations that are scattered throughout the book. I really enjoyed painting these; animalish kinds of things are really up my alley.

Some of the spot illustrations in the book, like the butterfly, as well as some of the objects in the illustrations of Joe’s lab and college dorm room came from my own collection of fossils, rocks, bones and organic matter that I’ve gathered over the years. I was also able to shoot a good chunk of the photo reference myself when I came across a display of fossils from the Beaty Biodiversity Museum and the Pacific Museum of the Earth collection while attending a lecture on biodiversity by David Suzuki. The prehistoric pig skull, above, came from that display.

I had no idea there was a biodiversity museum at UBC before I fortuitously stumbled upon the display that evening. The website indicates that the museum is currently under construction but that it will be open to the public in 2009. When it comes to projects like this book, I become keenly aware how much Vancouver is lacking in the museum department. However, I have heard that somewhere in the dusty storage vaults of a quiet Vancouver institution a collection of ‘a million’ seashells resides. So there are bits and pieces out there, just not all in one place and not on display. There are also a few collections at UBC of vertebrates and plants etc; some are by appointment only and a few are open to the public.

I prefer to work from real objects as much as possible but since that isn’t always possible, I take lots of photos whenever I happen to come across great collections of stuff that I think might come in handy some day. I have hundreds thousands of photos from various museums I’ve visited over the years of all sorts of object ranging from ancient Egyptian artifacts to dinosaur bones. My photos from the Royal Tyrrell Museum a few years back came in handy with this particular book.

I would be amazing to live near a resource like the American Museum of Natural History in New York (where I took hundreds and hundreds of photos of the dioramas). I could see spending quite a bit of time there slowly drawing my way through the specimens.

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