When considering the Caldecott Medal and its honor toward illustrators (which may or may not be the author as well), I can't help but think about the different types of modes of illustration. In class alone, we have seen cut paper, mixed media, scratch board, and regular pens and pencils. With an award that focuses on the artwork of the book, I do think like it is hard to judge between so many different types of artwork.
Obviously, the illustrations must fit the story. Even if the story is a simple tale, the illustrations can make the story pop. I also feel that innovation is a very important consideration when deciding the winner. In a world where there are so many more forms of art that are being represented in children's picture books, it is getting harder to move through nominees that are so vastly different from one another.
So should the Caldecott only honor the illustrator? In the cases where the illustrator and author are not the same person, I do think it is necessary to recognize that the author's words did help inspire the illustrator; however, the illustrator does take those words and make the story come alive through their art. Additionally, when the award itself is named after a famous illustrator, it's hard to award the book for something else other than the artwork. Of course, you could get into the whole debate about describing 'illustration' if you want -- whether the art is hand-drawn or painted rather than cut from paper or glued together. But if you think about illustration in the sense that is a visual aid, many forms of art can be included.
Having an author's words illustrated by an award-winning artist brings attention to the author's work even if the award does not honor the author. It is honor by association, even if the author and the illustrator were assigned to each other by the publisher. There are a few things that come to mind when I think of this situation: one, it will be great for the author's sales, obviously but two, everyone might be so preoccupied to look at the art that they forget to focus on the story. But then I thought about it some more, and I think that any award winning illustrations would bring more depth to the story and the author's words that maybe even the author did not realize.
3 comments:
Hey Kati!
I had never thought about illustrations possibly adding more depth to an author's words than the author visualized, which I think is an interesting idea. I've always felt that an author's "vision" of her work trumps everyone else's, but that isn't the case when you relinquish part of the portrayal job to someone else. (In the case of picture books, for instance, but also when books are turned into movies.) Besides, every individual reader ends up with her own "vision" of the work, regardless of what the author thinks.
When you say that innovation is an important consideration, does that mean that winners should show art in a way we've never seen before? Personally, I'm not sure innovation has a whole lot to do with how well the pictures tell the story. But the medal is also judging the quality of the art, so I guess innovation would still be a big consideration.
Your mentioning of the illustrations adding more depth to the book is striking to me. I had never considered that the author and illustrator might be different people. Furthermore, at that point the award possibly should be considered more of an artistic award than an award for books: How well can the artist say something through his/her pictures?
- Mandy
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