Author Elizabeth Brown and illustrator Aimee Sicuro’s picture book Dancing Through Fields of Color:The Story of Helen Frankenthaler is a biography about the artist’s breakthrough into the art world.
They said only men could paint powerful pictures, but Helen Frankenthaler (1928-2011) splashed her way through the modern art world. Channeling deep emotion, she poured paint onto her canvas and danced with the colors to make art unlike anything anyone had ever seen. She used unique tools like mops and squeegees to push the paint around, to dazzling effects. Frankenthaler became an originator of the influential “Color Field” style of abstract expressionist painting with her “soak stain” technique, and her artwork continues to electrify new generations of artists today.
Dancing Through Fields of Color discusses Frankenthaler’s early life, how she used colors to express emotion, and how she overcame the male-dominated art world of the 1950s.
“A pitch-perfect expression of a little-known artist in text and illustration alike, this is a top-notch example of the picture book biography.” —School Library Journal
Praise
"The textual descriptions of Frankenthaler's process are gorgeous . . . [and] Sicuro's watercolor, ink, and charcoal pencil illustrations are spirited."Kirkus Reviews
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"Sicuro’s bold illustrations are a wonderful match for a biography on an abstract artist; the saturated colors, thick lines, and rounded shapes work well with Brown’s descriptive text to immerse readers in Frankenthaler’s world . . . A pitch-perfect expression of a little-known artist in text and illustration alike, this is a top-notch example of the picture book biography."School Library Journal
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"Brown uses lyrical text full of action words and ranges of color to describe this lesser-known yet influential abstract expressionist artist from the twentieth century . . . [Sicuro's] loosely drawn illustrations with thick strokes of watercolor, ink, and charcoal pencil evoke both Helen’s moods and her abstract style."Booklist
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"Brown’s debut picture-book biography limns [Frankenthaler's] creative and imaginative childhood, dutiful art study in college, and early career in mid-twentieth-century NYC . . . Sicuro’s compositions—in watercolor, ink, and charcoal pencil . . . consistently reinforce the ideas of movement and color saturation."Horn Book Magazine
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"With sweeping strokes, Sicuro conveys the young artist’s joy in the act of creation."Publishers Weekly
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