You Are, Aren't You?

The poet and children's novelist Michael Rosen, the former Children's Laureate of the United Kingdom, is a force of nature. A good starting point for your youngster is We're Going On A Bear Hunt. My friends at the Eric Carle agreed with me about Mr. Rosen. The Carle had already featured Quentin Blake's art from Michael Rosen's Sad Book at their museum. I was very happy when Nick Clark and The Carle agreed to showcase art work from Mr. Rosen's only YA illustrated novel The Golem Of Old Prague for my show Monsters and Miracles. In 1997, a version of the book was published by Five Leaves Press with illustrations by Baruch Simons.

Ross Bradshaw, the genius behind Five Leaves has an incredible story and is a truly nice soul to boot. Check out his website at http://www.fiveleaves.co.uk/. Mr. Bradshaw has always been very supportive of my ideas (starting with my attempts to bring an Isaac Bashevis Singer exhibition to the United Kingdom). He immediately embraced my efforts to have republished Academy Award winner Frederic Raphael's masterpiece Lindmann. Ross also helped me in the process of tracking down Mr. Rosen and Mr. Simons. From the popular to the obscure, Ross follows his own heart to unearth or republish some great books including a few collections of Michael Rosen's early poetry.

I was honored that Mr. Rosen accepted our invitation to visit the Eric Carle Museum on November 6, 2010. Mr. Rosen participated in an amazing talk with former National Ambassador for Young People's Literature Katherine Paterson.

Prior to his visit to the States I asked Mr. Rosen about his interest in the legend of the Golem. He told me:

The history of Jews in Europe is a complex one and when I came across the Golem stories, I became fascinated by the ways in which they talked of how the Jewish minority (and perhaps any minority) survives. It seemed to me that even though the stories have the simplicity of folk stories, as a whole they conveyed some of the complexity. In particular, I loved the mix in tone that the stories convey: wit, cunning, fear, eeriness, wisdom, fallibility, mystery, magic and more. In my retelling, I created dialogue and inner thought to give the stories a little more body, a little more of realism than was in the tellings I drew on. I wanted readers to feel the power of the confrontations that occur throughout the story-cycle.

Thank you Mr. Rosen for supporting my exhibition. We look forward to your next tour of the USA.

Toons To Stroll Down Memory Lane With

The Pulitzer Prize-winning artist and writer Art Spiegelman never ceases to amaze me. His 2009 anthology The TOON Treasury of Classic Children's Comics is an extraordinary walk down memory lane. Spiegelman's Golden Age finds for the book are stunning. The introductions that he and his wife Françoise provide in the anthology are insightful. Jon Scieszka's preface gets the ball rolling. It was great to see that our first National Ambassador for Young People's Literature embraced this important project. And now with the recent release of Craig Yoe's Golden Collection of Klassic Krazy Kool Kids Komics I hope we can permanently fix the spotlight on some of these truly wacky, wonderful strips. The Spiegelman and Yoe anthologies are perfect companions. Hopefully Mo "Knuffle Bunny" Willems presence and blessing of the Yoe anthology will also draw new readers back to these classic comics.

Spiegelman and his wife really care about young readers and their new Toon Books project is a dazzler. Their website http://www.toonbooks.com/ provides a handy introduction to their series.

If you ever have a chance to see Art Spiegelman's work up close it is well worth the pilgrimage. His entire "Prince Rooster" story from the pages of LIttle Lit appears in my Monsters and Miracles exhibition at the Skirball Cultural Center in Los Angeles and the Eric Carle Museum of Picture Book Art in Amherst. The Spiegelman work on display is powerful and you can clearly see a master artist and storyteller at the height of his powers. Mr. Spiegelman was kind and generous enough to provide me with some additional insight into his work. You can read more about Art Spiegelman, Maurice Sendak and others in my essay for the Monsters and Miracles exhibition catalogue. It is a gorgeous book that the Eric Carle printed in Italy.

Poets And The Picture Book

The poet Rich Michelson several years ago was kind of enough to send me a stack of some of his finest books. His picture books for children in particular are mesmerizing. I love his work with the artist Leonard Baskin. Their A Book of Flies Real or Otherwise has become a household favorite. Baskin and Michelson really pushed each other creatively. They were quite a team.

I first met Rich at the National Jewish Book Awards in 2007. I served as a Judge for the NJBA. I later sought him out as a speaker. He presented his talk No and I Can't Dance Either: Writing Across Racial Lines. Rich is a captivating personality. His talk was well worth the price of admission. Check out his website at: http://www.rmichelson.com/rmichelson_galleries.html

Rich's A is for Abraham is one of those rare picture books about Judaism that escapes the usual trappings. Some of the amazing illustrations from Rich's books can be seen up close and personal at my exhibition Monsters and Miracles: A Journey Through Jewish Picture Books at the Skirball Cultural Center in Los Angeles through August 1, 2010. The show then transfers to the Eric Carle Museum of Picture Book Art.

Apart from Rich's poetry picture books, some recent worthwhile picture books worth pursuing include United States Poet Laureate Ted Kooser's Bag in the Wind, Pulitzer Prize-winning poet C.K. William's How the Nobble was Finally Found, Nobel prize-winning poet Joseph Brodsky's Discovery, and Caldecott Medalist Mordecai Gerstein's interpretation of French poet Jacques Prévert's How to Paint the Portrait of a Bird.

Faces Behind Barbed Wire

I would like to thank the following organizations and individuals for their support of our exhibition Faces Behind Barbed Wire: The Rivesaltes Internment Camp Memorial which ran from March 21, 2010 - May 6, 2010, at the Holocaust Museum and Learning Center in St. Louis: Dr. Denis Peschanski and the CNRS in Paris, Frederic Raphael, Marianne Petit and the Musée Mémorial du Camp de Rivesaltes, Fonds August Bohny, Crispin Brooks, Ita Gordon and Tina Minh of the USC Shoah Foundation Institute, Professor Alejandro Baer of the Universität Bayreuth/Universidad Complutenese de Madrid, Marie-Anne Toledano - Cultural Attaché at the French Consulate in Chicago, Dan Reich, Jean Cavender and the Holocaust Museum and Learning Center in St. Louis, La Compagnie des Phares et Balise, David Eidelman and the Alliance Française de St. Louis, Professor Jean-Louis Pautrot and Saint Louis University, Professor Pier Marton and Washington University in St. Louis, Moris Farhi, Daniel Asa Rose, Homewood Suites, Captions Incorporated, Documentary Educational Resources, Byrpn Kerman and Sauce Magazine, Jacqueline Veuve, France Today, Jorge Amat, and Congregation Kol Am. I am truly grateful to the Rivesaltes survivor community for their support and assistance.

In June 2010, my wife Rabbi Séverine Haziza-Sokol lead an educational mission comprised of members of Congregation Kol Am to Rivesaltes, France.

They were joined for this event by members of the Communaute Juive Liberale - Grenoble. A special thank you to Dr. Peschanski and Marianne Petit for their extraordinary work. The memorial will be one of Europe's largest Holocaust memorials. The museum also focuses on the suffering and internment of Spaniards and Algerians at Rivesaltes. The memorial is astonishing and consists of the only traces of the some 200 internment camps that operated in France prior to and during World War II. This important project has been the subject of profiles in The New York Times and Washington Post. Their work deserves our support. Please consult the following links for more information: http://www.cg66.fr/52-le-memorial-de-rivesaltes.htm ...

Cricket:The Realm of the Imagination

The April 2010 edition of the award-winning magazine Cricket serves as a companion to an exhibition I co-created and co-curated entitled Monsters and Miracles: A Journey Through Jewish Picture Books. The exhibition is appearing at the Skirball Cultural Center, Los Angeles, CA (April 8-August 1, 2010) and The Eric Carle Museum of Picture Book Art, Amherst, MA (October 15, 2010 – January 23, 2011). The April issue which I served as consulting editor on includes new and original stories by some of today’s finest artists and writers including Daniel and Jill Pinkwater, Lisa Brown and Ilan Stavans. There is also an exclusive interview with Eric Carle and a fascinating look at the work of Maurice Sendak by Patrick Rodgers, Traveling Exhibitions Coordinator for The Rosenbach Museum and Library. Copies of the magazine are available at the Skirball Cultural Center and The Eric Carle Museum of Picture Book Art. You can also check your local library or bookstore.