Thursday, November 19, 2009

Author/Illustrator 11: Jan Brett: Outstanding Animal Art

Beautiful pictures in beautiful surroundings. Jan Brett travels the world, ensuring that her locations, creations, animals and people are accurate in her books. She has written and illustrated a couple of dozen books along with illustrating another half dozen or so other books. Her books range from retold tales such as Beauty and the Beast and On Noah's Ark along with other imaginative books such as Fritz and the Beautiful Horses along with Hedgie's Surprise and Daisy Comes Home. She bought chicks to enable her to accurately draw chickens for Hedgie's Surprise and they now own five beautiful hens that love to pose for Jan. Ms.Brett has been drawing horses since she was little and Fritz was based upon a real pony who had fluffy fur and was named John.

Ms.Brett grew up in Massachusetts during the 50's and 60's. "From cave paintings to Norwegian sleighs, to Japanese gardens, I study the traditions of the many countries I visit and use them as a starting point for my children's books." Her book about Noah's ark has about 400 animals in it! She prefers illustrating over writing and her husband often does the keyboarding for her stories after she has written out the story. For more on Jan Brett, visit her website at: www.janbrett.com

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