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ENTRY TYPE:
WORK TITLE: What Will These Hands Make?
WORK NOTES:
PSEUDONYM(S):
BIRTHDATE:
WEBSITE: http://www.nikkimcclure.com/
CITY:
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COUNTRY: United States
NATIONALITY: American
LAST VOLUME: SATA 335
http://www.fecalface.com/SF/index.php?option=com_content&task=view&id=649
RESEARCHER NOTES:
PERSONAL
Born 1968, in Kirkland, WA; married Jay T. Scott (a fine woodworker); children: Finn.
EDUCATION:Evergreen State College, B.S., B.A., 1991.
ADDRESS
CAREER
Artist, illustrator, and writer of books for children. Freelance artist, beginning 1996; creator of poster art, and graphic designs for note cards, calendars, and T-shirts as well as album covers for recording labels K Records and Kill Rock Stars. Teacher of art classes. McClure & Scott Manufacturing (makers of lamps and furniture), cofounder, with husband Jay Scott. Exhibitions: Works have been exhibited at galleries and museums, including Land Gallery, Portland, OR; Needles and Pens, San Francisco, CA; and Mystic Seaport Museum, Mystic, CT.
AWARDS:Pacific Northwest Booksellers Association Award, 2010, for All in a Day by Cynthia Rylant; Scandiuzzi Children’s Book Award, Washington State Book Awards, 2012, for To Market, to Market; Environmentalist of the Year, Olympia Rotary Club, 2013.
WRITINGS
Also author/illustrator of Welcome, Things to Make and Do (journal), Remember, Embrace: A Pregnancy Journal, The First 1,000 Days, and Grow: Journals for Baby and Child.
SIDELIGHTS
Nikki McClure is a self-taught artist and author who produces stunningly detailed cut-paper illustrations. Using an X-Acto knife, she cuts each of her images from a single sheet of paper. Evoking the graphic quality of Japanese wood cuts and strongly influenced by her love of nature and mother-child relationships, McClure’s self-illustrated books for children include Awake to Nap Mama, Is It Summer Yet?, Apple, and Waiting for High Tide. Her unique cut-paper illustrations, which echo the graphic art of the 1930s and 1940s, are also a feature of Cynthia Rylant’s picture book All in a Day. “The word ‘lovely’ gets tossed around,” wrote Ilene Cooper in her Booklist review of this work, “but it seems to fit both the words and the art of this ode to the day.”
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McClure began her career by producing and publishing original books and calendars; her work was eventually picked up by regional and then national publishers. Discussing her technique with Orion interviewer Nicholas Triolo, McClure stated, “I use paper to reveal a story. I start with a piece of black paper that I cut away. Writing is adding and piling and making, marking up white space, and then paring away, trimming down to the essential. My visuals are probably most like poetry. I seek the elemental shape or line that makes an apple leaf different from a pear leaf.”
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In her self-illustrated Mama, Is It Summer Yet? she takes readers on a slow trip toward the warmer months, a time of longer days, ripening vegetables, and the buzz of languid bees. “McClure’s cut-paper scenes do more than just support the story; they form its heart,” wrote a Publishers Weekly critic, while a Kirkus Reviews writer observed that the story’s “gentle call and response between child and parent will lull young listeners and remind them of their own connections to caregivers.” Calling the artwork in Mama, Is It Summer Yet? “captivating,” Cooper concluded in Booklist that, “just when you wonder if summer will ever come, read this and make your heart happy.”
Humans living in harmony with nature’s cycles are the focus of To Market, to Market and Apple. In the first, a family’s shopping list is the starting point for learning how farmers bring their produce to market. “McClure’s art and life intersect in this stirring tribute to the connections among nature, people, and the food that nourishes them,” Lisa Egly Lehmuller remarked in School Library Journal, while Booklist reviewer Thom Barthelmess commented that her “precise cut-paper technique evokes the skill that goes into artistic and horticultural crafts.”
In Apple, a reproduction of McClure’s first hand-bound book, a fruit is plucked from a tree and is placed in a girl’s backpack, only to fall on the ground and end up as compost. “This deconstructed lesson in plant regeneration, composting and life cycles will reach apple-eating readers of many ages,” noted a Kirkus Reviews critic, and a Publishers Weekly writer praised the “rare gift” of McClure’s artistry by concluding that her apple “joins the natural world to the human world, and adds beauty to its surroundings wherever it’s found.”
Like Apple, McClure’s How to Be a Cat joins a single word of text with a detailed paper-cut illustration. This volume follows a kitten as its mother instructs it in the feline arts, including “STRETCH,” “STALK,” and “DREAM.” “While flat and certainly binary, these complex illustrations miraculously evoke the frisky, fluid physicality of feline movement,” observed a Kirkus Reviews writer. “McClure’s cut-paper spreads can be mesmerizing,” a Publishers Weekly reviewer asserted, and How to Be a Cat represents the artist “at her best.” The result, Joan Kindig remarked in School Library Journal, is “a delightful picture book in every way.”
The artist pays tribute to the youthful imagination in several of her books. In finds a boy playing at home, climbing inside a basket and transforming it into a spaceship until the lure of raindrops against a window coaxes him “Out.” “McClure’s cut-paper illustrations are filled with amazing detail” that will leave readers with “a cozy sense of wonder and possibility,” Julia Smith remarked in Booklist.“It’s hard to imagine how McClure’s creations could get any better,” asserted a Publishers Weekly writer, citing the “inventive and fluid” cut-paper art on display in In.
In Waiting for High Tide a child sits near an ocean tidal pool, observing his surroundings while his parents construct a log raft. “McClure’s cut-paper images are at once sweeping in their scale and extraordinary in their detail,” wrote School Library Journal contributor Jennifer Costa, and another Publishers Weekly reviewer observed that “the sense of place is so rich that it seems possible to smell the air and hear the gulls.” A Kirkus Reviews critic praised the “extraordinary, evocative clarity” of McClure’s art in Waiting for High Tide, deeming it “an extraordinary book.”
McClure’s The Great Chicken Escape appeared in 2018. Early in the morning as a nun comes to collect their eggs, four chickens fly out of their coop at a monastery. The nun manages to capture one, but the remaining three flee the grounds. They travel across an Alaskan forest and coastal area. Eventually, though, they return to the monastery. A contributor to Kirkus Reviews concluded: “Immensely charming and surprisingly moving, this satisfying adventure story honors nature, freedom, and the ringing bells inside us that steer us home.”
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Ingenuity and imagination are at the heart of McClure’s self-illustrated picture book What Will These Hands Make? As a family spends a busy day preparing for a birthday party, they observe the numerous items in their home and their community that have been by hand—a teacup, a knitted cap, a bicycle a bridge across a river, a cake. “This celebration of citizenry and craft is a poignant reminder of the objects and places that makers weave,” observed a Publishers Weekly contributor. A writer in Kirkus Reviews applauded McClure’s “lyrical, lucid verse,” further noting that her “[e]xtraordinary artwork inspires young people to use their hearts and hands.”
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In addition to her solo efforts McClure has provided the llustrations for books by Jeremy Chatelain and Colin Meloy, among other writers. “I have the reminder ‘Show what words cannot’ taped to my cutting desk,” she commented to Triolo. “To illustrate is to enlighten, to make visible and clear. I try to add what the writer left out, without taking away the image that comes from within the reader.”
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Meloy’s The Golden Thread: A Song for Pete Seeger chronicles Seeger’s life and his work as a songwriter, performer, civil rights advocate, union organizer, sailor, ship builder, carpenter, and environmentalist. His lyrics are used to punctuate different periods of his life. McClure combined black and gold paper cut to represent Seeger and his life. A Publishers Weekly contributor observed that “the dynamic spreads evoke both the historic heft of vintage newspaper photography and the soaring beauty of righteous, joyous song.” Writing in School Library Journal, Clara Hendricks remarked that “McClure’s artwork complements the subject with her signature style of impeccable and fluid cut paper.”
BIOCRIT
PERIODICALS
Booklist, April 1, 2009, Ilene Cooper, review of All in a Day, p. 38; April 15, 2010, Ilene Cooper, review of Mama, Is It Summer Yet?, p. 52; April 1, 2011, Thom Barthelmess, review of To Market, to Market, p. 76; August 1, 2012, Ilene Cooper, review of Apple, p. 81; March 15, 2015, Julia Smith, review of In, p. 78; April 1, 2018, Kay Weisman, review of The Golden Thread: A Song for Pete Seeger, p. 61; December 1, 2019, Lolly Gepson, review of What Will These Hands Make?, p. 65.
Bulletin of the Center for Children’s Books, June 1, 2013, Jeannette Hulick, review of How to Be a Cat, p. 474.
Kirkus Reviews, February 15, 2009, review of All in a Day; April 1, 2010, review of Mama, Is It Summer Yet?; April 15, 2011, review of To Market, to Market; July 15, 2012, review of Apple; February 15, 2013, review of How to Be a Cat; February 15, 2016, review of Waiting for High Tide; March 1, 2018, review of The Great Chicken Escape; April 17, 2018, Megan Labrise, interview with McClure; December 1, 2019, review of What Will These Hands Make?
Library Journal, August 1, 2007, Katherine C. Adams, review of Collect Raindrops: The Seasons Gathered, p. 84.
Publishers Weekly, January 19, 2009, review of All in a Day, p. 59; April 5, 2010, review of Mama, Is It Summer Yet?, p. 60; March 7, 2011, review of To Market, to Market, p. 63; May 28, 2012, review of Apple, p. 94; February 11, 2013, Steven Malk, review of How to Be a Cat, p. 62; January 19, 2015, review of In, p. 79; January 25, 2016, review of Waiting for High Tide, p. 208; March 5, 2018, review of The Golden Thread, p. 68; December 2, 2019, review of What Will These Hands Make?, p. 82.
School Library Journal, May 1, 2009, Kathleen Kelly MacMillan, review of All in a Day, p. 88; April 1, 2011, Lisa Egly Lehmuller, review of To Market, to Market, p. 162; November 1, 2012, Mary Elam, review of Apple, p. 80; April 1, 2013, Joan Kindig, review of How to Be a Cat, p. 136; May 1, 2014, Miriam Lang Budin, review of May the Stars Drip Down, p. 147; April 1, 2015, Laura Hunter, review of In, p. 122; March 1, 2016, Jennifer Costa, review of Waiting for High Tide, p. 114; March 1, 2018, Clara Hendricks, review of The Golden Thread, p. 137; January 1, 2020, Danielle Jones, review of What Will These Hands Make?, p. 59.
ONLINE
Deep Space Sparkle, https://www.deepspacesparkle.com/ (August 4, 2018), Patty Palmer, “Interview with Nikki McClure.”
Mystic Seaport Museum website, https://www.mysticseaport.org/ (February 3, 2017), “Mystic Seaport Opens ‘Life in Balance: The Art of Nikki McClure.’”
Nikki McClure website, http://www.nikkimcclure.com (July 1, 2020).
Orion online, https://orionmagazine.org/ (June 5, 2019), Nicholas Triolo, “Questions for the Artist: Nikki McClure.”
We Make, https://www.wemakepdx.com/ (January 31, 2016), Yvonne Perez Emerson, “Quiet Nature—An Interview with Nikki McClure.”*
I grew up in Kirkland, Washington spending my days watching ants and pretending I was an Artist.
I attended the Evergreen State College in Olympia, Washington. I studied ants and drew them (as well as everything else in my environment: birds, trees, flies, nudibranchs) and hung out with Artists. Upon graduating, I worked for the Department of Ecology. After one year, I left and became an Artist. Drawing ants, and ducks, making record covers, mittens for K records, performing on tour.
In 1996 I made my first papercut for the book, Apple. I have been cutting ever since. I now split my time between making a yearly calendar and making children’s books. I become a full-time berry picker in the summer. That is, when I’m not watching birds, hanging out with moss, and swimming in the Salish Sea.I show my artwork at Land Gallery in Portland every November, as well as shows internationally. I sometimes teach and I am always trying to learn how to do everything better.
I live in Olympia, Washington under cedar trees along the eastern shore of the Southern Salish Sea. I am in business with my husband Jay T. Scott, a fine woodworker. We collaborate on lamps and furniture as well as daily walks as McClure & Scott Manufacturing. My son is also a frequent collaborator and instigator of adventure as well as inspiration for many books and images.
Questions for the Artist: Nikki McClure
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by NICHOLAS TRIOLO
JUNE 5, 2019
Every issue of Orion includes a poetry broadside bound into the back cover, illustrated by a different artist each year. Orion is honored that Nikki McClure, a papercut artist living in Olympia, Washington, will illustrate this year’s series.
McClure is widely celebrated for her images made from black paper and an X-Acto knife. Her first broadside in the series—included in the Spring 2019 issue—pairs with Mary Oliver’s poem “At Blackwater Pond.” We caught up with McClure to learn more about what it meant for her to work with Oliver’s words, her process, and what she’s currently reading.
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NT: Your first Orion broadside was included in the Spring 2019 issue, papercuts paired with a poem by Mary Oliver. What is your personal connection to Oliver’s poetry?
NM: I was introduced to Mary Oliver’s work by a good friend and older mentor, Georgia Munger. She was a retired elementary school librarian who gave me my first art shows and encouraged me often by reciting inspiring poems at just the right moments. I would take a book of Oliver’s poems with me when I volunteered in my son’s classrooms, teaching “art.” Really it was teaching chaos, so I would read a poem each week to center them, to get them thinking about time in a certain place. What is our time now? Here?
I wrote to Mary once to see if I could illustrate a book of her poems for children. The request was denied. She wasn’t interested in that idea. I kept reading her poems to children anyway. Then when Orion contacted me to do a series of broadsides, I said I couldn’t right now, but in a year I could, and I would do it if I could illustrate a poem by Mary Oliver. Orion conducted some editorial magic and made that happen, and I was able to pick any poem I wanted of hers.
I sat down and read every poem I had, including books Georgia Munger left to me when she passed away. All day I read and thought about her words and life as I perched in my window seat. The next morning, I started drawing images for “At Blackwater Pond,” but everything I drew looked like a woman crying rivers of tears into her hands. I sent in a rough sketch to Chip Blake. It was then when he told me she died that very morning.
Without knowing it, I held this feeling of murmuring, singing, and listening to her words all day while she was passing. I never met her or spoke to her, but her ripples have met mine.
NT: What did it mean for you to work on this Mary Oliver piece?
NM: It was a life honor.
NT: All-time favorite Mary Oliver poem?
NM: “At Blackwater Pond” is one of them. Others include “Sleeping in the Forest,” “The Summer Day,” “Wild Geese.” I memorized “At Blackwater Pond” for a Mary Oliver tribute night at the local bookstore. I memorized it in honor of Georgia. I was the only one who did. We should all have a poem memorized. It helps.
NT: X-Acto knife and paper. It appears that your style, like writing, is more the art of subtraction than addition. Is that accurate?
NM: Yes, I use paper to reveal a story. I start with a piece of black paper that I cut away. Writing is adding and piling and making, marking up white space, and then paring away, trimming down to the essential. My visuals are probably most like poetry. I seek the elemental shape or line that makes an apple leaf different from a pear leaf.
“I never met her or spoke to her, but her ripples have met mine.”
NT: How many times a week do you prick yourself?
NM: Never. I often extract splinters imbedded in my fingertips from dry firewood or thorns from impromptu weeding using my X-Acto knife and dissecting microscope. Any unintentional cuts usually involve making lunch too quickly, or while chopping kale.
NT: Papercuts are your signature style. How often do you veer from this form?
NM: I mostly cut. But the preparation for cutting involves drawing. And the preparation for drawing is writing. And the preparation for writing is living. So I do all of those things, then I sit down and make a papercut. Earlier in life, I painted watercolors when on vacation. But now any spare creative energy is consumed by making interesting and nutritious dinners, spontaneous pagan celebrations, mending clothes, and tending my strawberry garden, though the “tending” part is usually just watching native bees travel from blossom to blossom. I spent all day yesterday trying to indigo dye turkey tail fungi onto fabric.
NT: What is your process for responding to something written and making it visual?
NM: I have the reminder “Show what words cannot” taped to my cutting desk. To illustrate is to enlighten, to make visible and clear. I try to add what the writer left out, without taking away the image that comes from within the reader. Illustrating other authors’ words is different than illustrating my own texts. It is a challenge to enter into their world. For my work, I often see the image first, then add the text.
The process is backward in the case of the Orion broadside project. I know nothing of the poets’ lives, except a bit of Oliver’s. They are mysteries. I only have their words and maybe some magic can happen and I can add a new feeling to the poem. I have to rely on deep intuition. That can be a gamble. But when it works, it works deep.
NT: How does poetry influence your work?
NM: Poetry reminds me to honor this place, the southernmost finger of the Salish Sea, the edge where I live in a cedar forest with twenty Band-tailed pigeons clearing off the feeder when they tumble down from the tree and sky. I have to refill the feeder with sunflower seed three times before lunch. The pregnant Douglas squirrel does her best to clean up the scattered seeds. But I am typing and doing this work of sharing indoors, a window and a wall away from the constant feeding. Poetry reminds. Art reminds. When successful, they resonate and vibrate within into practice. Poetry does that to me. It stirs me and I become a keener observer.
NT: What are you reading right now?
NM: Urusla K. Le Guin’s The Left Hand of Darkness, recommended by a poet who sings, Daniel Higgs. I’ve only just begun reading science fiction, to keep up with the world my son has entered. We are a long way now from Blueberries for Sal.
NT: What are three of the most influential books you’ve ever read, as it relates to understanding the human/nature relationship?
NM: Wow, this one is serious. Since I just mentioned Blueberries for Sal, I want to say Time of Wonder, also by Robert McCloskey. The line “Where do hummingbirds go in a hurricane?” strikes me as an important question for children and adult humans to wonder, to consider what is outside of themselves.
As far as our relationship to nature, my husband says I should read Edward Abbey, though I have to admit I haven’t yet. I’ll work on that. Another book is The Wheel on the School, by Meindert DeJong, which shows how a curious question, “Why are there no storks in Shora?” posed by a child, unites a community. The environment is made better and the human interactions are as well.
I’ve been thinking of Silent Spring by Rachel Carson a lot this season as I walk in the woods and see so many people with earbuds in. Will they even notice when the birds stop singing? The dawn chorus is getting quieter. Carson’s sense of urgency for the planet is something that we all need to start having. Here in Olympia, it has already been 88 degrees in mid-May. Today there are twelve American white pelicans on the beach. All migration maps do not show western Washington as part of the pelicans’ range, but this is the second year I’ve seen them here. I’ve lived here long enough to recognize this change.
Carson was direct. What book is our modern equivalent? Sandra Steingraber’s essays in Orion feel close. But what can we sound an alarm with? Food shortages? Climate refugees? Carson did it with the loss of bird’s songs, the loss of beauty. We know our interconnectedness more than ever now, just as we have become more disconnected. No wonder I turn to children’s books. We need to raise noticers and we are failing.
“I have to rely on deep intuition. That can be a gamble. But when it works, it works deep.”
NT: What is the artist’s responsibility during a human-caused mass extinction event?
NM: Notice. Record. Interpret. Share. And do so without excess consumption in its creation. I wonder what the trees would think of what I make from their fibers and forests and streams.
Artists can navigate and help to understand. They can turn science into emotion. They can be examples of living, where creating isn’t just making stuff. Personally, I don’t know how to respond myself. Grief and despair and tears or reverence and wonder, so I just gaze out the window and watch the birds and dragonflies doing their best to keep this whole ecosystem going.
NT: Who are some artists that you think are moving the human/more-than-human conversation in generative ways?
NM: I’m not aware enough to know. I’m a bit of a hermit. I see more birds in a day than people. I don’t browse the internet; I spend enough time inside. I hope that I am helping move something good forward in my own small way.
NT: You’ve been a long-time resident of the Pacific Northwest. How does your watershed’s landscape inform your art?
NM: It is it. I’ve only ever lived here. My art would be different if I lived somewhere else and I would be different, too. My son is now a tall cedar tree and I am becoming more like a seal who watches birds and falls asleep trying to feel rocking waves. This is just the physicality of Self, the art-making part is the same. I walk every morning and things happen that spark images. I want to make pictures precise in place and time.
NT: What, in your estimation, does the visual artist have in his/her/their toolbox in response to the more-than-human world that a writer might not?
NM: Time. Writers take more time, in crafting and then in reading the words. Art can be seen in an instant. People don’t make time for more than images, a barrage of them all day long. And striking, well-made images that ignite emotion are memorable even after one has spent just seconds with it. Words sink in deep, but they take more time. Keep writing, writers! We all need to be adding our voices.
Silent Spring pertains to humans now, and we are the ones who have been silenced.
Interview with Nikki McClure
While searching for a literature tie-in for my Apple Art Lesson, I found Nikki McClure’s exquisite book Apple. This story takes you on a visual journey of the life cycle of an apple; from apple picking time to composting and re-birth. The children had fun anticipating what would become of the bright red apple.
I asked Nikki if she would mind answering a few questions about her book.
Patty: When I first discovered your book, I was drawn to the starkness of the cover illustration. It’s not often that we see a children’s picture book created with a limited color palette. What was your thought process behind the colors?
Nikki: The red apple is a character. Color isn’t used for decoration or to catch your eye…although it does with this cover. I use color to tell the story. The original artwork is black paper glued to a white backing. Adding color is an intentional alteration of the original art.
Patty: I knew this book would make a lovely companion to an autumn art lesson for my Kinders, but I didn’t know how they would respond to the single word format of the book. I was thrilled to see that the children were enraptured! They loved filling in the empty spaces with their imaginations and learned quite a few words in the process. How long did it take to come up with the one perfect word for each page?
Nikki: That’s what I love about wordless or almost wordless stories; the one word sinks in, but then the “reader” becomes the “teller” as they make up the missing pieces. They are encouraged to craft a thicker story in their mind. How long to come up with the words…well, it took 16 years to add words to the book. But once I decided to have words, they came quickly. Though not without editing! Some words were scrapped and others found.
Patty: Can you describe your paper-cutting process? It looks really hard!
Nikki: I take a piece of black paper and draw on it with pencil with the picture that I want to appear. I then take an x-acto blade and start cutting. I do the part that I worry over the most FIRST, that way I get my mistakes and fears over with right away and can then enjoy the process and experiment. It takes about a week to cut a detailed picture.
Patty: Do you always work with a limited color palette?
Nikki: Yes. I would just like to make black and white books…but I also see the power in color. So I use color to tell the story. Plus, colored papers are never the perfect color and they fade over time. I like reducing everything to it’s elemental form without relying on color to help me.
Patty: What were your favorite books as a child?
Nikki: Blueberries for Sal, The Secret Garden, Moominsummer Madness (pictures only then as the story was so crazy-but now I love all that Tove Jansson ever made)
Patty: Did you receive art lessons as a child? If so, when did you start and which ones were your favorites?
Nikki: I have only taken one art lesson. A cartooning class at age 12. I learned how to draw a face proportionately. I took art in high school …but I taught myself mostly. I was given the key to the supply closet and an empty classroom. I took natural history classes in college. I drew a lot, but very technical drawings and no instruction. I had that book “How to Draw 50 Animals” as a child. I drew all 50.
Patty: How often do you draw or create art?
Nikki: I try to work every day, but not all days are drawing days or cutting days. Those I have to parcel out to keep my arm happy. But deciding on dinner, raking leaves, sweeping the floor, reading thousands of kid books with my son luckily all count as creative work. So I make every day.
Patty: So true! Thanks so much Nikki for taking the time to answer these questions. Your books are delightful.
To learn more about Nikki McClure and her books, please visit her website.
Here is a wonderful, video that reveals so much about Nikki, her art and her inspiration.
Have you done an art lesson based on any one of Nikki’s books?
Link to Apple on Amazon.com
*This post has affiliate links
INTERVIEW WITH PAPER ARTIST NIKKI MCCLURE
matt inman April 11, 2018
Nikki McClure.png
INTERVIEW WITH PAPER ARTIST NIKKI MCCLURE
working within your limitations
Matt: So starting off, I want to talk about the inefficiency of your craft. What are your thoughts on lasers, specifically laser cutting machines? You could totally sketch something on black paper and have a machine efficiently and precisely cut something out.
Nikki: (laughter) Well, it might not be as efficient as you think. Allowing a computer to make your decisions as far as line weight and what is light and dark, that's asking a lot of a computer. You'd end up doing a lot of work at the computer for the computer to be able to do the work.
I sketch, cut and send it to a friend who scans it for me. I have limited myself, but I'm also totally dependent on this other person. So, that's how I feel about laser cutters, or computers. It has this idea that it was supposed to save us so much time, but it hasn’t; its just made us spend more time with it.
Matt: Yeah, that's deep and really good! What do you get out of your slower, deliberate art? What's in it, that even if a laser cutter could do your art, it just can't communicate?
Nikki: Right. I love the decisiveness of it. That actions have immediate results to the cutting. It is really meditative. As I'm cutting, it’s just my thought. I really like the actual physical part of it, and it stimulates me in ways other things don't.
McClure, Nikki WHAT WILL THESE HANDS MAKE? Abrams (Children's Fiction) $19.99 2, 25 ISBN: 978-1-4197-2576-0
A grandmother holds a baby's hand and wonders, "What will these hands make?" Myriad possibilities follow.
What if those little hands made "a fiddle to play quick / a stack of wood for the night / a play to cheer / a lantern to guide the way back home?" Or how about "a bridge to cross a river / a boat to sail the sea / a house for swallows / a home for families?" These projects appear embedded within luxuriantly detailed scenes, made with McClure's own steady hand and an X-Acto knife. Capitalized headers boldly ask "WILL THESE HANDS MAKE," with possibilities unfurling in lyrical, lucid verse beneath. Awe-inspiring double-page spreads show a busy town from multiple, miraculous perspectives. Putty-colored paper serves as a soothing, neutral background for McClure's inky-black illustrations, and it also allows all people to share the same skin tone. Selective pops of color (icy blue, buttercream yellow, brick red, cotton white) highlight fabric, flowers, cake, a mast. The matte pigments glow on the taupe paper, emphasizing just how good, hands-on work provides bright spots in communities. McClure encourages readers to trace their hands on two vacant ovals on the final pages, and it seems she's asking also for a promise to do something with their own hands in the future. A conversational author's note describes how she cuts paper to make artwork.
Extraordinary artwork inspires young people to use their hearts and hands. (Picture book. 4-10)
Copyright: COPYRIGHT 2019 Kirkus Media LLC
http://www.kirkusreviews.com/
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"McClure, Nikki: WHAT WILL THESE HANDS MAKE?" Kirkus Reviews, 1 Dec. 2019. Gale General OneFile, https://link.gale.com/apps/doc/A606964253/ITOF?u=schlager&sid=ITOF&xid=1492fcd2. Accessed 2 Mar. 2020.
MCCLURE, Nikki. What Will These Hands Make? illus. by Nikki McClure. 40p. Abrams. Feb. 2020. Tr $19.99. ISBN 9781419725760.
PreS-Gr 1--Themes of community, creativity, and craft are at the heart of this book about a family preparing for a grandmother's birthday celebration. With the repetitive question of "What will these hands make?," a young girl explores all the possibilities of what hands can make. The child repurposes a worn sweater into an imaginative fish-shaped pillow before going out to the larger world, where a variety of handmade items are mentioned, from a knitted hat for baby, a bench, and a cake to things such as sidewalks, bicycles, and bridges. McClure's (How to Be a Cat) signature art made from black paper with an exacto knife on a tan background is sprinkled with images of a variety of people doing hands-on projects. Pages alternate between text and wordless red-and-white spreads that give opportunities for contemplation on all the things in our world that hands can make. Tire language can be a bit stilted at times, and McClure breaks from her previous pattern at the end to ask questions like "Will these hands make a safe place to be?," "Will these hands make a community?," and "What will your hands make?" VERDICT A good selection to inspire young makers and for fans of McClure's previous works.--Danielle Jones, Multnomah County Library, OR
Copyright: COPYRIGHT 2020 Library Journals, LLC. A wholly owned subsidiary of Media Source, Inc. No redistribution permitted.
http://www.schoollibraryjournal.com/
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MLA 8th Edition APA 6th Edition Chicago 17th Edition
Jones, Danielle. "MCCLURE, Nikki. What Will These Hands Make?" School Library Journal, vol. 66, no. 1, Jan. 2020, p. 59. Gale General OneFile, https://link.gale.com/apps/doc/A610418393/ITOF?u=schlager&sid=ITOF&xid=aad15006. Accessed 2 Mar. 2020.