Brian Wildsmith

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Brian Wildsmith (born January 22, 1930 in Penistone , South Yorkshire , England , † August 31, 2016 in Grasse , Alpes-Maritimes , France ) was a British painter and children's book illustrator .

Life

Wildsmith was born in 1930 in a small mining village and went to Sheffield to high school . In 1946, at the age of seventeen, he enrolled at the Barnsley School of Art and stayed there until 1949. It was there that he met his future wife, the daughter of an employee of the Wentworth Woodhouse . At the Barnsley Art School , he won a scholarship to the Slade School of Fine Art in London , where he studied with William Coldstream , among others, until 1952 .

After graduating from London , Wildsmith did his military service . He married in 1955 and began teaching art at Selhurst High School in London before setting up on his own in 1957. Wildsmith designed book covers for the publisher John Murray and others. Furthermore, he worked as a book illustrator in the style of lineart for publishers such as Penguin Books and Oxford University Press until 1964 . During these years he also taught once a week at Maidstone College of Art , which is now part of the Kent Institute of Art & Design .

From 1971, Wildsmith lived and worked with his wife and four children in the hills of Provence in southern France in a village between Cannes and Grasse.

Work and effects

Since 1957 Wildsmith has been sponsored by various editors of children's books in England, particularly Oxford University Press . His children's book ABC won the Kate Greenaway Medal in 1962 .

In 1994, a Brian Wildsmith art museum was set up in Izu-kogen south of Tōkyō , which, for example, had one and a half million visitors in 2005. 800 of his works are shown in the museum.

Publications

  • ABC . Oxford University Press, Oxford, England 1962.
  • 123 . Oxford University Press, Oxford, England 1965.
  • Illustrations for Robert Louis Stevenson : A Child's Garden of Verses . F. Watts, New York City, USA 1966.
  • The Lion and the Rat. 1967?
    • German: The lion and the rat, a fable by Lafontaine. Gutenberg Book Guild, Frankfurt am Main 1967.
  • Birds . Oxford University Press, Oxford, England 1967.
  • The Circus . Oxford University Press, Oxford, England 1970.
  • The Owl and the Woodpecker . Oxford University Press, Oxford, England 1971.
  • Little Wood Duck . Oxford University Press, Oxford, England 1972.
    • German: The little wild duck . Atlantis Verlag, Zurich / Freiburg im Breisgau 1973, ISBN 3-7611-0405-7 .
  • Noah's Ark: A pop-up book . Bohem-Press, Zurich 1995, ISBN 3-85581-263-2 .
  • A Christmas Story . Oxford University Press, Oxford, England 1989.
  • The Prince of the Snow Country . Free Spiritual Life Publishing House, Stuttgart 1991, ISBN 3-7725-1132-5 .
  • The Easter Story . Oxford University Press, Oxford, England 1993.
  • St. Francis . Oxford University Press, Oxford, England, 1997.
  • Exodus . Eerdman Books for Young Readers, 1998, ISBN 0-802851754 .
  • The Bremen Town Musicians: A Brothers Grimm fairy tale. retold and illustrated by Wildsmith. Bohem Press, Zurich 2000, ISBN 3-85581-334-5 .
Autobiography
  • Brian Wildsmith (1930-). A Short Autobiography . Gale Research, Detroit 1988.

Exhibition catalogs

  • Brian Wildsmith , Tōkyō 1995.

Web links

personal data
SURNAME Wildsmith, Brian
BRIEF DESCRIPTION British painter and children's book illustrator
DATE OF BIRTH January 22, 1930
PLACE OF BIRTH Penistone, South Yorkshire , England
DATE OF DEATH August 31, 2016
Place of death Grasse , Alpes-Maritimes , France