How to choose a profession? This fundamental question is treated in quite an unusual way when a girl decides to be “a girl from the circus” – and gives good reasons for her decision. The girl’s mother gives examples of professions with the same advantages, but Irene finds a way to follow her dream.
The new picture book by Sanja Lovrenčić and Dominik Vuković follows the journey of a single rose. Passing from hand to hand, the red flower outlines the life of a city neighbourhood through which it is carried by various characters. The neighbourhood is a rich microworld in which chance encounters, small daily rituals and never-ending human dramas take place. The characters that the rose travels among belong to different social groups: from dog walkers, young parents, a shop assistant, a resident of a nursing home and a young artist, to marginalized people such as an elderly homeless man and a street musician. All of them, however, are connected by a simple gesture of kindness: passing the rose from one hand to another. The rose thus becomes a metaphor for the community that permeates the fabric of the city, despite the ever-present differences. Ultimately, this tender flower symbolizes the fragility of every gentle gesture – but also its beauty.
Jasmina Kosanović, the author of a series of interesting and well-received picture books, does not seem to know how to tell a story about rain. Instead of words, images come to her, all airy and gentle – truly rainy. But for those who like to give themselves over to their imagination, every illustration in this picture book can be the beginning of an adventure. What are those people waiting for under their umbrellas? Who does a sad man with a scarf break up with? Who is behind the windows where the drops are pouring down? Where is the sailboat sailing under an almost clear, yet still rain-soaked sky? A series of rainy scenes results in the author seeing her own self clearly, sun kissed. Those who imagine a series of their own rainy stories will perhaps find out something about themselves, once they eventually emerge from Jasmina’s dreamy, watercolour world.
At the heart of the new picture book by the award-winning illustrator Agata Lučić is art itself, in all its joyful forms. On the pages of this book, intended for children, but which will delight and cheer up adults as well, we will hear numerous and varied answers to the questions of what art can do, where it can be found, how we can most easily encounter it. ‘Art is Smart’ is a praise of art itself, but also a short lesson for the young ones about different kinds of artistic activity and their equal importance. The picture book is abundantly and dynamically illustrated in the author’s recognizable style, and the text flows in an unstilted poetic style, with cheerful rhymes that arouse curiosity in the reader and draw her on to an optimistic close.
In Cats, the author offers several connected tales: a brave cat Mortimer goes to the sea to see the great white shark (meeting on his way the dangerous mister Darkly); a company of wandering acrobat-cats falls apart because of a very strange problem; Zigfrid and Zelda, brother and sister, practice the skills of measuring and sewing in their own way; and cat chefs, Leonard and Edgar are making pancakes for all of them.
Age: 4-6
In this picture book Croatian author Igor Rajki, winner of the prestigious Grigor Vitez award and the award of the Fairy tale festival of Ogulin, deals with a contemporary issue – the issue of the excessive presence of electronic devices and their screens in our everyday life. He does this in an original way, using his distinctive imaginative poetic language, kindling the readers’ imagination and making them think at the same time. The narrator of the story is giving, as if he were a professor of some kind, a lesson about ‘assembling of darkness in the dark’ – an enchanting phenomenon that occurs at the end of the day, in closed spaces, when darkness begins to descend from the ceiling and rise from the floor; the two darknesses embrace each other and slowly turn into the thick dark. But that is not all; during their game they create small sprouts, so called darklets. Darklets playfully twirl around objects, taming their shapes and leaving no trace. But when various screens start to interfere, a problem occurs: grayish shadows appear where darklets should be… The literary story about darklets is narrated in another, visual language by Klasja Habjan, a young illustrator and designer. She creates impressive, secretive life in spaces on the edge between night and day, spaces inhabited by fleeting human and animal figures, fragments of objects and fragments of their interactions; she does this with extraordinary inventiveness, on a very high aesthetic level, making this book attractive not only for reading but also for (repeated) viewing. By offering the youngest readers an utterly unusual visual experience, Klasja Habjan broadens the concept of what a picture book can be, and opens up the space of children’s book for new ways of artistic expression.
Addressing the children for the first time, the renowned Darkville, the setting and the main character of this picture book written by a distinguished author Iva Bezinović-Haydon, is a sad town: all plants are being systematically cut there. No one really knows whose idea that was, but two city officials play a significant role in its implementation. One of them stamps the word ‘NO’ on all requests for a change, the other maintains order with his cutting tools – until a little blue flower emerges from a crack in the asphalt and everything starts to change… Using simple words and an appealing plot, the author talks about the need humans feel for the living green world, for colors, diversity and freedom, but also about different ways of standing up to bad rules imposed from somewhere above – it can be done in a hidden manner, in private spaces, or openly, in public, joining forces with other people. The young illustrator Laura Martinović brought the story about Darkville to life with her playful and warm illustrations, full of creative visual ideas and details that enrich the text.
The story about Ema – written by Vanja Marković, an expert in inclusive and social pedagogy – deals with an important topic of our time: the way people perceive each other. Roaming the streets of her hometown, the little heroine is trying to find someone to play with. She encounters a whole bunch of various characters, but they notice only her looks – her shaggy hair, her huge eyes, her dirty jacket. They all nag her and none of them wants to follow her imagination, but her ideas for games remain on pages, as possibilities for readers themselves to develop. In the end even Ema repeats the pattern that surrounds her: when a yellow cat asks her to play with it she refuses the invitation, thinking that a black cat would be much more interesting. In a playful way the story opens the readers’ eyes to the wrongs implied in superficial ways of looking at others. The storyteller’s style is simple and flowing, very well adapted to the target group of readers (6-8). The illustrations by Vibor Juhas complement and enrich the text; they are close to the aesthetics of comic books and full of little visual surprises.
In her second artist’s book, Agata Lučić takes readers of all generations to a flea market – an almost monochromatic blue world filled with various objects. Each thing there carries traces of time spent in someone’s life, traces of somebody’s past. The young visual artist evokes fragments of life that “forgotten things” shared with their humans in her original, very recognizable style, gradually creating a warm atmosphere – with bits of magic. The last double-page holds a surprise: as the objects manage to attract new owners and are being accepted along with their stories, various colors enter the world of the picture book. It is no longer a space of memories; it becomes a living space. “Forgotten Things” are both nostalgic and cheerful, they urge the reader to open up to hidden histories of unknown people and certain values accessible only to a watchful eye; they invite both children and adults to dream, offering a world of peculiar visual pleasure.
We acquire and discard things too easily, warns the author of this gentle and playful picture book; but even when they have already been discarded, left to their fate on the stands of some open-air “mini market”, they can be looked at, singled out from the crowd, appropriated, restored, and brought back to life.
Book #4909
This story about a fairy is inspired by real-life experience. Its author Mirjana Mrkela speaks about loneliness and feelings of rejection, common in the lives of people who seem different from the majority. As a person who lost her sight in adulthood, the author easily sympathizes with people who are rejected or marginalized in our society for whatever reason. She tells her story as a fairy tale, drawing on certain elements from Slavic mythology. Her heroine, a fairy who, having stepped into the realm of some kind of evil old magic, becomes a goat, retreats from people who do not accept her. She hides in a mountain world of plants and animals and grieves there. But the moon and the sun are there for her, as well as for all other beings. The moon encourages her with its shine, and the sun makes her strong and calm. The pale fairy represents all those who long for understanding and acceptance. The author created the picture book in close collaboration with Katarina Radošević Galić, a Croatian illustrator and scenographer.
One of the most popular fairy tales penned by Ivana Brlić Mažuranić, and one of those that Croatian children first encounter, is precisely the one about Regoč. However, even though the original story is entitled simply “Regoč”, the little fairy Kosjenka plays a more important role in it. Curious and lively, she sets the sluggish giant on an adventure. Cheerful when she finds company, compassionate in times of trouble, she sacrifices all her fairy magic for new friends, for children from two feuding villages near the Zlovoda lake. Although the two main characters belong to the realm of the fantastical, the story ends on a perfectly human note, with the construction of a new village. And while Regoč returns to his town of Legen, Kosjenka can no longer go back among the fairies, so she stays with the children from the village – as well as with little readers. For this silent book, visual artist Vendi Vernić told Ivana Brlić Mažuranić’s story in a purely visual language. For those who do not know the original, there is a small glossary at the beginning. Converted into pictures, the story becomes accessible to preschool readers.
This playful and cheerful book is perfect for those learning to read as well as for those who are helping them in this endeavor. Every of thirty very short stories – in which numerous characters, both human and animal, appear – is dominated by one single letter. This letter can be searched for, with ears or eyes, and every story can be continued. This unique spelling book invites the reader to play whereby it turns gaining reading habits into an easy and fun project.
Playing with the motives of Andersen’s “Little girl with the matches” Melita Kraus tells the story about a little she-dog named Lili, whose old master got ill and had to go to the hospital – on the Christmas Eve. The little dog is left alone and tries to win someone’s attention, but nobody cares for her. Very tired and hungry she rambles through the town, until she is too exhausted to continue. She lies down and sees – in a dream – her dog-parents. They give her advice – to knock at the door in front of which she is lying…
Simply told and emotional, ideal reading for the young children (+3).
“Whenever I find something that I like, I want to tell a story about it” , says the narrator of this book. But she will by no means tell the story of Julije Knifer and his famous meander motif alone. The painter himself talks about anti-paintings and anti-bulbs, about the rhythms of black and white, vertical and horizontal lines, research and the search for extremes – all of this in his own words taken from original diary entries. And the illustrations inspired by his art also tell the readers about his journey towards and with meanders in their own way. In the fifth picture book of their Croatian fine art series, Sanja Lovrenčić and Dominik Vuković present the work of one of the most original and respected Croatian artists of the twentieth century, well-recognized abroad.
Lili loves colours. Everything around her is always colourful. Her room, her drawings, her clothes, her thoughts. Until one Monday, when Lili loses in a race and nothing can help her feel better. One by one, monsters come and steal colours out of her life, leaving her in a sombre world as she deals with disappointment and sadness. But Lili will find out that, even though it does not always seem so, colours have a way of finding their way back into our lives – with a little help from our friends. An important story told in a simple yet effective way, with gorgeous illustrations by award-winning artist Klasja Habjan.
In this extraordinary picture-book the story keeps returning to its beginning. At every page, Igor Rajki starts out with the classical formula “Once there was a…”, only to interrupt the narration and turn to something else. The little sketches created in this way as well as the reasons the author offers for never finishing any of his stories finally build up to a hilarious mosaic of anecdotes while constructing a somewhat nervous but highly entertaining narrative voice. The visual artist Krešimir Zimonić responded to the fragmentary narrative style by using techniques of collage which combine drawings, photographs, graffiti styled writings and “ready-made” visual material. Once is, for this reason, a thoroughly sketchy and incredibly rich little book.
