Double Delight: Celebrating Beauty with Sophie Blacknall


Beauty comes in many forms: the bizarre, the whimsical, the wondrous. Author illustrator and two-time Caldecott Medallist, Sophie Blacknall embraces the very best of beauty in her visual and imaginative picture book narratives creating imagery that makes your heart swoon. Here are two of her latest masterpieces.

If I Was A Horse

When I was much shorter, I dreamed of owing a horse. It was a dead-end desire however my love for all things equine never diminished so instead of walking, I galloped. Instead of speaking, I whinnied. Instead of sitting in the shelter shed at lunchtimes, I careened around the school oval …like a horse. I didn’t just want a horse. I was a horse. This is the premise of Blackall’s 2023 release; exploring what a child would do if she were a horse.

This joyful expose of imaginative play and sense of self is splendidly supported by Blacknall’s exquisite illustrations created with a combination of media including watercolours, pencils, and collaged materials resulting in a rich tapestry of textures and feelings. Being a horse poses intriguing questions like, how would you fit into your clothes? How would your school friends react? And is bath time really a die-hard necessity after all!

Conversely, a universe of wild exciting possibilities also results from being a horse not least of which is being your little sister’s best most faithful companion. If I Was A Horse reflects the beauty of unharnessed imagination in one of the most child-relatable ways; through empathetic character identification. At least it does for this little horse lover.

Title:  If I Was A Horse
Author / Illustrator:  Sophie Blacknall
Publisher:  Lothian Children’s Books (Hachette imprint), $24.99
Publication Date:  27 September 2023
Format: Hardcover (with dustjacket)
ISBN: 9780734422712
For ages:  3+
Type:  Picture Book

Buy the Book: Hachette Australia, Boomerang Books

Farmhouse

Released last year, Farmhouse is another example of unfettered beauty; that which is current, past and lost. Rather like filming one scene of a movie in one take, Blacknall employs a similar technique by telling the tale of a farmhouse in one continuous sentence. This gorgeous ambling poetic piece perfectly suits the location of the farmhouse (by a glittering stream that twists and turns …), its personality and the inhabitants that dwell within, all 14 of them!

Through the years and lilting prose, we come to know the farmhouse’s 12 children, their quirks and squabbles, their triumphs and misgivings. We are privy to their dreams and hidden treasures. We are witness to their daily routines and simple pleasures like apple picking and fishing in the stream. Moments blossom into years and years turn into lifetimes until one by one, the children leave the home that sheltered, nurtured and embraced them.

Bereft of human occupation, the house falls into decline but is not entirely empty. As it ages and slumps into disrepair, nature reclaims its organic components. Nooks and crannies, basements and even parlour organs become places for creatures that flutter and fly and snooze throughout winter until finally the narrator, the one creates this ode of love, happens upon an overgrown farmhouse and discovers its many treasures. These in turn prompt her to record the farmhouse’s story and that of all who dwelled within its walls.

Farmhouse is based on Blacknall’s real life experiences told additionally through the beautiful endpapers that grace this book. (As a fan of resonating endpapers, Blackall’s are exceptional). The luxuriously multi-layered illustrations abound with rich colour and intricate detail each breathing life into the house and its inhabitants.

The old derelict farmhouse she discovered in the woods is now demolished but its story, or rather the potential tales once hidden within its timbers, resound in this exquisite picture book, where they’ll live on, so long as they’re told.

Title:  Farmhouse
Author /Illustrator:  Sophie Blacknall
Publisher:  Lothian Children’s Books (Hachette imprint), $24.99
Publication Date:  31 August 2022
Format: Hardcover (with dustjacket)
ISBN: 9780734421654
For ages:  5+
Type:  Picture Book                  

Buy the Book: Hachette Australia, Boomerang Books       

 

 

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