Since 1995, publishers the world over have submitted their best books for the coveted BolognaRagazzi Award. Born in the wake of earlier prizes awarded since the first editions of the Children’s Book Fair – the Balanzoned’Oro andTorchiod’oro prizes, the Young Critics Prize, and Bologna Fair Graphics Prize– the current Award encompasses them all in a single prize for the “best publishing project”. The winning books are selected from among thousands of submissionsfor their quality of production, the language of the illustrations and the horizons of imagination and knowledge they open to young readers. Over the years, the Jury has been composed of leading children’s authors, illustrators and publishers.Their interest in the books submitted and the Jury’s important work have led to the success and prestige of the BolognaRagazzi Award, currently deemed one of the most sought-after prizes in the sector.
Once again, the 2014 BolognaRagazzi Award has four categories: Fiction, Non Fiction, New Horizons and Opera Prima. This year’s edition received 1081 entries from 42 countries for a total of 77 publishers, judged by an international Jury comprising Chairman Martin Salisbury (Professor of Illustration, Anglia Ruskin University, United Kingdom), Manuel Estrada (graphic designer and illustrator, Spain) and Laurence Tutello (specialist bookseller, Paris, France).
Martin Salisburyworked as a freelance illustrator and exhibiting painter for many years. He is currently Professor of Illustration at Cambridge School of Art (in Anglia Ruskin University), where he founded and leads the UK’s first degree course on Children’s Book Illustration and the Centre for Children’s Book Studies. He is the author of a number of books on children’s book illustration.
Manuel Estradaand his ten studio collaborators work for Spain’s top publishing houses. He is the author of collections and a number of covers for the daily El Paisand covers for special publications of the Royal Spanish Language Academy. He redesigned Alianza Editorial’s prestigious paperback series and has designed many children’s book series. Estrada works as a graphic designer and his albums have been displayed in the New York head offices of the National Center of the American Institute of Graphic Art. He is president of the DIMAD Foundation and member of the Spanish Higher Council for the teaching of Art. His work has received a number of prizes and credits.
Laurence Tutello, president of the French Association of Specialized Booksellers (A.L.S.J.) since 2006, she opened her Paris bookstore in 1994.She has always seen reading as a space of freedom and independence, and promotes a high standard of children’s literature both in terms of content and the artistic creativity of its illustrations.
2014 WINNERS OF THE “BolognaRagazzi Award”:
FICTION
Le Noël de Marguerite
Text by India Desjardins, illustrations by Pascal Blanchet
La Pastèque, Montreal, Canada, 2013
What the Jury said
Blanchet’s artwork draws on early to mid 20th Century Americana referencing advertising material and popular motifs of the period. Elegant and stylish, the book is consistent and integrated throughout in its visual language. Although executed with great technical skill, the visual narrative goes deeper than mere stylistic bravura. It is the artist’s exceptional command of light and atmosphere that takes the book beyond the merely fashionable. The story of loneliness and melancholy is developed through glimpses of interior and exterior worlds and the powerful visual resonance of everyday objects and empty spaces. The central character’s emotional journey is illuminated throughout by gentle shafts of light, both natural and man-made. The book exudes warmth without ever falling into sentimentality. The narrative takes place to a backdrop of silently falling snow that gradually fades away as we reach conclusion. Carefully considered patterned endpapers enclose and wrap the book, completing the understated Christmas message. The excellence of concept, design and execution convinced the Jury that this was the outstanding book in the Fiction category.
NON-FICTION
MajnAlefBeif
Text byJehoszueKamiński, illustrations byUrszulaPalusińska
ZydowskieStowarz y Szenieczulent, Krakow, Poland, 2012
What the Jury said
A stunningly produced alphabet of Yiddish poems, this book instantly united the Jury as the outright winner for the Non-Fiction category. The strikingly muscular imagery is executed in a manner that is reminiscent of woodblock printing, featuring bold, flat colour and crude surface texture. Each spread is beautifully designed in terms of weight and distribution of shapes on the page. This is a striking, graphically literate work that is both modern and traditional in feel. The large scale of the book perfectly accommodates the drama of its contents and every aspect of its production has been given the utmost attention.
NEW HORIZONS
La chica de polvo
Text and illustrations byJung Yumi
ReyNaranjoEditores – Bogota, Colombia
Produced by Culture Platform, Seoul, South Korea
What the Jury said
This powerful, silent visual sequence is in the form of the book version of an animated film. Its compelling black and white imagery quietly tells the story of an apparently ordinary life in intense detail. Tiny moments in time are described across numerous pages, slowed down almost to a standstill with scrupulous attention to the most apparently insignificant of everyday objects. The author sustains the same level of intense focus throughout this epic journey, convincing the Jury that this is a work of exceptional creative ambition.
OPERA PRIMA
HalensHistorie
Text byYulia Horst, illustrations byDaria Rychkova
CappelenDamm – Oslo, Norway, 2013
What the Jury said
The Jury felt that this was an astonishingly mature and culturally literate debut. The book explores the proposal, ‘what would the world be like if we all had tails?’ Every aspect of life and relationships is explored in relation to this theme. Lovers gently and coyly entwine their tails, athletes build up their tail muscles in the gym while punks carefully groom theirs into the requisite spikey shapes. The artist skips between colour and black and white, drawing with an eye for anecdotal detail human interaction.
2014 SPECIAL MENTIONS OF THE “BolognaRagazzi Award”:
FICTION
The promise
Text byNicola Davies, illustrations byLaura Carlin
Walker Books Ltd., London, United Kingdom, 2013
What the Jury said
The Promise describes a journey from dark to light, from urban to organic. Laura Carlin’s illustrations take us from the darkest urban landscape into a world of radiant colour and hope, all the time finding pattern and rhythm in the visual. A deeply lyrical and poetic book in which harmony comes to the fore both literally and metaphorically.
Die Katzen von Kopenhagen
Text byJames Joyce, illustrations byWolf Erlbruch
Carl HanserVerlag GmbH & Co. KG,Munich,Germany,2013
What the Jury said
Taking James Joyce’s anecdotal observations of Copenhagen as the starting point, Wolf Erlbruch’s raw, expressive drawings lead us through a world of cycling, smoking fish, pickpockets, indolent policemen and thieving cats. These superficially childlike but highly visually literate drawings perfectly complement the text.
L'ombre de chacun
Text and illustrations byMélanieRutten
Editions MeMo, Nantes, France, 2013
What the Jury said
A flowing, expressive line and delicate transparent washes characterize Rutten’s highly individual visual language. She creates a world of anthropomorphic creatures and walking books that are somehow immediately convincing as they lead us into their bizarre world, a world that is nevertheless full of warmth and friendship.
IssunBôshi
Text and illustrations byIcinori
ActesSud Junior, Paris, France, 2013
What the Jury said
Bold, brash colours are layered in woodcut style in this story of a tiny person in a world of giants. Beautifully designed with well-considered use of white space to highlight extremes of scale, the book present a highly theatrical ancient Japanese aesthetic. This is a sumptuously rich, abundant book that teems with life.
NON-FICTION
Josephine
Text byPatricia Hruby Powell, illustrations byChristian Robinson
Chronicle Books, San Francisco,United States of America,2014
What the Jury said
The exotic story of Josephine Baker is told in suitably rich, painterly visual style. The artist’s vibrant use of colour and texture is used as a backdrop to an extensive text. Playful brushstrokes create vibrant movement, shapes and period motifs that evoke the jazz era in all its colour and drama.
Dottoko Zoo
Illustrations by Norio Nakamura
FukuinkanShoten Publishers, Inc.– Tokyo, Japan, 2012
What the Jury said
This is a graphically witty walk through the zoo, an experiment in the abstraction of shapes into the fewest number of pixels possible to allow identification. A highly sophisticated graphic puzzle, a tour de force of composition and minimalism designed to stretch the mind and the eye.
Mar
Text byRicardo Henriques, illustrations by André Letria
PatoLógicoEdicões – Lisbon, Portugal, 2012
What the Jury said
The design and illustration of this book echoes perfectly its nautical theme. Type and image are beautifully integrated across the page using only black and a second colour, blue. The artist exploits contrasts of scale effectively. Huge sea creatures do battle with tiny vessels. Lighthouses send out their beams of light across the page. The culture of the sea is covered in all its many aspects, including facts, figures and folklore in this highly satisfying graphic experience.
NEW HORIZONS
Do not open this book!
Text byFatima Sharafeddine, illustrations byFereshtehNajafi
Kalimat - Sharjah, United Arab Emirates
What the Jury said
This richly decorative, unfolding concertina book from the United Arab Emirates presents two sides of a child’s consciousness. On one side we follow his uneventful, everyday experience whilst on the other, rich hot colours lead us into his alternative world of fantasy and imagination. The artist demonstrates a strong personal visual vocabulary of heavily textured brushwork and distinctive, confident use of colour.
CollccíonPoesíaIllustrada
EditorialAmanuta, Santiago, Chile, 2012
What the Jury said
This distinctive series of picturebooks from Chile features a well-integrated approach to design and illustration, employing a range of illustrative idioms that are unified by a strong overall sense of design and ‘brand’. A well-considered and sensitive approach to typography is flexible and adaptable to the varying illustrative styles. The uncoated cardboard covers are printed with rich screen print inks that glow against the coarse surface. The jury agreed that this was a series of books of clear graphic distinction.
OPERA PRIMA
Voir le jour
Text and illustrations byEmma Giuliani
Editions des GrandesPersonnes – Paris, France, 2013
What the Jury said
This elegantly simple, unfolding concertina book invites us to look beyond the monochrome to find the hidden colours of everyday life. A book full of little surprises that reveal and illuminate the cycle of life in an understated yet highly effective manner.
The hair
Text and illustrations bySooyoung Kim
Somebooks – Seoul, South Korea, 2013
What the Jury said
Sooyung Kim creates an intense and disturbing world in this handcrafted production. The book explores themes of alienation and ‘difference’. The suffering and pain of the central character in transition is described with powerful drama and intensity. A strong left to right linear dynamic heightens the sense of the character’s physical and metaphorical journey. Disturbing and enigmatic, this is a highly compelling debut.
Зіркиімаковізернята (Stars and Poppy Seeds)
Text and illustrations byRomanaRomanyshynandAndriyLesiv
VydavnytastvoStarogo Leva (The Old Lion Publishing House) – Lviv, Ukraine, 2013
What the Jury said
The theme of mathematics is explored in this narrative of a girl’s desire to count everything in the world. Each page becomes a pattern of numbers and shapes, dots and symbols in a flowing collage of the visual accoutrements of scientific knowledge. The central character playfully interacts with the objects of her obsession across the pages. The medium of digital collage is used with assurance, successfully integrating found graphic material and hand-rendered marks.
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