Image Credit: Tomie dePaola His Art & Stories on Amazon
Contents
Image Credit: Tomie dePaola His Art & Stories on Amazon
Image Credit: Tomie dePaola His Art & Stories on Amazon
Image Credit: Tomie dePaola His Art & Stories on Amazon
Image Credit: Tomie dePaola His Art & Stories on Amazon
Image Credit: Tomie dePaola His Art & Stories on Amazon
Image Credit: Tomie dePaola His Art & Stories on Amazon
Image Credit: Tomie dePaola His Art & Stories on Amazon
Tomie dePaola as His Sister’s Partner for a Ballet Performance
Image Credit: Tomie dePaola His Art & Stories on Amazon
Tomie dePaola – Dancing with a Fellow Art Student at a Pratt Event
Storymaking
Tomie, Where Do You Get Your Stories?
“The desire to write stories, as well as to illustrate them, was always part of dePaola’s career plans. His first attemptppand second publishing effort–was a (short-lived original tale, The Wonderful Dragon of Timlin; Parker Pig, Esquire, and The Monsters’ Ball–which, he says ‘are best counted as learning experiences.’ Most of his energy during these early publishing years was concentrated on sharpening his illustrator techniques, but gradually tales of his own began taking shape in his mind.” Elleman, pg. 101.
Autobiographical Tales
The Beginning of the 26 Fairmount Series
“His father, an ardent photographer and also a home-movie buff, rarely let a birthday party, summer picnic at a beach, Christmas festivit, or any family gathering go by without recording it on film.The great-grandparents, grandparents, parents, siblings, and other relatives who once so reail posed for the senion dePaola’s camera now inhabit his son’s stories, radiating warmth and believability.
“DePaola, the recipient of tese family treasures, says that these old home movies provide him with laughs and memories; it is obvious they furnish inspirational grist for his ever-active, crative mind. … In Nana Upstairs & Downstairs, the progagonist’s father is seen in the background with a home movie camera; in Tom and in The Baby Sister, photographic-style drawings identify the characters; in The Art Lesson, his photographer cousins make a cameo appearance; and in Flicks, a bo enjoys five ‘silent films’ at the local movie theater. In a more general manner, his father’s old movies reconnect dePaoloa with his past and act as a memory check for the background details that give such warm ambience to his illustrations. And while the artist has an acute recollection about events of his. childhood, viewing these [pg. 25] films and photos can’t help but solidify the relatives’ images as he works to capture their identities and likenesses in his artwork.
“Whatever the source, dePaola’s wonderful assortment of Irish and Italian relatives arrives on the page richly arrayed in costume. expression, and personality. Reading dePaoloa’s autobiographical books is akin to getting to know the family–some sadness and pain show through, but love abounds. He contends that turning his childhood joys and traumas into stories delivers a core of reality that children can relate to and allows himself, as the writer, the opportunity for fictional invention.
“DePaola the child is, of course, the focus of these stories. Readers meet him most often as the character Tommy–altough sometimes he appars under other monikers. Tommy made his debut in Nana in 1973; then, after a sixteen-year absence, he returned in three titles (The Art Lesson, Tom, and The Baby Sister}
In between, dePaola continued drawing upon his childhood experiences, veiling himself umder other character names. He is Bobby in Now One Foot, Now the Other; Joey in Watch Out for the Chicken Feet in Your Soup; Andy in Andy, That’s M Name; and Oliver in Oliver Button Is a Sissy
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