PaperTigers Blog » Spoonbridge and Cherry http://www.papertigers.org/wordpress Mon, 13 Feb 2012 22:17:47 +0000 en hourly 1 http://wordpress.org/?v=3.3.1 Sculpture for Kids http://www.papertigers.org/wordpress/sculpture-for-kids/ http://www.papertigers.org/wordpress/sculpture-for-kids/#comments Thu, 24 Jan 2008 15:00:05 +0000 Charlotte http://www.papertigers.org/wordpress/?p=172 3-D Scuplture ABCWhat I like about art is how it comes into your consciousness sideways while you’re thinking about something else. Bob Raczka’s recent alphabet picture book, 3-D ABC: A Sculptural Alphabet, (search at Lerner Publishing) is quirky in exactly this way. His minimal text never refers directly to the letters the images supposedly illustrate. The letters K and L, for example, are represented in a 2-page spread of Brancusi’s “The Kiss” and Robert Indiana’s “Love.” The text reads simply “Sometimes, two completely different sculptures… can say exactly the same thing.” The cover art, Rauschenberg’s Spoonbridge and Cherry at the Walker Art Center in Minneapolis, is a captivating image for any kid. (“I want to go there,” I overheard a preschooler at the library say to his mom, pointing to the cover photo.)

3-D ABC introduces images of significant 20th century sculpture by artists from Giocometti and Picasso to Jeff Koons, installed from Munich to New York to Tokyo (links are to images of works in the book). Raczka gives kids a solid sense of the range of sculptural materials, scale and subject matter. With delightful juxtaposition of images and respectfully fine reproduction quality, 3-D ABC introduces young readers to shapes that are iconic across cultures, ideas that make the world very small in a very good way.

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