Jake Makes a World: Jacob Lawrence, A Young Artist in Harlem: A Picture Book

by Sharifa Rhodes-Pitts, Christopher Myers (Illustrator)

Overview

Award-winning creators Sharifa Rhodes-Pitts and Christopher Myers’s picture bookJake Makes a World follows the creative adventures of the young Jacob Lawrence as he finds inspiration in the vibrant colors and characters of his community in Harlem.

From his mother’s apartment, where he is surrounded by brightly colored walls with intricate patterns; to the streets full of familiar and not-so-familiar faces, sounds, rhythms, and smells; to the art studio where he goes each day after school to transform his everyday world on an epic scale, Jake takes readers on an enchanting journey through the bustling sights and sounds of his neighborhood.

Includes a reproduction of an actual Migration series panel

“Rhodes-Pitts has written a clear, simple tale, told in present tense and filled with colorful imagery. Myers’s art has a looser, sketchier quality than Lawrence’s more graceful figures, but both artists demonstrate a passion for vibrant, eye-popping colors that powerfully capture the African American experience.” —School Library Journal (Starred Review)

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9780870709654
Publisher:	The Museum of Modern Art
Publication date:	06/30/2015
Pages:	44
Sales rank:	169,964
Product dimensions:	9.10(w) x 11.80(h) x 0.50(d)
Age Range:	4 - 8 Years

About the Author

Sharifa Rhodes-Pitts is an award-winning writer and historian whose work has appeared in the New York Times, Harper’s, Vogue, and Essence, among other publications. Originally from Houston, she graduated from Harvard and was a Fulbright Scholar. She lives in New York City. Christopher Myers is an award-winning author and illustrator of children’s books, notably Harlem and Black Cat, which won the Coretta Scott King Award. He lives in New York City.

Editorial Reviews

STARRED REVIEW
“... illustrator Myers has captured the vibrant energy, bold hues, and expressionist shapes of Lawrence’s work. Rhodes-Pitts, meanwhile contributes colorful, energetic text... When an acclaimed author-illustrator team collaborate on a subject who is getting his due at a major museum, you're going to see heightened awareness and interest.

Booklist

STARRED REVIEW
“... illustrator Myers has captured the vibrant energy, bold hues, and expressionist shapes of Lawrence’s work. Rhodes-Pitts, meanwhile contributes colorful, energetic text... When an acclaimed author-illustrator team collaborate on a subject who is getting his due at a major museum, you're going to see heightened awareness and interest.”—Booklist

"Vibrant hues and diagonal elements animate the straightforward accounts of street-corner preachers and checkers players... this is a dynamic and creative introduction to a groundbreaking artist and an iconic collection."—Kirkus

**STARRED REVIEW**
"...Rhodes-Pitts has written a clear, simple tale, told in present tense and filled with colorful imagery. Myers’s art has a looser, sketchier quality than Lawrence’s more graceful figures, but both artists demonstrate a passion for vibrant, eye-popping colors that powerfully capture the African American experience... VERDICT Creative youngsters may be motivated to craft works about their own neighborhoods."—School Library Journal

From the Publisher

STARRED REVIEW
“... illustrator Myers has captured the vibrant energy, bold hues, and expressionist shapes of Lawrence’s work. Rhodes-Pitts, meanwhile contributes colorful, energetic text... When an acclaimed author-illustrator team collaborate on a subject who is getting his due at a major museum, you're going to see heightened awareness and interest.

Booklist

★ 11/01/2015
PreS-Gr 2—A picture book biography on renowned painter Jacob Lawrence (1917–2000). Lawrence moved to Harlem in 1930 to rejoin his mother, who had moved to New York three years earlier in search of work. Lawrence was 13 years old and already a gifted artist. Stirred by the sights, sounds, and bustling movement he saw and heard in his new neighborhood, which was abuzz with the creativity of the Harlem Renaissance, he produced bold, vivid art; fortunately, he had the opportunity to attend an after-school arts program in which he honed his considerable talents. Inspired by Lawrence's early years and his deep desire to represent the people and community around him, Rhodes-Pitts has written a clear, simple tale, told in present tense and filled with colorful imagery. Myers's art has a looser, sketchier quality than Lawrence's more graceful figures, but both artists demonstrate a passion for vibrant, eye-popping colors that powerfully capture the African American experience. Myers's illustrations are energetic and flowing, though facial features—absent in Lawrence's work—are less successful. Several of Lawrence's paintings from his famous Migration series are interspersed throughout and identified in the back matter. There is also a short biographical piece about Lawrence and his work. VERDICT Creative youngsters may be motivated to craft works about their own neighborhoods. Pair this with Patricia MacLachlan's The Iridescence of Birds (Roaring Brook, 2014), about the boyhood of another 20th-century master, Henri Matisse, for an artist-themed lesson or storytime.—Carol Goldman, Queens Library, NY

School Library Journal

2015-08-26
Coinciding with the Museum of Modern Art's exhibition of Jacob Lawrence's Migration series, this title imagines the artist as a young teenager experiencing his own move from Philadelphia to Harlem in 1930. With just a few sentences per spread, historian Rhodes-Pitts describes Jake's reactions to the colors and textures of once-familiar furnishings—things he has been separated from since his mother sought work in New York three years earlier: "His feet sink deep into the thick blue rug. When his toes touch the ground, it's like a sky upside down." Perhaps to suggest that the adolescent is already thinking artistically or that he is noticing his stimulating milieu, Myers inserts sly visual references to 20th-century painters. In addition to Matisse and Miró, he pays homage to O'Keeffe as the boy peers into "Starlight Night" through his window. Vibrant hues and diagonal elements animate the straightforward accounts of street-corner preachers and checkers players. The author adopts a more lyrical tone as Jake visits the Utopia Children's House for art classes after school. In the penultimate scene, Myers depicts the young man building his neighborhood inside a shoebox with figures that foreshadow the compositions in the final spread of five Migration scenes. Comprising 24 pages, the narrative closes a bit abruptly; nonetheless, this is a dynamic and creative introduction to a groundbreaking artist and an iconic collection. (biographical note, selected works, museum trustees) (Picture book. 4-8)

Kirkus Reviews