My Name Is Georgia: A Portrait by Jeanette Winter
"When I was twelve years old, I knew what I wanted--to be an artist." So beginsMy Name Is Georgia, Jeanette Winter's lovely picture-book portrait of American artist Georgia O'Keeffe. It is a portrait of a strong-minded young girl who liked to play by herself, dress differently from her sisters, and let her black hair fly when others wore braids. And it is the portrait of an artist who lived to be 98 years old, letting the world see things as she saw them through her remarkable paintings. This small book--with sparse, carefully chosen prose--traces O'Keeffe's life through her schooling in Chicago and New York, and her first trek to Texas: "And I painted the sunset and the sky and the wonderful loneliness and emptiness of the place. I painted day and night." From there she experienced the "canyons of steel" of New York City, "where other artists lived," then it was off to the New Mexico desert. Winter does an exquisite job of reflecting an artist's creative life--how she wanted others to see flowers the way she saw them, how she painted them "BIG, so people would notice." The author's illustrations, perfect squares on white pages with the occasional cloud or bird drifting out of the lines, make this small, powerful tribute shine.  (Ages 6 and older)--Karin Snelson--This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.