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Australian Nominees for the HCA Award 2014

IBBY Australia Inc is proud to announce its nominations for the prestigious biennial Hans Christian Andersen Awards for writing and illustration in 2014 – Ron Brooks for Illustration and Nadia Wheatley for Writing.

The HCA Award is the highest international recognition given to a living author and illustrator whose complete works have made a lasting contribution to children’s literature. It honours the achievements of creators nominated by the over seventy national sections of the International Board on Books for Young People. The Award for Writing has been presented since 1956 and the Illustrator’s Award since 1966. Australia has made a number of past nominations and in 1986 was recipient of both awards – Patricia Wrightson for Writing and Robert Ingpen for Illustration.
On the 25th March at the Bologna Children’s Book Fair, IBBY announced that 60 nominations had been received from its member sections for the 2014 HCA awards. The international jury members will now start assessing the nominations and IBBY will announce the winners at the Bologna Children’s Book Fair in March 2014.
The Award, which consists of a gold medal and a diploma, will be presented at a festive ceremony during the biennial IBBY Congress which will be held in Mexico City in 2014. Her Majesty Queen Margrethe II of Denmark is the Patron of the Awards. Since 2009, Nami Island Inc. from the Republic of Korea has been the generous sponsor of the Andersen Awards.
Australia’s 2014 nominees are well-known both in Australia and in international children’s publishing:

Ron Brooks is an artist who works across a range of disciplines, including painting, sculpture, printmaking and illustration. In the forty years he has been making children’s books he has won many awards, including the Children’s Book Council of Australia Picture Book of the Year Award (three times), and is published in many languages around the world. Two of his earlier books, The Bunyip of Berkeley’s Creek (1973) and John Brown, Rose and the Midnight Cat (1977), both written by Jenny Wagner, are widely recognized as the books that introduced Australian picture books onto the world scene. Three of his more recently acclaimed books are Old Pig (1995), Fox (2000), and The Dream of the Thylacine (2011), all written by Margaret Wild and published by Allen & Unwin. His memoir Drawn from the Heart, published by Allen & Unwin (2010), explores both the joy and pain of the creative process. More recently, The Coat, written by Julie Hunt, was published by Allen & Unwin (2012), and Margaret Wild’s On the Day You Were Born will be published by Allen & Unwin in 2013. He lives in the Huon Valley, in Tasmania.

Nadia Wheatley writes for both adults and young people. Her award-winning books cover the genres of fiction, history, biography and picture books, and reflect her commitment to social justice. Nadia’s first book, Five Times Dizzy, was often described as the first multicultural children’s book in this country. With Donna Rawlins she created one of the most enduring classics in our literature – the multigenerational picture book My Place (1987). Her novels for teenagers have been equally influential with The House That was Eureka (1985) (being re-released this year as a Text Classic), The Blooding (1987), and Vigil (2000) each published by Penguin. During the period 1998-2001 Nadia Wheatley and artist Ken Searle worked as consultants at the school at Papunya (an Aboriginal community in the Western Desert, Northern Territory). As part of their work, they helped forty Indigenous staff and students produce the multi-award-winning Papunya School Book of Country and History (Allen & Unwin). In 2005 Nadia Wheatley and Ken Searle developed an innovative Harmony project with children from Muslim, Catholic and state schools in Sydney’s south-west. Examples of the students’ writing and art are included in the picture book Going Bush (Allen & Unwin), which is illustrated and designed by Ken and has a narrative text by Nadia. Her vast children’s history Australians All (Allen & Unwin) is due for release shortly. She resides in NSW.
For further information contact: Dr Robyn Sheahan-Bright, Chair, HCA Sub-Committee of the IBBY Australia Inc Committee

International Children’s Book Day – Sydney Celebrations

IBBY Australia invites you to celebrate International Children’s Book Day

Feasting on Literature

Saturday 6th April 2013, 2:00pm
Santa Maria del Monte Junior School
59 The Boulevarde (between Margaret and Carrington Streets)
Strathfield, New South Wales 2135

Professor Robyn Ewing
on
Quality Literature in the Australian Curriculum

and

Anna Fienberg and Kim Gamble
on
Tashi and the World

Full details in the flyer

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Limited Edition prints by 2008 HC Andersen Australian Illustrator Nominee Shaun Tan

IBBY Australia (Inc) Offers Limited Edition prints by 2008 HC Andersen Australian Illustrator Nominee Shaun Tan

The perfect gift to celebrate a special occasion – Birthday, Anniversary, Retirement, Thank You, or Farewell

These fine art prints are in a limited edition run of 200 signed and numbered by the artist.  Splitting Image printers in Melbourne offer high quality and accurate Giclee prints using light fast inks on archival papers

The prints are 210mm (w)  x  270mm (h) and the original medium was Gouache on paper.
Cost: $150 (unframed) $15 postage in Australia/overseas on request.
Contact Merchandise Convenor Tina Price on ibbysales@gmail.com to purchase.
See the flyer for further details.

2013 Outstanding Books for Young People with Disabilities

IBBY Australia Inc is proud to announce that three Australian titles have been chosen by the IBBY Documentation Centre of Books for Disabled Young People in Norway for inclusion in the 2013 Outstanding Books for Young People with Disabilities List.  These books will be on display at the IBBY stand at the Bologna Book Fair, Italy from the 25-28^th March and included in the Presentation on the 2013 Outstanding Books for Young People with Disabilities Press Conference on the 25^th March.

The two Young Adult novels are The Invisible Hero by Elizabeth Fensham (UQP) and Whisper by Chrissie Keighery (Hardie Grant Egmont) and the picture book is Two Mates by Melanie Prewett, illustrated by Maggie Prewett (Magabala Press).

The Invisible Hero features Philip, a dyslexic, mildly deaf boy who has been raised by his grandmother and is treated as stupid by his classmates.  Jack Mackinnon is the star of the school and uses bullying to maintain his power.  When the class is set the task of researching heroes and villains, the social order starts to unravel.  As Philip emerges from invisibility, he is revealed to have true courage.

 Whisper is about a teenager, Demi who has lost her hearing through meningitis.  She has transferred to a school for the hearing impaired.  This book deals with many of the usual struggles of teenage life, but with some extra frustrations and challenges, especially of how to choose friends.  The politics of deafness are interwoven into a very readable and engaging story.

Of particular interest to West Australians, Two Mates is set in Broome and  was written by the mother of an Indigenous boy Jack, and illustrated by his grandmother.  Maggie Prewett is the author’s mother and Jack’s grandmother. She is descended from the Ngarluma people of the Pilbara region of Western Australia and her art is held in collections throughout Australia.

This is Melanie Prewett’s first book and she was inspired to write the book after watching the friendship of the two boys grow and develop since they were babies.  Together they search for hermit crabs, fish for salmon, explore the markets, eat satays and dress up as superheros.  Only at the end of the story is it revealed that Raf is in a wheelchair, as he has spina bifida.

This picture of Jack and Raf together with Melanie and Maggie was taken at Broome Primary School where the book launch was held last year.

Further information about Outstanding Books for Young People with Disabilities can be found on the IBBY website.   Contact publishers for information about individual titles.

2012 HCA Award Nomination Certificate Presentation

Elizabeth Hutchins, Christobel with her certificate and Angelo Loukakis, Executive Director of the ASA

South Australian members of the Australian Society of Authors met for their end of year Christmas event in Adelaide on the 4th December.  Included in the evening was the presentation by Elizabeth Hutchins of the 2012 Hans Christian Andersen Award Nomination certificate to Australia’s nominee for writing, Christobel Mattingley, AM.  Mention was made of the high regard with which Christobel is held in South Australia, where she is especially loved and revered by indigenous people for producing Survival in our Own Land which is about Aboriginal experiences in the state since 1836.  Elizabeth highlighted Christobel’s care for people and our world as demonstrated in her concern for world peace in the No Guns for Asmir trilogy, conservation issues in Chelonia Green Champion of Turtles and compassion for those with disabilities in The Race.  Elizabeth concluded “Thank you – you are one of our state’s and Australia’s treasures”.