African American Leaders:
Illustration by Bryan Collier

December 2, 2006 – May 20, 2007

This exhibition features the eye catching works of award winning children’s book illustrator Bryan Collier. Collier’s characteristic style combines watercolor and collage that has grown out of a lifelong fascination with texture, shape, and color. The artist described, “Collage is more than just an art style. Collage is all about bringing different elements together. Once you form a sensibility about connection, how different elements relate to each other, you deepen your understanding of yourself and others.”

Collier’s interest in art began at an early age that was encouraged at home. Some of his earliest childhood memories include watching his grandmother make quilts. Collier began painting at age fifteen and won a first place in a congressional competition in 1985. Four years later, he earned a bachelor’s of fine arts degree with honors from the prestigious Pratt Institute in New York City.

From the time he was a child Collier loved to read stories and especially enjoyed the illustrations. In 1995 the artist visited the children’s section of a bookstore. “I saw books that didn’t look, feel, or sound like me, my kids or my people,” the artist recalled. He became determined to create a book so that he could tell stories about the world in the way he saw it. After several years of hard work and perseverance, Collier published Uptown, for which he received the Coretta Scott King Medal in 2001.

Collier’s success has continued and he has received numerous honors as an author and illustrator. This exhibition includes works from seven of his books including Freedom River (Coretta Scott King Honor, 2001), I Am Your Child, God: Prayers for Our Children, Martin’s Big Words (Caldecott Honor and Coretta Scott King Honor, 2002), Rosa, Visiting Langston (Coretta Scott King Illustrator Honor, 2003), and Welcome, Precious.

“The important thing I want you to see is the fact that we’re connected,” explained Collier. “And we’re connected closer than you think we are as a human race. Emotions and feelings and ideas that you have, I have the same ones. Even our fears are some of the same. Art is a vehicle to bridge that connection, to let you see that we’re on the same path.”