Henri's Scissors

Starred review from May 27, 2013
After quickly tracing French painter Matisse’s journey to becoming an artist (“He was happy, and his paintings made people happy”) and explaining how illness left him unable to paint at the end of his life, Winter (Kali’s Song) describes his discovery of a medium less physically demanding than painting but just as expressive: painted paper and scissors. “Why didn’t I think of it earlier?” he asks delightedly. Simple, folk-style paintings show Matisse in a wheelchair in a studio amid his collages; in a quiet visual cue, a plant with oversize leaves suggests inspiration for their big, organic shapes. He continues to create until his death, another moment Winter handles gracefully: “The rainbow of shapes cradled the old artist and carried him into the heavens.” Old age can be fertile and useful, Winter implies; disability doesn’t mean the end of creating, and triumph is possible where only sadness could have been foreseen. All of these messages lie obliquely in the text, but even readers who don’t dig that deep will share Matisse’s joy. Ages 5–8. Agent: Susan Cohen, Writers House. (Aug.)■

June 15, 2013
In her extensive picture-book-biography oeuvre, Winter has proven to be particularly attuned to selecting the just-right elements of her subjects' complex lives while making them both accessible to and readily understood by young children. Here she limns the major biographical details of Matisse's long life: A French law student recovering and on bed rest after an appendectomy is given a paint set; he discovers his true calling, abandons the law, moves to Paris and embarks on a long career as a member of the Fauvist movement. Many years later, once again bedridden and frail, he begins the final and perhaps most enduring stage of his work. Winter both describes and employs Matisse's signature, late-career technique of brilliantly colored, hand-painted, cut-paper compositions. She enlivens the simple text with liberal yet judicious quotes from Matisse's letters and comments from contemporaries. This is a beautifully designed book that will certainly connect with readers, although the closing spreads may be too poetically obscure for the intended school-age audience. Winter writes that at Matisse's death, "the rainbow of shapes cradled the old artist and carried him into the heavens." The book's final question, "Are some of the stars we see at night coming to us from Henri's scissors?" seems forced. This soaringly sentimental resolution notwithstanding, the book is a charming introduction to a widely reproduced, child-friendly artist, one that children will assuredly encounter and affirmingly embrace. (author's note) (Picture book/biography. 5-8)

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June 1, 2013

K-Gr 3-At age 72, following surgery for cancer, Henri Matisse was too weak to paint. During his convalescence at the seaside, he picked up scissors and began cutting shapes from painted paper. In his own words, "It seems to me that I am in a second life." Winter's picture-book biography focuses on that second life, neatly summarizing his childhood and career in the first eight pages: "He kept on painting, forgot about law, and left his small town to be an artist in Paris." Winter captures the joy that Matisse found in cut paper, both through her acrylic and cut-paper illustrations and through quotes from his letters. The images are evocative of his art, with bright colors and rounded shapes. The first pages, depicting his youth and adulthood, are deeply framed like museum art, then transition to full-page compositions when his life changes due to illness. The author addresses his death with a light touch: "Then one night, Matisse walked into his paper garden, and the rainbow of shapes cradled the old artist and carried him into the heavens," where perhaps he now uses his scissors to make the stars in the night sky. Libraries with demand for picture-book biographies and art history will want to add this well-done title to their collections.-Suzanne Myers Harold, Multnomah County Library System, Portland, OR

Copyright 2013 School Library Journal, LLC Used with permission.

Starred review from June 1, 2013
Grades K-3 *Starred Review* Masterful picture-book biographer Winter (The Watcher, 2011) offers an elegant, accessible portrait of expressive artist Henri Matisse. She tackles his childhood, law career, and establishment as a painter of note in the first eight pages, using small, square-frame illustrations with text placed above and below. As an old man, Matisse becomes ill, and the book turns a stylistic corner, spending the balance of its pages exploring the changes in his circumstances and the subsequent development of his medium and his genius. Unable to paint, he begins cutting shapes from paper and dives into the process, allowing his shapes to grow with his imagination. And the book adapts in turn, the imagery now sprawling across pages, filling the space with rich color in exuberant compositions. At the end, Matisse falls into dreaming, joining his shapes in the heavens, and Winter wonders, Are some of the stars we see at night coming from Henri's scissors? Perhaps. With a gentle narrative dotted with quotes from the artist himself, luminous illustrations, and a warm, celebratory spirit, this exemplary picture-book biography delivers a clear, sensitive portrait of the whole man, story and soul alike. A brief author's note concludes.(Reprinted with permission of Booklist, copyright 2013, American Library Association.)