Beatrice Alemagna: “A Painter and a Writer of Stories”

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Beatrice Alemagna: “A Painter and a Writer of Stories” Anna Becchi (bio) Beatrice Alemagna was born in Bologna in 1973. Her cultured family put her in touch with many stories since she was a little child and encouraged her and her sister Veronica in their creativity. So, by the time she was eight she had already decided that, whatever the cost, once grown up she would become “a painter and a writer of stories,” which is how she likes to describe herself. Essentially a self-made artist, she perfected her graphic style at the ISIA in Urbino. When she started her career, however, the market in Italy wasn’t ready for her experimental and sophisticated illustrations; it was only later that little independent publishing houses like Topipittori, based in Milan, opened up to Alemagna’s work, and this is where most of her Italian books are still published. Click for larger view View full resolution Winning the first-prize Figures Futures at the Salon du Livre et de la Presse Jeunesse in Montreuil in 1996, she got her self- confidence boosted and realized that in France her art would be better understood. This was the reason that, one year later, Alemagna decided to move to Paris. She wanted to stay for a few months, but this land—like she said in an interview—welcomed her “with open arms” and in the end she grew roots there. She still lives in the French capital with her husband and two daughters. After working for advertisement companies, illustrating adult book covers, and designing posters for the Centre Pompidou, she specialized mainly in creating artistic picturebooks using techniques that are suited at the same time for children and adults. She has written and illustrated dozens of books for Albin Michel, Topipittori, Harper Collins, Tate Publisher, Thames & Hudson, Enchanted Lion, Frances Lincoln, Mondadori, Hélium, MoMA, Seuil, Autrement, Gallimard, Les grandes personnes, Donzelli, Didier jeunesse, Phaïdon, Mirando Bok, Rabén & Sjögren, Einaudi Edizioni, and Walker Books. Her books have received numerous awards and have been translated into multiple languages. Several of them have been selected for the White Ravens list by the International Youth Library in Munich. She has been repeatedly nominated for the Astrid Lindgren Memorial Award and the Hans Christian Andersen Award. Her artwork has been the subject of many solo exhibitions and has also been featured in group exhibitions at major museums. Alemagna always works by hand using diverse colors and media (pencils, crayons, oil color, watercolor, gouache, ink), but she often returns to the potency of mixed-media collage and experiments with other unusual stylistic means like embroidery (My Friend, 2002) or felting (Bugs in a Blanket, 2009, [End Page 67] and all her following books about bugs). She plays with perspective and composes her images in wonderful ways. She loves to mix techniques and to create hybrid forms. In her illustrations, she doesn’t like to be restricted by anything; she defies boundaries of age, time, aesthetic canons, and established conventions. She is not limited by the size of the page and so her books are often oversized, but they still talk about little things that she discovers in nature or in people’s facial expressions and emotions. Beatrice Alemagna regards herself mainly as a storytelller. For her, words are an instrument, just like a pencil or a brush. And if she doesn’t find the exact words she is looking for, she doesn’t even conceive the picture she wants to draw, so everything actually starts from the text. She explains, “To draw is to tell. Everyone who feels emotion has something to tell. Emotions keep on changing, growing, as children do. My drawings and stories change with them.” While drawing comes naturally to her, creating a book with a narrative rhythm can be difficult or even painful. When the finished book is in her hands, however, her joy and satisfaction are great. Perhaps one of her most accomplished books is Un lion à Paris (A Lion in Paris; 2006). It tells the story of a lion who, bored by his rural life in the savanna, seeks excitement and opportunity in the City of Light. Upon arriving...