David Seow's Blog, page 25

Asian Festival of Children's Content, Day Three

AFCC Day Two: Picture Books and After Reading Activities with Ying Chang Compestine and Dr George Jacobs,

a volunteer, Vasantha, Kenneth and Adan Living the Singapore StoryLike a bird of prey circling its victims, it was only a matter of time before the talons of the cough I felt coming on the previous night, snatched the last vestiges of my health yesterday morning. Hack! Cough! Phlegm!

So I downed a couple tablets of paracetamol, chugged down my  a variety of cough syrup. It's not dangerous to mix two different kinds, is it? Oh, well, if it is then perhaps my books will eventually sell well. Denise, I bequeath you sole distributorship of all my books and some of my original author illustrations!

The weather here hasn't helped things so after three showers, I made it down to the Library for the second day of AFCC, the Parents Forum. I was scheduled to moderate Picture Books and Activities for After Reading  with best-selling and award-winning author Ying Chang Compestine and Dr George Jacobs. 

I had never moderated before and when Alycia from the Book Council asked me to do so, I thought are you completely NUTS! What if I mess up? I'm most comfortable speaking to an audience that requires afternoon naps - either the very young or the very old. Nevertheless, I agreed to so 

I met Ying during her brief visit to Singapore last year but I had never met Dr Jacobs before. We met a few minutes before the session at Closetful of books before adjourning to the Multipurpose room for the discussion.

The room was packed!! I fumbled over my introduction and then Ying  started her presentation. I wish I had such confidence and a command over the subject matter when I talk. She had the audience enthralled from the get go and that's no hyperbole as she went through the picture books that she's written and the inspiration behind each of them

First Day of AFCC

Denise with her large Closetful of Books
Celebrity in da house: Rilla Melati
Kelvin with the award-nominated books
Check out the delegates who couldn't wait for the festival to start!!

Asian Festival of Children's Content, Day One: Launch and Hedwig Anuar Children's Book Award Prize Presentation

The Asian Festival of Children's Content kicked off  it's week-long series of events including:  talks, workshops, masterclasses, speed pitching rounds and, the very first ever AFCC retreat on the Indonesian island of Bintan.
While a select few authors and illustrators were on their way to a literary adventure of a lifetime with Andrea Passion-Flores, Sarah Odedina, Candy Gourlay and Catarina Sobral, the majority of the delegates were at the Mochtar Riardy Auditorium of the SMU Administration Building for AFCC's opening ceremony and Hedwig Anuar Children's Book Award prize presentation.




Book Council Chairman, Claire Chiang delivered the opening address before Guest-of-Honour Minister-in-charge of Muslim Affairs,  Minister of Communications and Information, Yacoob Ibrahim, spoke of the stories his grandmother regaled him with in his childhood.




Then Edmund Lim, Chief Judge of the Hedwig Anuar Children's Book Awards spoke briefly of the judging process and before the guest-of-honour was invited back on stage to present the prize.




After a few moments of keeping the audience in suspense,
The nominees were:  'Hidden in Plain Sight' by Su-Lin Ang, 'Letters to Aly' by Li-Ann, 'The Mango Tree' by Hidayah Amin, 'Not in the Stars' by Pauline Loh , The Diary of Amos Lee: Monkeying in Malaysia' by Adeline Foo, illustrated by Stephanie Wong. 

After a few moments of keeping us in suspense, the emcee announced that it was a tie. The winners of this year's award
'The Rock and the Bird' by Chew Chia Shao Wei  and Angee Neo and 'The Mango Tree' by Hidayah Amin and Idris Ali.









Congratulations to the winners and the finalists, well-deserved, well-deserved. 

 My publisher Edmund Wee is all smiles below after securing a second consecutive win with one of his books. Do you think it's a good time to ask for a royalty increase? Thanks, Edmund, we love you!

Coming Soon...

Book Illustrators Gallery Launch

Last Saturday I attended the launch of the Book Illustrators Gallery aka BIG at the National Library, which is the first  BIG (pardon the pun) event leading up to the annual Asian Festival of Children's Content. 
At the inaugural launch of BIG back in 2011, around 30 illustrations were featured.  But this year illustrators from Afghanistan, Australia, Canada, China, Hong Kong, India, Indonesia, Iran, Israel, Korea, Lithuania, Malaysia, New Zealand, Philippines, Russia, Singapore, Taiwan and the United Kingdom submitted  their works for consideration.  Out of the 150 entries, 103 were eventually selected for inclusion for the BIG.   It's really encouraging to see so many talented illustrators from around the world who are interested in having their artwork displayed in the BIG during the AFCC!


Book Council Ex-Co Member Koh Juat Muay and Gallery Curator Susanna Goho
One of the featured illustrators was my friend, Dave Liew and I convinced him to pose for a quick snap with his illustrations right before the launch. Oh, before I forget, my genius illustrator Soefara also has an illustration in the gallery. 
David Liew
This year renown and popular illustrator Lee Kow Fong spoke about his journey as an illustrator.  He told the audience that it's never too late to start illustrating as he went for an illustration course  in the United Kingdom at the age of 39! I have to say that's very inspiriting  and there's still hope for me. In fact, I may just follow suit even though I'm only 31 +++++++......

Lee Kow Fong

Next, Festival Director and Deputy Director of the National Book Development Council of Singapore, Kenneth Quek, delivered his opening address before presenting guest of honour, Venka Purushothaman, with  a  token of appreciation from gallery curator Susanna Goho.
Kenneth addresses the guests
Kenneth Quek,  Venka Purushothaman, and Susana Goho-Quek After the official launch, I managed to catch up with the guest of honour, Venka Purushothaman, Provost of Lasalle College of the Arts, to ask him about his thoughts on picture book illustrations.

What are your thoughts on children’s picture book illustrations?
Picture books, in terms of illustrations, are highly developed with much scope to grow. What I see is a lot of really in-depth reflection and reflexivity that’s emerging amongst young designers, illustrators and storytellers.  It’s something we should develop as a community of practice. With picture books people might look at the illustrations as images that inherently support the story.  But, in actual fact, illustrations have a whole ecology and economy of ways of telling stories and they have their own vocabulary, so I think it’s very important for us to celebrate that field and very specifically find ways to build discourse around it. Events like BIG (Book Illustrators Gallery) help build discourse. It’s not just about the images but what they really mean and how do they deepen our understanding of the world around us. So I think it’s a very significant area to be developed extensively through a community of practice.
Can you remember your first picture book?
Not really. I was a child who grew up on Mad Magazine. I was a child of the 70s. [At that time]  It was very much about the Walt Disney and Hanna Barbera way of illustrating  [cartoons] that influenced every young person through the medium of television. Television was the ‘book’ from which we loved to understand illustration. Having said that, the segue-way into the literary world is a very different aspect of it. In a sense the field of illustration and picture books were very divorced from each other. Things were illustrated in order to teach something. While the picture books are able to tell the story without the words. Of course there are historians who say that this links into cave paintings and whole structure of storytelling. In contemporary medium you have books, television and radio that tell stories in different ways.
Does Lasalle have a course on Picture illustration?
We actually do. We don’t teach it as a full course but we do have image and illustration [modules] but we do have it on several fronts. First of all in Lasalle the designers have to do storytelling through image making. Everything in art and design is about a story. But how do you express it. We have students who partner with art therapy students and they have created books just for the  therapeutic world. In the fine art world, we have been working with the medical sector with medical illustrations. Storytelling is a massively big part of the college and we believe that art and storytelling is not divorced.

What do you think of the illustrations you see here in Singapore?
The Singapore illustrations are phenomenal and there’s a lot of raw energy emerging and it requires a lot more mentorship and guidance and referencing to other international illustrators and people who have established practices.


Thank you, Mr Purushothaman.



Now, if you'd like to check out the Book Illustrators Gallery, head on down to the National Library. The exhibition runs until the 11th of June.

Welcome HRH Princess Charlotte Elizabeth Diana

Congratulations to the Duke and Duchess of Cambridge and Prince George and welcome to Princess Cambridge. Here's just a teaser of the upcoming A Day with the Duchess #2: A Royal Adventure.


HRH Princess Charlotte Elizabeth Diana

It's a Princess!!

Congratulations to the Duke and Duchess of Cambridge and Prince George and welcome to Princess Cambridge.

The Asian Festival of Children's Content 2015

It's almost time for the biggest children's literary event in the region - The Asian Festival of Children's Content - or AFCC as it is popularly known. 

If you're an aspiring author or illustrator, it's the place to be. This year the conference will be a week-long affair that includes a Teacher's congress, Parents Forum, and the Writers & Illustrators Conference as well as masterclasses, seminars, workshops and a media summit. 

Wendy Orr
With Sally Gardner Susanne Gervay
Candy Gourlay, Wendy Orr, Sally Gardner, Susanne Gervay, Marjorie Coughlan, Corinne Robson, Leonard Marcus, James Mayhew, Christopher Cheng, Ken Spillman, Andrew Weale, Norm Jorgensen, James Foley, Suzy Lee, Yusof Gajah, Emily Lim, Shamini Flint, Dianne Wolfer, Eliza Teoh, Adeline Foo, Sarah Odedina, Otto Fong, David Liew are just some of the illustrious speakers who have attended the event. You'll even have a chance to pitch your story ideas at a speed pitching session and you can also have your illustrations or stories critiqued at the First Look and First Pages critique panels.


Leonard Marcus and James Mayhew
Ken SpillmanAuthors nominated for the Scholastic Picture Book Award and the Hedwig Anuar Children's Book Award will find out who will walk away with the top prizes at the festival. 


The Hedwig Anuar Children's Book Award So the event is kind of like the Oscars of the Asian Children's Lit scene, except there won't be any paparazzi, red carpet fashions or a red carpet for that matter and Wolgang Puck will not have a legion of his chefs whipping up a banquet at the AFCC closing dinner.



This year, I'll be speaking on conducting school visits with my fellow author, Sarah Mousey, AKA my competition :). As you can see I've made her bio really, really, really small. ;) So come on, people, register now! JK, Sarah, you'll have to start your own blog to get back at me! :) :) :)






CLICK THIS LINK TO REGISTER

Visit to Winstedt School

After a brief hiatus from school visits, I made a trip to Winstedt School for a story-telling last week with Denise from Closetful of Books. As always the kids were great. Thanks for having me over Winstedt School!