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Join Michael Foreman on an incredible journey around the globe. His prolific career as an illustrator has taken him through war-torn Vietnam to the vast forests of Siberia, from Mao's China to Japan, the Arctic to the South Seas and from the top of the world to the bottom of the ocean. Armed with a pencil and watercolours, Michael's signature style captured the sights and sounds of all he encountered. These are his incredible memoirs.
About the author
Michael Foreman has written and illustrated many books for children. He has won the coveted Kate Greenaway Medal in the U.K. twice, as well as the Smarties Book Prize, the Bologna Book Prize, and many other prestigious awards. Michael divides his time between London and St. Ives in Cornwall.
Summary
Join Michael Foreman on an incredible journey around the globe. His prolific career as an illustrator has taken him through war-torn Vietnam to the vast forests of Siberia, from Mao's China to Japan, the Arctic to the South Seas and from the top of the world to the bottom of the ocean.
Report
"This extraordinary volume is an inspiration. The images, mostly in pen and watercolour and using the colours of sunsets and sweets, are an incentive to draw and to take a sketchbook everywhere you go in hope of one day achieving something like Foreman's skilled and loving line.
They invite you in, to scrutinise detail and absorb atmosphere, and they reward prolonged contemplation. They also seduce you with the variety of the world, while nuggets of text tell lyrical travellers' tales, like the wayfaring rat in The Wind of the Willows, until you have to hold yourself back from heading for the horizon.
From New York to Los Angeles, Mexico to Mongolia, the Holy Land to the Himalayas, Norway to Nigeria, Venice to the Valley of the Kings, Foreman captures the strangeness and beauty of landscape and people.
He savours particularly the splendours of Asia - of Bali, India and China - and has a talent for sneaking away from tours and schedules to discover, alone and without intervention, the essence of a place. In Japan, Foreman painted Mount Fuji 36 times, as did Hokusai, the artist with whom he most identifies. Ultimately, he also persuades us of our common global humanity, showing that football and family, for instance, matter universally."
Nicolette Jones The Sunday Times