We have spent this past week attending our third Bologna Children's book fair and it's been wonderful! For starters Bologna, the city itself is a hive of activity over this week with exhibitions and events popping up all over the place. The Fair itself is a visual feast with Illustration on display at every turn, great talks and conferences and lots of meetings and introductions to new and interesting people. Here are a couple of highlights...
We were invited to an exhibition opening called 'The Horse'. Featuring a variety of Latvian illustrators/authors and their interpretation of what kind of story a horse might tell. Our lovely friend Ruta Briede had work featured in it and there was a beautiful catalogue to accompany it.
Also got to see the exhibition called 'The Forest' which featured illustrations by some of my favourite italian illustrators, Valerio Vidali and Violeta Lopiz. The artworks are from a book with the same name written by Riccardo Bozzi. The exhibition was held in Zoo cafe and I thought it was really creative the way they had incorporated the elements of paper cut and paintings into the actual display of the work. It was also great to see some of the process and storyboarding, as well as the final artworks.
All in all, we had so much fun and it was over before you knew what had happened! Onwards to London for the London Book Fair which takes place in a weeks time!