|
Jan Brett lives in a seacoast town in Massachusetts, close to where
she grew up. During the summer her family moves to a home in the
Berkshire Hills.
As a child, Jan Brett decided to be an illustrator and spent many
hours reading and drawing. She says, "I remember the special
quiet of rainy days, when I felt that I could enter the pages of
my beautiful picture books. Now I try to re-create that feeling
of believing that the imaginary place I'm drawing really exists.
The detail in my work helps to convince me, and I hope others as
well, that such places might be real."
As a student at the Boston Museum School, she spent hours in the
Museum of Fine Arts. "It was overwhelming to see room-size
landscapes and towering stone sculpture, and then moments later
to refocus on delicately embroidered kimonos and ancient porcelain,"
she says. "I'm delighted and surprised when fragments of these
beautiful images come back to me in my painting."
Travel is also a constant inspiration. Together with her husband,
who is a member of the Boston Symphony Orchestra, Jan Brett visits
many different countries, where she researches the architecture
and costumes that appear in her work. "From cave paintings
to Norwegian sleighs, to Japanese gardens, I study the traditions
of the many countries I visit and use them as a starting point for
my children's books."
|
