Eric Carle is a well-known American Designer and also an illustrator of exemplary graphical work that brought change to kid’s literature through his outstanding book that employed appealing illustrations. One of his best literature book is The Very Hungry Caterpillar , which was sold worldwide with over 38 million copies. Carle was born in Syracuse on 25 th June 1925 in New York City by Eric and Johanna Carlie (Klingberg, 1977). When Carle turned six years old, his family moved to their native home, Stuttgart in Germany. Carlie received his early childhood education in Stuttgart and later received his degree at the same place in a local school of arts. When WWII broke out, Carlie’s father was conscripted into the German Army where he later turned broke after he was held as a prisoner for long (Klingberg, 1977). Carlie also got conscripted into the army at the age of 15 years old where he greatly suffered psychologically as a result of the war (Klingberg, 1977). The psychological torture that he faced made him long to return to America, but in the year 1995, he eventually shifted to New York where he luckily secured his first employment in graphic design for a popular publication. Still, at the emergence of the Korean War, he was sketched to join the American army, and on his return, he was employed once more by The New York Times in the department of promotions (Klingberg, 1977).
Through his hard work, Carle worked his way up the ladder, and he later became the director of arts within the advertising company (Klingberg, 1977). Additionally, the illustrations of Carle on the red lobster caught the attention of Bill Martin’s junior who was an author as well as an educator. Bill asked for Carlie assistance in picture illustrations of the book, Brown Bear, Brown Bear, What Do You See? Which gained significant success in its 1967 publication (Klingberg, 1977). The book as a great deal as it initiated Carlie’s career as a writer in children’s stories as well as an illustrator. Other literary works of Carle include 1,2,3 to the Zoo , The Hungry Caterpillar and The Grouchy Ladybug . Carle has also penned down and designed over seventy picture-books which have been translated into over thirty languages. The artwork of Carle employs the handcraft collages, a unique art technique that is distinct and appealing to the eyes. In the year 2009, Google saluted The Very Hungry Caterpillar , by Carlie though giving him a platform to design the Google Doodle of the book for Google homepage in celebration of early spring (Klingberg, 1977). Also, in 2003, Carle won the Laura Ingalls Wilder Award because of his contribution in children’s book as a living author and an illustrator.
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The typical genre of Eric Carle is Children’s picture books written in distinctive styles that are unique and recognisable. The artworks of Carle are created by utilising hand-painted papers neatly cut in layers forming bright-coloured images (Bryant, Keiper, & Petit, 2006). Additionally, may literature books of Carle have extra dimensions such as twinkling lights for instance in The Very Lonely Firefly . The major theme in Carle’s genre is inspired by his exceptional love for nature- a unique and common interest shared by almost all small children (Bryant, Keiper, & Petit, 2006). Carle tries to make his literary work entertaining and at the same time offers the readers a chance to learn something from the surrounding world. Furthermore, Carle tries to recognise the feelings of kids, their inquisitiveness, their creativity and also their tries to stimulate their intellectual reasoning (Bryant, Keiper, & Petit, 2006).
The strategies that Carle utilises in selecting and also developing his ideas are based on his attempt to close the gap between a home and a school environment (Bryant, Keiper, & Petit, 2006). In a home environment, the author attempts to make the surrounding warm, secure, playful and enjoyable for children. On the other hand, a school environment which in most kids represents a strange environment with few friends, teachers and classmates, the author tries to make it friendly and interesting for kids. Children learning, therefore, becomes fun and also fascinating, a factor that boosts the creativity of kids and replaces the fear and school boredom with a positive message.
Some of the books written by Carle are:
The Very Hungry Caterpillar
Carle, E. (2000). The Very Hungry Caterpillar . Early Years Educator , 2 (3).
1,2,3 to the Zoo
Carle, E. (1968). 1, 2, 3 to the Zoo . World Publishing Company.
he Secret Birthday Message
Carle, E., & Banks. (1972). The secret birthday message . HarperCollins
Publishers.
Brown Bear, Brown Bear, What Do You See? (illustrator)
Bear, B., & Bear, B. (2003). What Do You See? Print-Fiction). Martin, Bill, Jr. and Carle, Eric, illus. Henry Holt & Co., Inc.(FEN) .
Pancakes, Pancakes!
Carle, E. (1998). Pancakes, Pancakes! Simon and Schuster.
The main issues that I can learn from Eric Carle’s website related to the accuracy of gender, culture, ethnicity, religion and children with disabilities are as follows. First, the author utilises a gender-neutral language on his website in replacement of masculine or feminine pronouns such as “he” and “she”. Carle also uses neural names such as mankind in replacement of generic nouns that end with the word “man” which mare create a sense of gender disparity among kids. Also, the author uses plain animation images that do no portray specific race religion or culture. In using such animated images, the reader on the website may not have any feeling of cultural, ethnic or religious disparity, especially in young children.
The author’s style in his work of arts is tailored uniquely and can be recognised easily because of his collage technique by use of papers painted manually and cut into colourful layers. Also, many literature books of Carle have extra dimensions such as twinkling lights for instance in The Very Lonely Firefly . The patterns that Carle uses in his artwork expresses a strong interest in children in an attempt to entertain them, recognise their inner feelings as kids, their creativity and psychological growth (Bryant, Keiper, & Petit, 2006). For teachers, it becomes easy to illustrate the images to the learners and promotes fast understanding in class.
In conclusion, Eric Carle is a well-known American Designer and also an illustrator of exemplary graphical work that brought change to kid’s literature through his outstanding book that employed appealing illustrations. One of his best literature book is The Very Hungry Caterpillar , which was sold worldwide with over 38 million copies. The typical genre of Eric Carle is Children’s picture books written in distinctive styles that are unique and recognisable. The artworks of Carle are created by utilising hand-painted papers neatly cut in layers forming bright-coloured images. The strategies that Carle utilises in selecting and also developing his ideas are based on his attempt to close the gap between a home and a school environment. The main issues that I can learn from Eric Carle’s website related to the accuracy of gender, culture, ethnicity, religion, children with disabilities.
References
"Biographical Notes for Eric Carle" . The Official Eric Carle Web Site
Bryant, M. A., Keiper, M., & Petit, A. (2006). Learning about Fall with Children's Literature: Cross-Curricular Units Based on the Works of Eric Carle, Robert Kalan, Ludwig Bemelmans and More . Chicago Review Press.
Klingberg, D. R. (1977). PROFILE: Eric Carle. Language Arts , 54 (4), 445-452.
