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Lauren Stringer was born in Great Falls, Montana. She received her BA in art and art history from the University of California, Santa Cruz, in 1980, and continued her art education with the Whitney Museum of American Art, Independent Study Program in NYC until 1982. Stringer lived in New York for eight years, exhibiting her work regularly in museums and galleries, as well as designing sets and costumes for performance art, theater, and dance. In 1984, she was an Artist-in-Residence at the Edward Albee Foundation and the Millay Colony for the Arts. In 1986, she was an Artist-in-Residence in the Dominican Republic at Altos de Chavon. Minnesota became her home in 1988, where she began exhibiting her work with Groveland Gallery and teaching in schools as an Artist-in-Residence. In 1991, she received the McKnight Foundation Fellowship for sculpture. In 1994, Stringer painted her first children's book, Mud, written by Mary Lyn Ray (Harcourt Brace, 1996), which won the Minnesota Book Award for Illustration, the IRA Children's Choice Award, and Crayola Kids Best Book of the Year Award. Since Mud, she has become passionate about painting illustrations for children's books. She has just illustrated her own story, Winter is the Warmest Season (Harcourt, Inc., 2006). Now she is at work on Snow, which was written by Cynthia Rylant. In between painting for books, Stringer continues to build her own sculptures and paint her own paintings. Lauren Stringer creates her stories, paintings, and sculptures in a huge old Victorian house in Minneapolis, Minnesota, where she lives with her husband, their two children, and four cats. |
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Winter is the Warmest Season Most people think summer is the warmest season. This story, however, is brimming with evidence to the contrary—from roaring fires to grilled cheese sandwiches to toasty flannel pajamas. A unique twist on the traditional wintertime picture book, the beautiful visual narrative follows a boy and his family though a day of hot breakfasts, steaming afternoon cocoa, and a festive candlelit party before bed. With its inviting scenes, poetic text, and gorgeous illustrations, Winter Is the Warmest Season celebrates all the wonderful things that make winter the coziest time of the year. |
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Fold Me a Poem Join a young boy as he creates a world filled with origami creatures of all shapes and sizes out of an array of brightly colored paper. From roosters waking up and buffalo pawing the tablecloth to cheetahs racing lions and moths that yearn for butterfly colors, here is a glimpse into the vibrant imagination of a child. Awards |
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Our Family Tree: an Evolution Story Reading Guide available from Minnesota Storytime All of us are part of an old, old family. The roots of our family tree reach back millions of years to the beginning of life on earth. Open this family album and embark on an amazing journey. You'll meet some of our oldest relatives—from both the land and the sea—and discover what we inherited from each of them along the many steps of our wondrous past. "Evolution is what has created the living world and what keeps it going. If we do not understand evolution, we will never understand our world. How lucky our children are to have this beautiful and moving guide from which to learn!" —Dr. Ernst Mayer, Professor of Zoology |
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Literature and the Child (fifth edition) Since this book's debut, Literature and the Child has become a popular choice in the children's literature market. The book covers the two major topical areas of children's literature: genres of children's literature (e.g., picture books, folklore, etc.) and the use of children's literature in the classroom. The book is beautifully written and illustrated to reflect the tone and feel of children's books. |
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Castles, Caves, and Honeycombs "A silky web. The words roll forward rhythmically, creating a satisfying pattern of sounds as effective as the word pictures of animal homes. Stringer interprets the verse in a series of paintings that echo the cozy reassuranc of the text through the repetition of rounded forms and subtly graded shades of color. Each home, whether shell, nest, or den, offers a unique and comforting haven for its inhabitants. Collectively, they offer a vision as cozy as mama raccoon's encircling hug, seen from the end of her hollow log home. Every aspect of the art is curved: the lines themselves, the overall shapes of the pictures, and the path the they follows in looking at each of the illustrations. The only truly straight lines are found in the typeface and the edge of the pages. The result is a warm, comforting vision of home, extending from the animals in the natural world to the children sleeping in their beds on the last page. Beautifully crafted and satisfying." —Carolyn Phelan (from Booklist, copyright American Library Assn, all rights reserved) Awards |
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Red Rubber Boot Day |
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Scarecrow "In Scarecrow, Cynthia Rylant's lovely, lulling prose puts us inside the straw-filled head of a stuffed man. She lets us in on a scarecrow secret: he knows he's just borrowed pieces, put together, but he appreciates what is: 'It takes a certain peace, hanging around in a garden all day. It takes a love of silence and air. A liking for long, slow thoughts. A friendliness toward birds.' This scarecrow welcomes the company of crows and grackles, he feels lucky to observe the passing of day into night, spring into summer into fall. Scarecrow is a book about quiet and watching; it's about knowing splendor when you see it, even if it's only through button eyes. Lauren Stringer's artwork is no less than gorgeous. Rounded shapes fill the page; her warm palette is rich and surprising: one picture's black crows, red sky and golden-white clouds look like Mark Rothko meets Georgia O'Keefe. Not many artists can improve upon the beauty of the skies; I search them now for clouds that might resemble hers. —Christine Alfano (from What's the Rumpus? Issue Number 28, copyright Wild Rumpus Books for Young Readers) Awards |
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Mud Reading Guide available from Minnesota Storytime "With a mere 116 words, Ray captures the anticipation and excitement winter's captives feel as spring approaches. She distills the scent of mud as 'earth comes unfrozen' and 'the hills ... remember their colors. Winter will Squish Squck Sop Splat Slurp melt in mud. Happy mud. Stir it. Stick it. Dig it. Dance it ... Come Spring. Come grass. Come green.' Stringer feels this text and evokes its feeling visually. End papers are mud-brown in front and new-leaf-green in back. Until the child springs up and becomes airborne at the end, most of the acrylic pictures are down in the dirt, all rounded shapes of mud balls, toes and heels and pudgy legs. The scale is large, with a bare foot crowding a page, a strategy that draws the reader intimately into the fun. When joy breaks out and becomes too much, the type conforms to curves in the illustrations. That Stringer is a sculptor as well as a painter is no surprise." —Jane Resh Thomas (from Minneapolis StarTribune) Awards |
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Come Home Before Dark |
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