Gyo Fujikawa
Enchanting Childrens' Book Illustrator
Fujikawa's Life
Gyo Fujikawa (1908–98) was the designer, illustrator and author of many children's books. She was born on November 4, 1908, in Berkeley, California, to Hikozo and Yu Fujikawa, a farmer and an aspiring Japanese social worker.
Her artistic talents and temperament were evident from a young age, and with the encouragement of a high school teacher, she received a scholarship in 1926 to study at the Chouinard Art Institute in Los Angeles.
Once she arrived in Los Angeles, she was immediately drawn into a thriving artistic milieu, studying with modern dance pioneer Michio Ito and befriending other Nisei artists.
She is considered a Nisei. This means she is the American-born child of Japanese immigrants. Most of the Nisei were children or young adults during World War II.
Nisei also implies speaking English as a first language and primarily being educated in the United States.
Following graduation and a year spent in Japan, Fujikawa was hired to teach at Chouinard from 1933 to 1937. She began a highly successful career in advertising in 1933, when she was hired to work at the Walt Disney Studios as a designer, working on promotional materials that included a large book edition of the animated film, Fantasia.
In 1941, she was transferred to Disney's New York studios, where she designed numerous "25 cent" Disney books for the mass market. After leaving Disney she worked briefly for the Fox Film Company and later as art director for William Douglas McAdams, a New York pharmaceutical agency. When World War II broke out, she was not held in a Japanese internment camp because she was in New York City.
Her family was forced to spend the war years at the Rohwer camp in Arkansas.
In 1957, she illustrated her first picture book, an edition of A Child's Garden of Verses by Robert Louis Stevenson, which was published by Groset and Dunlap. She also produced more than forty of her own books, which were some of the earliest children's books to use multiracial characters— a consistent feature across her body of work. Fujikawa is one of the few illustrators known to pioneer diversity of races in her work.
The first two books she both wrote and illustrated, Babies (1963) and Baby Animals (1963) have sold a combined 1.3 million copies and are still in print.
Fujikawa's books have been translated into seventeen languages and are read in more than twenty-two countries.
During her long career, she also designed six postage stamps for the United States Postal Service, including the 1997 32¢ yellow rose self-adhesive stamp, the United States-Japan Treaty ratification centenary stamp of 1960, and a postage stamp that commemorated first lady "Lady Bird" Johnson's "Plant a More Beautiful America" program, prompting an invitation to the White House by the President of the United States.
Fujikawa said about her career as a children's book author and illustrator, "I am flattered when people ask me how I know so much about how children think and feel. Although I have never had children of my own, and cannot say I had a particularly marvelous childhood, perhaps I can say I am still like a child myself. Part of me, I guess, never grew up."
Fujikawa died on November 26, 1998, in New York at age 90.
Best Known For Her Children's Books
She Also Illustrated Products, Stamps and Magazine Covers
FAST FACTS
Trained at Chouinard Art Institute in Los Angeles.
She taught at the same Art Institute where she was a student.
She spent a year in Japan and developed an appreciation of Japanese art.
She began her career by working for Walt Disney.
She avoided being held in a Japanese internment camp because she lived in New York.
Millions of copies of books sold.
She has created U.S. postage stamps.
She has also illustrated advertisements, products for BeechNut and has done the covers of popular magazines.
She pioneered diversity in children's books.
She died on November 26, 1998 in NYC.
My Favorite Piece of Artwork By Gyo Fujikawa
Why Is This My Favorite?
She shows her style in this picture - she draws happy, rosy cheeked children with dot eyes.
She is known for incorporating all races in her work, and this was my first introduction to children who did not look like me. By seeing her pictures, I knew that other children would not be the same as me and could see that even though we were different, we still could have things in common.
This watercolor depicts the colorful imagination of children. It comes from the book "Oh, What a Busy Day!" In this book, Fujikawa went through a typical child's day, but she showed what took place in the child's day as he or she played. She also depicted how children creatively play (as pictured below).
I love how Fujikawa simply drew children and included everyone. I love the colorful watercolor paintings and the simplicity of her drawings as well. I have pictured a gallery of some of my other favorites below to support why I enjoy her art so much.
All Artwork by Gyo Fujikawa.
Works Cited
"Gyo Fujikawa." Major Authors and Illustrators for Children and Young Adults, Gale, 2002. Biography in Context, http://link.galegroup.com/apps/doc/K1617001296/BIC1?u=nysl_nc_mexhs&xid=82c72944. Accessed 21 Mar. 2018.
McDowell, Edwin. "Gyo Fujikawa, 90, Creator of Children's Books. (Obituary)" http://www.nytimes.com/1998/12/07/arts/gyo-fujikawa-90-creator-of-children-s-books.html . Accessed 21 March. 2018.