Books published by publisher Phaidon Press, 2009

Dig through the leaf pile in this collage-inspired book with see-through pagesReaders explore the concept of layering and collage with this interactive exercise in composition. Each clear acetate page features a single element in the leaf pile, though some are not leaves at all! As readers turn the pages, the leaf pile is deconstructed piece by piece on the right side, and reconstructed on the left. Younger readers will enjoy the seek-and-find aspect of the hidden objects, while older readers might experiment by adding their own images between the pages. A key at the back provides the names of each kind of leaf shown. Inspired by the Whitney Museum's approach to looking at art, these books provide a new way to look at the world.Colors are brighter than they appear - printed in pure Pantones.Ages 2-4

A whimsical–yet factual–series of questions and answers about the things we eat... and don't eat!Blue Hen (MD) Young Reader Award HonorFood critic Joshua David Stein whets the appetite of young readers with a wondrous and informative approach to talking about food. This humorous, stylized and entirely unexpected set of food facts will engage both good eaters and resisters alike. With questions both practical ("Can you eat a sea urchin?") and playful ("Do eggs grow on eggplants?"), this read-aloud text offers young children facts to share and the subtle encouragement to taste something new! Food and textile illustrator Julia Rothman brings an authenticity to the text that Stein has written from the heart, for his own three year-old and for pre-schoolers everywhere.Created for ages 3-5 years

A clever and spirited rhyming story of friends who literally come in all shapes and sizesWhen Circle rolls into one of Triangle's points and pops, chaos momentarily ensues until Octagon's "Stop!" brings everyone to their senses. An effortlessly rhyming text introduces us to a collection of shapes and subtly weaves their physical characteristics into traits that both lead to and solve a would-be catastrophe. Master illustrator Serge Bloch's shapes are accompanied by a chorus of miniature people who play along, creating the perfect complement to Barbara Kanninen's economy of words. Worthy of comparison to Shel Silverstein's The Missing Piece, this raucous chain of events is satisfyingly cyclical, ending just exactly where it began.

Francesca Woodman has become one of the most talked about, studied and influential of late twentieth-century photographers. She started taking photographs when she was barely thirteen, and in less than a decade created a body of work that has now secured her reputation as one of the most original American artists of the 1970s. Woodman brought an understanding of Baroque painting, modernist art and contemporary post-Minimalist practice to her haunting, sensual, images. Both in her work with models and in her sometimes disturbing self-portraits, she made a thoroughgoing challenge to the certainties of photography.Interested in how people relate to space, and how the three-dimensional world can be reconciled with the two dimensions of the photographic image, Woodman played complex games of hide-and-seek with her camera. One of the enduring appeals of her work is the way in which she constructs enigmas that trap our gaze. She depicts herself seemingly fading into a flat plane, merging with a wall under the wallpaper, dissolving into the floor, or flattening herself behind glass. She constantly compares the fragility of her own body with the physical environment around her. Fascinated by transformation and the permeability of seemingly fixed boundaries, Woodman conjures in her work the precarious moment between adolescence and adulthood, between presence and absence.This comprehensive monograph includes over 200 of Woodman's works - some of which have never been exhibited or published before - as well as previously unseen extracts from her journals, selected and introduced by her father, George Woodman. There are examples of her large-scale 'blue-prints', and reproductions of her artist's books, including Some Disordered Interior Geometries, which was published in 1981, the year she took her own life. An extensive text by Chris Townsend examines the influences of Gothic literature, Surrealism, feminism and post-Minimalist art on Woodman's photographs, as well as placing her in relation to her contemporaries, such as Cindy Sherman and Richard Prince. This book confirms Woodman's position as one of America's most talented and important artists since 1970, with a legacy lasting well beyond her own time.

Beatrice Alemanga returns with a follow up to the charming Bugs in a Blanket. What happens when the bugs venture out into the big, wide garden to find some new friends? This sturdy board book introduces children to lovable bugs who learn how to accept creatures they are initially afraid of. Author Beatrice Alemagna invented a whole new technique of illustration for this book using a felted wool technique and an amalgam of applique, fabrics and stitching.

One of these things is almost like the others...Inspired by the picture book Undercover, a sixty-four-page masterpiece of spot-the-odd-one-out published in 2016, comes a series of odd-one-out board books for the youngest readers. Bastien Contraire creates spreads with four to eight images each - all of which belong together, except one that may resemble the others but has no business joining the lot. A teapot amongst sitting cats, a belt amongst snakes, and a feathered hat amongst birds are all hiding in plain site for the delighted toddler to discover giddily! Young readers will exercise skills of categorization and visual acuity in finding the 'poser', and bask in the preposterous silliness.

Monsieur Racine wakes up one day to find his precious pear tree looted of all the award‐winning fruit. When he discovers that the culprit is a funny‐looking beast, his anger gives way to curiosity and two become friends. But the beast is not quite what it seems, eventually it comes apart–literally to show itself to be no beast at all, but the two playful children from next door, covered with skins and rags.

This book explores the choices and attitudes of thirty different artists. It helps stimulate children's own creativity and imagination by asking them to wonder why artists create things in the way that they do. It explores the various ideas, meanings, roles and functions of art by looking at painting, sculpture, photography and prints and helps develop children's understanding of colour, form, texture and pattern.