Plastelina and the Newspaper
Author: Alenka Spacal
Original title: Plastelinčica in časopis
Bajalka, Maribor, 2022
About the picture book:
Plastelina and the Newspaper introduces children to several fields of culture – not just reading, but also visual art, theatre, music, and dance. Plastelina, a member of the Plastelinek family, learns about culture through a newspaper and the idea of clocks. First, her mother, Plastelema, tries to answer her question, “What is culture?” Then, she and her friend Plasteliza use the newspaper to make fanciful art and toys. They draw on the newspaper and hold their own art exhibition. They fold it into an accordion and stage a concert. They make masks out of it and put on a play. They crumple it into a ball and fold it into both a boat and an airplane. This is their newspaper culture.
For the book, author and illustrator Alenka Spacal first made all the characters out of various colours of plasticine. The carefully constructed three-dimensional models were of great assistance in producing the illustrations, since she could position them and adjust their heads and feet however she liked. As a result, these imaginative characters are truly unique and hold an immediate appeal for children. Children, after all, love working with plasticine, a soft, mouldable material designed especially for creative play. The picture book also stimulates children’s creativity by showing them fun things they can do with old newspapers. The book is intended for pre-readers and beginning readers.
All the illustrations were hand-painted with the finest of brushes. Spacal used watercolours on top of acrylic paints in order to make the newspaper look as realistic as possible, especially in the pictures depicting the crumpled newspaper. She used tiny brushstrokes to render the typography for imaginary newspaper articles on the topic of picture books. Thus, the book pays tribute to the culture of print newspapers, an ever more endangered medium in the digital age.
Excerpts:
I’m Plastelina and my family are the Plastelinek.
Every morning, there’s a newspaper waiting for us at home.
…
My father, Plastelado, picks through the lettuce on the newspaper.
…
My mother, Plastelema, likes to read the newspaper.
Her favourite page is the one with big, bold letters that say: CULTURE.
“What’s culture?” I ask her. “Does it have something to do with clocks?”
…
We both make masks out of newspaper. Then we put on a play.
…
We crumple a piece of newspaper into a ball and play catch.
Our ball flies up, comes down, bounces, and rolls.
…
We make a boat out of newspaper and go down to the river.
“Wow! Look how fast it goes!” we shout.
Translated by Rawley Grau
Awards:
- Books Merit Awards (for the Children’s Book Plastelina and the Newspaper), iJungle Illustration Awards 2023 Winners.
- Merit, in the category Books Published (for the Children’s Book Plastelina and the Newspaper), 3×3 International Illustration Awards 2023, USA.
- Finalist, in the category Children’s Book – Published, Hiii Illustration 2022 (for the Children’s Book Plastelina and the Newspaper).