'A Life Made by Hand' by Andrea D'Aquino is a GORGEOUS, child-friendly introduction to Japanese-American artist, Ruth Asawa.

Picture book biographies are some of my absolute favorite genres of children's literature, and this one is even more special for including an activity for kids, as well as, information for teachers and parents to continue the education for art and artists.

Back when the Pandemic lockdown started, I decided that kids who were stuck at home were missing out on their classroom teachers and their school librarians reading to them each day, so I decided *I* would be that reader for them. Andrea D'Aquino's book was one of my favorites that I shared on my daily reading.

https://www.facebook.com/watch/?v=2574682956155782

I highly recommend this book and feel like it should be required reading in every elementary art classroom.

Thank you to NetGalley and Princeton Architectural Press for the opportunity to read and review this book.

This is a wonderful book to introduce young readers to art and the artist Ruth Asawa, esp girls looking for role models. It is very well written and illustrated. There is even a paper art project in the back for children to make. Enjoy

"A Life Made by Hand" is a cut little story to introduce kids to the artist Ruth Asawa. I love learning about people using children's picture books. I would have loved some photographs of her sculptures and art.

This book was a delight to read.Ruth Asawa is a gem to read about. The images throughout are inspiring to see. The simplistic dialogue, is typed in such an artistic and interesting manner around the images.

Oh what a beautiful book! I opened the book, turned a few pages and felt completely inspired to create and share her work. I was impressed by the way her life was shared. The illustrations in the book were perfect including coloring and text. I loved everything about this book!

I received an advanced digital copy of this book from the author, Princeton Architectural Press and Netgalley.com. Thanks to all for the opportunity to read and review. The opinions expressed in this review are my own.

Ms. D'Aquino's biography of Ruth Asawa is directed at young readers but readers and art aficionados of all ages will delight in this book. I loved every page of this! So illuminating and thoughtfully done!

5 out of 5 stars. Highly recommended.

A Life Made by Hand is an illustrated biography of Ruth Asawa aimed at younger readers (K-3). Written and illustrated by Andrea D'Aquino, it's due out 3rd Sept 2019 from Princeton Architectural Press, it's 40 pages and will be available in hardback format.

This is an interesting book about the childhood and early adult life of Ruth Asawa. The art is as shown on the cover, and I think that it does a good job of representing -without- being simply photographic or derivative. The artist was more than her sculptural production and I believe the author managed to convey much of her (Asawa's) life experiences without being depressing or providing too much info for younger readers. The book doesn't deal with the family's forcible detention in camps during WW2, first in California, then in Arkansas. The omission was apparently at the request of her daughters, and it is discussed in the afterword.

The book includes a good selection of links to sources for further reading and exploration. This would make a superlative summer enrichment read for youngsters (perhaps with a coordinated visit to an exhibit of her work), or a classroom read, library book, or gift for an art interested youngster.

There's a cute tutorial for a kirigami insect at the end of the book which would make a nice classroom enrichment tie-in for a unit on Asawa.

Four stars.

I really dislike this sort of picture-book biography. It's more of a showcase for the author/illustrator's work than it is for the artist it's supposed to be about!

As I was paging through the rather ugly illustrations, I assumed that I was looking at samples of Ruth Asawa's work. And I wondered why she was such a big deal, because the art is primitive, uninspiring, and rather juvenile. (Yes, art is subjective. But, to me, it doesn't really feel like art if it looks like something I made myself back in kindergarten. What makes art special for me is if I'm in awe of the artist's skills because it's something I couldn't do myself.) But then I did a quick image search... and found that, unlike the illustrations in this book, Ruth Asawa's art is absolutely gorgeous! She made these wire sculptures that are sort of reminiscent of jellyfish (or something else you might see under the sea). D'Aquino's crude renderings in pencil of these works of art don't do them justice at all. Unfortunately, there's just one photo at the end of the book that shows what Asawa's art really looked like.

I've encountered this problem before in books like Allen Say's Silent Days, Silent Dreams, which was about an artist but didn't feature any of the artist's work, just the author's pale imitations. It feels almost disrespectful to make books like these, to use the story as a springboard for the author's own work while leaving the art of the subject of the book out of the equation!

Asawa's story is interesting, but I found the note at the end far more interesting still. The family's request to leave out the parts about the internment are understandable, but unfortunately it made the actual story seem incomplete (as I was reading, I suspected she might have been sent to an internment camp, and then wondered why it wasn't even mentioned).

Overall, I'm disappointed. I would've rather read a picture-book biography with actual photographs of Asawa's art, rather than some other artist's interpretation of them. Leaving out the artist's actual art didn't work for me in Silent Days, Silent Dreams, and it doesn't work for me here, either.

An ambitious and beautifully organized and collected narrative and images to accompany them. A must for young children and young children's classrooms.

I'd not heard of Ruth Asawa until very recently, and just, wow. What amazing work, and what an inspiring woman. I enjoyed this book very much, and I appreciate that the text focuses on her art, her curiosity about the world, the shapes found in nature, and her education rather than her family's internment during WWII. Not that that isn't important, but her work deserves to be the focus. The collage style illustrations throughout the book go well with the organic nature of Asawa's work, and compliment the subject nicely. The author's note at the end includes more biographical information, and the book concludes with an art project, how to make a paper dragonfly. Overall, a lovely book!

Oh! This one is so cute!

It reminded me so much of my own childhood, I would spend hours looking at things.

And come on, it's about Ruth Asawa, her art is to die for!