Antonio Frasconi (1919-2013)

Frasconi

Antonio Frasconi, woodcut artist and children’s-book illustrator, died on January 9th at the age of 93. I heard about it this morning, but I’ve yet to find a full obituary (apart from this brief notice by Joey of Purchase College). So, I’m writing a few words.

He was born in Buenos Aires, to Franco Frasconi (a chef) and the former Armida Carbonia (a restaurateur), both of whom had emigrated from Italy during World War I. Young Antonio grew up in Montevideo, where, by age 12, he had become a printmaker’s apprentice and, by his teens, was seeing his satirical cartoons appear in local newspapers.

In the 1940s, he began working in woodcuts, producing work which won him a scholarship from the Art Students League in New York. To study there, he emigrated to the United States in 1945. By 1948, he had his first exhibit – at the Weyhe Gallery, also in New York.

But the reason I know about him are his beautiful illustrations for children’s books. He married fellow artist Leona Pierce in 1951, and the birth of their first son, Pablo, in 1952, inspired him to create work for young people. As Frasconi noted in a 1994 Horn Book interview, “the happiness he brought, both as an inspiration and as an audience for my work, made me think in terms of using my work as part of his education.” Frasconi observed that, with his accented English, his own reading to Pablo was different than his wife’s reading to Pablo. He went to the library, looking for bilingual books, and, finding none, decided to create his own.

The result was the groundbreaking and beautiful See and Say: A Picturebook in Four Languages (Harcourt, 1955). It presents a series of objects, each named in in English (printed in black), in Italian (blue), French (red), and Spanish (green). Illustrated in bright woodcut prints, the book is a great “first words” book for young children, and language education for any age. Though not the first children’s book Frasconi illustrated, it was the first one he both wrote and illustrated, and I highly recommend it. Used copies are not too hard to find, but this book (attention, New York Review Children’s Collection!) really ought to be brought back into print.

Antonio Frasconi, from See and Say (1955)

Antonio Frasconi, from See and Say (1955)

The images above come from The Ward-o-Matic‘s post on See and Say. Visit the site to see more.

Back in 2000, I spoke with Mr. Frasconi because he was a very close friend of Crockett Johnson. Both men leaned left, had artistic influences that extended beyond children’s books, and held each other’s work in high regard. Indeed, Antonio’s political leanings inspired him to move – along with his family (Leona, Pablo, and Miguel) – to Village Creek, a planned integrated community that is directly adjacent to Rowayton, Connecticut, where Johnson and his wife Ruth Krauss lived. That was in 1957. The family met Johnson and Krauss soon after moving there, and quickly became friends.

photo of Antonio FrasconiThere were regular spaghetti dinners at Ruth and Dave’s house (Crockett Johnson’s real first name was “Dave,” and friends called him “Dave”). Antonio illustrated Ruth’s The Cantilever Rainbow (1965), her greatest avant-garde children’s book. When the Berkeley Free Speech Movement (1964-1965) got television coverage, Dave phoned Antonio so that he could come over and see it (at that time the Frasconis didn’t have a TV). So, the family went over and watched the protests. When Dave started serious painting, the Frasconis were among the first people he showed them to. As Miguel Frasconi recalled, Dave was “so excited,” as he explained to Antonio “the geometric properties of these pictures – like he had discovered something totally new.” At the time, Miguel thought: “this is an adult, and he’s as excited as a little kid.”

While my own brief acquaintance (one interview, really) with Antonio Frasconi and his family derived from work on my biography of Crockett Johnson and Ruth Krauss (2012), Frasconi’s work is well worth getting to know in its own right. He illustrated and designed over 100 books, including collections of poetry by Langston Hughes, Walt Whitman, and Pablo Neruda. He created Los Desparecidos (The Disappeared, 1984), a powerful collection of woodcuts that tells the story of those tortured, imprisoned, or killed under the Uruguayan dictatorship. He created art for children’s books. He was a great teacher, artist, and humanitarian.

Thanks for sharing your recollections with me. And rest in peace, Mr. Frasconi.

Works Consulted:

“Antonio Frasconi.” The Annex Galleries. <http://www.annexgalleries.com/artists/biography/739/Frasconi/Antonio>

“Antonio Frasconi.” Contemporary Authors Online. Detroit: Gale, 2003. Literature Resource Center. Web. 13 Jan. 2013.

“Antonio Frasconi (Uruguay).” North Dakota Museum of Art. <http://www.ndmoa.com/Exhibitions/PastEx/Disappeared/Frasconi/index.html>

Goldenberg, Carol. “An interview with Antonio Frasconi.” The Horn Book Magazine Nov.-Dec. 1994: 693+. Literature Resource Center. Web. 13 Jan. 2013.

Nel, Philip. Telephone interview with Antonio Frasconi. 12 Oct. 2000.

—.  Telephone interview with Miguel Frasconi. 2 Dec. 2007.

—.  Telephone interview with Pablo Frasconi. 28 Nov. 2007.

Sources for images: Facebook post from Miguel Frasconi, Ward-o-Matic blog post on See and Say, and “Artist and Professor Antonio Frasconi, 1919-2013” (at Jane Public Thinking).

9 Comments

  1. DALE FULLER

    Reply

    Mr. Nel,
    Thank you for writing this about Antonio Frasconi. I have been a fan of his since 1965 when I took a printmaking class from an ex-student of his at Cabrillo College in Santa Cruz, California. And continue to be inspired by his vision in my own modest printmaking endeavours.
    Dale Fuller
    Midway, British Columbia

  2. Reply

    Mr. Fuller: You’re welcome. Thanks for your comment. I hope that we’ll soon see a proper, career-spanning biography in The New York Times and elsewhere.

  3. Pingback: Antonio Frasconi, Woodcut Master

  4. Carl Reilly

    Reply

    During the 1960’s Antonio Frasconi and I corresponded during the period when I sent him my Animal Alphabet book produced in linocuts (Animals and lettering) on a hand printing press. His replies I retain, including envelopes overprinted with wood engraved postage stamps.
    what an inspiration he was.

    Carl Reilly, Leire Leicestershire, England.
    LE17 5HW

  5. Reply

    Carl: Great that you have some correspondence from Antonio Frasconi. I only ever spoke with him (& his sons) on the telephone. Would love to see more of his work brought back into print.

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  7. Reply

    I studied woodcut with Frasconi at Haystack Mountain School of crafts, then located in Liberty Maine, in 1956, my junior year at Cleveland Institute of Art. I had been recommended by Clay Walker, painter,sculptor,woodcutter, to study with Frasconi. As yet I had not chosen my profession which is an artist jeweler, that came two years later. But I had learned a valuable lesson from Antonio, Tony.

    I chided him for gluing lima beans on his woodblock to print them. He said to me slightly disgusted,”You purists are all alike” It was a valuable lesson.

    In terms of jewelry he would have been very happy to have discovered how much of a purist I became, not.

    He was a tough cookie, I liked him a lot. See and Say is a fine book, for children and adults alike. There is a huge book in the permanent collection of MOMA that I have seen several years ago, a stunningly magnificent work.

    Thomas Gentille

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