Eva Billow facts for kids
Eva Billow (1902–1993) was a famous Swedish artist. She drew cartoons and wrote books for kids. People remember her for writing and drawing fun rhyming stories for children. Some of her well-known books are Pojkarna Igelkotts vinterskor (1948) and Nickes lediga dag (1950). Her stories were about everyday life, often with funny animals as the main characters. She also wrote poems about kids at home, sometimes as animals, sometimes as people.
About Eva Billow
Eva Hildegard Maria Forss was born on May 2, 1902. Her family lived in a place called Övre Ullered in Sweden. She was the youngest child of Johan Albin Forss, who owned a factory and was a farmer, and Gerda Ingeborg Tereseia.
After finishing school, Eva went to a special art school in Stockholm. She learned to teach drawing and create ads there. She even taught beautiful handwriting (called calligraphy) there for many years, from 1925 to 1968. In 1925, she also started drawing for a magazine called Svenska Journalen. For this magazine, she made a children's series called Kajsa och Snurran. These stories had rhyming words and later became a book in 1929.
Eva Billow became very creative in the late 1940s. One of her first books from this time was Pojkarna Igelkotts vinterskor (1948). It was a picture book for young children about a family of hedgehogs. Other characters in the book were also animals, birds, and insects. She continued to write playful, rhyming stories about everyday life. These included När John Blund försov sig (1949) and Nickes lediga dag (1950). Her poems were put together in a book called Godmorgon och godnatt (1951). In 1949, she also drew pictures for a short story series by the famous writer Astrid Lindgren, called Nils Karlsson-Pyssling.
Eva Billow's art style was very new and special. Because of this, a group called Svensk Bokkonst chose her books as "Books of the Year" several times. This happened in 1946, 1948, 1949, and 1950.
Eva Billow passed away in Stockholm on February 22, 1993.
