Jan Spivey Gilchrist facts for kids

Jan Spivey Gilchrist is an amazing American author, illustrator, and artist from Chicago, Illinois. She is best known for her work in children's books. She created beautiful pictures for books like The Great Migration: Journey to the North, Nathaniel Talking, and My America. Her books have won many important awards, including the Coretta Scott King Medal for Illustration. She also received the Parents' Choice Award.

Early Life and Art Journey

Jan Spivey Gilchrist was born on February 15, 1949, in Chicago, Illinois. Her parents were Charles and Arthric Spivey. Jan started drawing when she was a young girl. She had a bone disease that kept her from playing outside. Her father, Charles, was a minister. He really encouraged her love for art. They would often travel from their home to visit the Art Institute of Chicago.

At the museum, young Jan wished she could see art made by and featuring African Americans. She was sad that there wasn't much of it. She later said, "So I decided to change everything. I was going to make sure that African Americans were in paintings and books."

With her strong passion for art, Jan went to Eastern Illinois University. She studied art education, hoping to become a teacher. She graduated in 1973. After college, she taught art in different public schools for several years. While teaching, she also continued her own studies. She earned a Master of Art in Painting from the University of Northern Iowa in 1979. She also has advanced degrees in writing and English.

Becoming a Book Illustrator

While teaching, Jan Gilchrist kept painting and showing her artwork. One day, she met Eloise Greenfield. Eloise was a famous author who wrote children's books about African American families. Jan was very impressed by Eloise's stories. Jan showed Eloise some of her artwork. Eloise was so impressed that she suggested Jan should become a book illustrator!

Soon after, Jan met with editors at Philomel Books, a publishing company in New York. This meeting helped her start her career as an illustrator.

Jan Gilchrist has worked with three generations of Eloise Greenfield's family. Her first published book was Children of Long Ago in 1988. It was written by Eloise's mother, Lessie Blanche Little. Jan and Eloise published their first book together, Nathaniel Talking, in 1989. They have created 27 books together! Eloise says their great working relationship comes from respecting each other's art. Jan also worked with Eloise's daughter, Monica Greenfield, on two books: The Baby (1994) and Waiting for Christmas (1996).

Since her first book, Jan Gilchrist has worked on 73 other children's books. While she mostly illustrates for other authors, she has also written and illustrated some of her own books. Her first book as an author, Indigo and Moonlight Gold, came out in 1993. It was about a young African American girl learning about time. Her second book, Madelia (1997), tells the story of a girl who loves painting more than going to church sermons.

Today, Jan continues to write and illustrate children's books from her home near Chicago, Illinois.

Her Unique Art Style

Jan Gilchrist uses many different art materials in her work. These include watercolor, mixed-media collage, gouache (a type of paint), pastels, and pencil. Many of the books she illustrates focus on the African-American experience through history. She draws a wide range of people, from enslaved people in the past to modern-day children doing everyday things. She has even illustrated famous figures like Barack Obama and Michael Jordan.

In Nathaniel Talking, Jan used large charcoal drawings. These drawings beautifully showed Nathaniel's feelings and daily life. Her soft charcoal art can also be seen in Children of Long Ago. Jan also uses collage very well, like in The Great Migration: Journey to the North. In this book, she mixes portraits of travelers with photos, newspaper headlines, maps, and small painted scenes. She used watercolor pictures in The Girl Who Buried Her Dreams in a Can. This book tells the true story of a girl's journey to get an education in rural Zimbabwe.

Eloise Greenfield, her frequent collaborator, says Jan's art is full of emotion. She pays special attention to the eyes of her characters, making them very expressive. Jan often uses real people as models to make her characters and their everyday lives look very realistic.

Awards and Recognition

Jan Gilchrist is a very active artist and illustrator. She is praised for her work in watercolor, pen, marker, pencil, gouache, and oil. Her art is displayed in permanent collections at several museums. These include the DuSable Museum of African American History, the Isobel Neal Gallery, and the South Side Community Art Center. Her work is also kept in special collections at the University of Southern Mississippi and the University of Minnesota. Her art has been shown in exhibitions at places like the Anacostia Community Museum of the Smithsonian Museums and the Art Institute of Chicago.

She won the 1990 Coretta Scott King Award for her illustrations in Nathaniel Talking. This book was co-written with Eloise Greenfield. Their book Night on Neighborhood Street also earned Jan a Coretta Scott King Illustrator Honor award in 1992. It was even chosen as a Reading Rainbow Book! In 2014, Jan received the Zora Neale Hurston Award. Her work has also been recognized by the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People (NAACP) and Parents' Choice. Because of all her amazing work, she was welcomed into the Society of Illustrators in 2001. She also joined the International Literary Hall of Fame for Writers of African Descent in 1999.

List of Works

Books Written and Illustrated by Jan

• Indigo and Moonlight Gold (1993) ISBN: 9780863162107
• Madelia (1997) ISBN: 9780803720527
• My America (2007) ISBN: 9780060791049
• Obama: The Day the World Danced (2010) ISBN: 9780982409503
• A Voice As Soft as a Honeybee's Flutter: Inspired by Psalm 46 (2019) ISBN: 9781627079365
• You See Me, God: Inspired by Psalm 139 (2020) ISBN: 9781627079389

Books Illustrated by Jan (Other Authors)

• Children of Long Ago (by Lessie Jones Little, 1988) ISBN: 9780613997805
• Nathaniel Talking (by Eloise Greenfield, 1989) ISBN: 9780863162008
• Night on Neighborhood Street (by Eloise Greenfield, 1991) ISBN: 9780140556834
• Lisa's Daddy & Daughter Day (by Eloise Greenfield, 1991) ISBN: 9780887419195
• Daddy And I (by Eloise Greenfield, 1991) ISBN: 9780863162060
• Big Friend, Little Friend (by Eloise Greenfield, 1991) ISBN: 9780863162046
• I Make Music (by Eloise Greenfield, 1991) ISBN: 9780863162053
• My Doll Keshia (by Eloise Greenfield, 1991) ISBN: 978-0863162039
• Red Dog Blue Fly: Football Poems (by Sharon Bell Mathis, 1991) ISBN: 9780140543377
• Everett Anderson's Christmas Is Coming (by Lucille Clifton, 1993) ISBN: 9780785720911
• First Pink Light (by Eloise Greenfield. Gilchrist illustrated the 1993 reprint but not the original 1976 edition) ISBN: 9780863162121
• Aaron & Gayla's Counting Book (by Eloise Greenfield, 1993) ISBN: 9780863162244
• William and the Good Old Days (by Eloise Greenfield, 1993) ISBN: 9780060210939
• Aaron & Gayla's Alphabet Book (by Eloise Greenfield, 1993) ISBN: 9780863162138
• The Baby (by Monica Greenfield, 1994) ISBN: 9780694005772
• Lift Ev'ry Voice and Sing (by James Weldon Johnson, 1995) ISBN: 978-0-590-46982-1
• Recycling Dump (by Andrea Butler, 1995) ISBN: 9780673362674
• Sharing Danny's Dad (by Angela Shelf Medearis, 1995) ISBN: 9780673362759
• Waiting for Christmas (by Monica Greenfield, 1996) ISBN: 9780590527002
• For the Love of the Game: Michael Jordan and Me (by Eloise Greenfield, 1997) ISBN: 9780064435550
• Singing Down the Rain (by Joy Cowley, 1997) ISBN: 9780060276027
• Kia Tanisha (by Eloise Greenfield, 1997) ISBN: 9780694008476
• Kia Tanisha Drives Her Car (by Eloise Greenfield, 1997) ISBN: 9780694008483
• Lemonade Sun and Other Poems (by Rebecca Kai Dotlich, 1998) ISBN: 9780606207607
• Easter Parade (by Eloise Greenfield, 1998) ISBN: 9780786822713
• Water, Water (by Eloise Greenfield, 1999) ISBN: 9780694012473
• Angels (by Eloise Greenfield, 1998) ISBN: 9780786804429
• Sweet Baby Coming (by Eloise Greenfield, 2000) ISBN: 9780694005789
• I Can Draw A Weeposaur and Other Dinosaurs (by Eloise Greenfield, 2001) ISBN: 9780688176341
• Mimi's Tutu (by Tynia Thomassie, 2002) ISBN: 9780590440219
• How They Got Over: African Americans and the Call of the Sea (by Eloise Greenfield, 2002) ISBN: 9780060289911
• Honey I Love (by Eloise Greenfield. Gilchrist illustrated the 2003 edition, the original was published in 1978 as an unillustrated poem, 2003) ISBN: 9780060091248
• In The Land of Words (by Eloise Greenfield, 2003) ISBN: 9780060289935
• Me & Neesie (by Eloise Greenfield. Gilchrist illustrated the 30th anniversary edition in 2004 but not the original 1975 edition) ISBN: 9780060007010
• A Friend From Galilee (by Dandi Daley Mackall, 2004) ISBN: 9780806645865
• Christmas Soup (by Alice Faye Duncan and Phyllis Dooley, 2005) ISBN: 9780310709305
• When the Horses Ride By: Children in the Times of War (by Eloise Greenfield, 2006) ISBN: 9781584302490
• The Friendly Four (by Eloise Greenfield, 2006) ISBN: 9780060007591
• Brothers Sisters: Family Poems (by Eloise Greenfield, 2008) ISBN: 9780060562847
• Yafi's Family: An Ethiopian Boy's Journey of Love, Loss, and Adoption (by Linda Pettitt, 2010) ISBN: 9780979748141
• The Great Migration (by Eloise Greenfield, 2010) ISBN: 9780061259210
• Secrets of the Seven Stars: Elly's Awakening (by Kelley Powell Barcellona, 2014) ISBN: 9780615828350
• My God Is Awesome (by Kyla McKenzie & Monique McKenzie, 2014) ISBN: 9781502542854
• The Girl Who Buried Her Dream in a Can (by Terarai Trent, 2015) ISBN: 9780670016549
• One Last Word: Wisdom from the Harlem Renaissance (by Nikki Grimes, Cozbi A. Cabrera, R. Gregory Christie, Pat Cummings, Ebony Glenn, E. B. Lewis, and Frank Morrison, 2017) ISBN: 9781619635548
• We Are Shining (by Gwendolyn Brooks, 2017) ISBN: 9780062570666
• The Thumbtack Dancer (by Leslie Tyron, 2017) ISBN: 9780997772005
• The Boss: Entrepreneurship for Kids (by Robert D. Blackwell, Sr., 2018) ISBN: 9781480863446
• Kringle's Christmas (by Savy Leiser, 2018) ISBN: 9780999161456