Gérard DuBois wins 2021 Elizabeth Mrazik-Cleaver Canadian Picture Book Award

In March, at the Annual Meeting of Members, IBBY Canada announced that Gérard DuBois won the 2021 Elizabeth Mrazik-Cleaver Canadian Picture Book Award for À qui appartiennent les nuages?, written by Mario Brassard and published by Éditions de la Pastèque. Selected from 120 books submitted by 36 publishers, the winner receives $1,000. 

Gérard DuBois is an accomplished visual artist and illustrator of magazines and books for children. He studied graphic design in Paris at L.E.I. Rue Madame and École Supérieure Estienne. After graduating, he moved to Montreal. Since then, he has worked as a freelance illustrator and his work has been featured in several children’s books—including Monsieur Marceau, Enfantillages, Dorothea’s Eyes and On the Other Side of the Forest—and in renowned magazines, such as The New Yorker, TIME, Washington Post, Wall Street Journal, Le Monde, The Guardian and many more. In 2018, Canada Post issued a Gérard DuBois stamp as part of the five-stamp series the “Great Canadian Illustrators.” He has been the recipient of several distinguished awards for his work, including the BolognaRagazzi Award, and most recently the Governor General’s Literary Award for Young People’s Literature – Illustrated Books.

The jury also selected two honour books from the list of 10 finalists:

Gemma and the Giant Girl, illustrations by Marie Lafrance, text by Sara O’Leary (Tundra Books)

A delight for children and their parents alike who had to rediscover their own home during the pandemic.

Time is a Flower, illustrations and text by Julie Morstad (Tundra Books)

Julie Morstad looks into the world of children and proposes concepts for understanding time that go way beyond a ticking clock or calendar.

About the Cleaver Award:

The Elizabeth Mrazik-Cleaver Canadian Picture Book Award was established in 1985 following the death of Elizabeth Mrazik-Cleaver, one of Canada’s pre-eminent book illustrators. The recipient receives $1,000. The Cleaver Award is administered by a committee of three members of the Canadian section of the International Board on Books for Young People. Find out more.

Thank you to the 2021 Elizabeth Mrazik-Cleaver Canadian Picture Book Award jury: Josiane Polidori, Chair, former Head of Children’s Literature at Library and Archives Canada; Heather Doepner, Collection Development Librarian at Halifax Public Libraries; Julie Girard-Tarif, Full Lecturer in French and Translation at the University of Alberta.

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