War and violence are integral to the history of Europe as well as its present, but the explicit representation of these themes can be challenging in a classroom context. This picturebook by French artist Olivier Tallec gently raises these themes in a … [Read more...]
Meidän piti lähteä [We had to Leave]
This is another example of a wordless picturebook that deals with the topic of the migrant crisis. We Had to Leave is gentler and happier than the other examples in the corpus: Migrando [Migrating], Orizzonti [Horizons], and Mediterraneo [The … [Read more...]
Che Capolavoro! [What a Masterpiece!]
This picturebook takes canonical examples of classic and modern art to explore the universality of artwork in everyday life. The main character is surrounded by signifiers of art and culture - from Banksy to Salvador Dali, from Einstein to the Eiffel … [Read more...]
Ką padarė žirklės? [What the Scissors Did]
The majority of wordless picturebooks produced in Europe are produced in Northern and Western European countries. However, the oldest example of the form used in this corpus is a Lithuanian wordless picturebook originally published in 1961. It has … [Read more...]
כשירד הלילה [When the Night Fell]
This vibrantly illustrated wordless picturebook explores the role of creation and creativity in the imagination of children. A young girl draws a group of monsters, an elephant, and a little girl on a sheet of paper with a set of pencils. The figures … [Read more...]
De gele ballon [Der gelbe Ballon]
This powerful book is a reminder of how small the planet really is. We see different panoramas on each page, depicting different scenes from around the world, brought to life by vivid colour. The intricacy of the wimmelbook is avoided by the clarity … [Read more...]
Domek [The House]
When a family leave their house for a new apartment in the centre of the city, the house uproots itself in order to follow them and win them back. A tale of rivalry between old and new technologies and ways of living begins, as the house follows the … [Read more...]
La Danse de la Mer [The Dance of the Sea]
The ocean is the main character in this beautiful French wordless picturebook. Intricate and poetic line drawings depict the passage of ships across a sea that is both calm and chaotic. The sea is personified as dancing women who begin by permitting … [Read more...]
The Dog who was a Cat Inside
The premise of this short film is a dog and a cat that share the same body: although this sounds complicated, it is a clever use of the visual wordless form, clearly depicting a sense of identity ambivalence that all can relate to. The dog and the … [Read more...]
