A Song of Sun and Sky

In this color-oriented picture book, Cockcroft imagines a fictional conversation between the painter Georgia O’Keeffe (1887–1986) and Lula, a child whose father’s station wagon breaks down in front of O’Keeffe’s home. When the artist carries an unfinished painting outside to work, Lula asks, “But why do you use so many colors? The desert is just orange.” The painter responds in queries that make Lula consider variations (“What color is a brown dog at sunset?”), then begin to perceive them. “There are the colors of every bird that flew through here.... Of every family,” the woman says. Warm, digitized pencil and watercolor spreads that consider the landscape show ghostly forms of animals and humans in the sky above. Exploring the ways artists perceive and use color, Cockcroft also captures a moment when a child connects with an adult who takes them seriously. When Lula and her dad, both portrayed with brown skin, return to the car, everything the child sees is new: “Even her father looked different.” A detailed biography of O’Keeffe concludes. Ages 4–8. (Apr.)