Anni and Bert: A Weaving Story

Textile artist Anni Albers (1899–1994) imparts her ideas about weaving to a bird with a busted nest in Hall’s fanciful story. Searching for materials to fix his drafty home, blue-black bird Bert wanders into an art studio filled with string, where a welcoming Albers teaches him to weave. In lengthy passages, the artist explains a loom’s mechanics, interspersing the instruction with stories about her life. Heady descriptions of artistic philosophy slow the storytelling, but the pair’s quirky banter provides a lightening effect: when Bert complains that he doesn’t have a loom, Albers replies, “You must pull yourself together.... You’re the artist and the explorer and the inventor.” Scribbly, naif-style illustrations by Semykina wrap themselves like textiles around the page-filling text, providing subtle visual context via depictions of Bauhaus objects, South American–inspired textiles, and the artist’s own creations. An author’s note concludes. Ages 5–7. (May)