Drawing with the Latinx Kidlit Book Festival

Although Latinx Heritage Month came to an end last October 15, many of us in our libraries, schools, communities and blogs (like Edi’s Latine Heritage Month in the Library series) highlighted, celebrated and recognized the different Latinx communities within the youth literature world. For those of us that work directly with children and children’s books on a daily basis, we dream and work to connect readers with creators, via books, in-person or virtually. I value the existence of Latinx Kidlit Book Festival and how it strives to provide free access to make these connections happen. 

Created in 2020, during the early months of the COVID-19 pandemic, the Latinx Kidlit Book Festival, aims to provide a platform and space to support Latinx youth literature creators and connect them with their readers and other creators and educators. With the contribution of volunteers and sponsors, the Latinx Kidlit Books Festival non-profit organization held their fifth virtual festival with a wonderful slate of authors, illustrators, educators. From September 17 to October 11, 2024, audiences could tune in to watch and participate on programs tailored to current and future authors and illustrators, educators and librarians, and of course, youth.

Image 1. First graders from a local elementary school visited our library to tune in to the Latinx Kidlit Book Festival Draw Off. 

One of the features of the festival is the “Draw Off” between children’s literature illustrators, where moderators or attendees provide prompts to participating illustrators to draw in real time in front of the virtual audience. This was my second year inviting students from a local elementary school over to the library to tune it and virtually meet some of their favorite Latinx illustrators. In addition to listening and watching illustrators talk about their life and craft and to be illustrating inspired by prompts, I also wanted children to “draw off” along with them. We provided drawing paper, colored pencils, markers and crayons, so students could draw following the prompts. 

This year we tuned in Draw Off: Famous Faces with Nomar Pérez, Edel Rodríguez, Ellia Ana Hill and Christina Rodriguez-Unalt. Nomar Pérez is a Puerto Rican art director, author and illustrator of several picture books, and he received the 2022 Pura Belpré Award Children’s Author Honor and Children’s Illustrator Honor for De aquí como el aquí (The second book written in Spanish to received a Pura Belpré Award recognition). Edel Rodríguez is a Cuban American artist and illustrator who received the 2024 Pura Belpré Award Young Adult Honor for his graphic novel Worm: A Cuban American Odyssey. Ellia Ana Hill is a Puerto Rican illustrator, artist and author of several bilingual books published by Lil’ Libros including The No Boy/El niño que dice no and the Medias Naranjas biography series. Christina Rodriguez-Unalt is a Latinx professor and illustrator, who has published several bilingual books with Piñata Books, an imprint of Arte Público Press. 

My students were familiar with several of these Latinx illustrators given that our library has their books and some of their titles, like Coquí in the City, is part of their curriculum. But they were so excited to be in a space with famous people that work as artists! Many of us in libraries, schools, community centers, and educational institutions often don’t have the budget to bring authors and illustrators to our spaces. While at the same time we are encouraged and are in need of providing not only collections, but services and programming to the communities we serve are year long. We must take advantage of opportunities like the Latinx Kidlit Book Festival that with an internet connection, we can bridge creators and children in meaningful ways and enhance our library programming offer. 

Image 2. A sample of some of the library books written and/or illustrated by the panelists. 

       During the Draw Off, all four illustrators chatted about their work, their favorite art supplies, how they prepare and research when they are faced with the task of illustrating a real person, as well as their love and challenges as illustrators in the children’s books field. Children were following along, while drawing what some of the illustrators were doing. I wanted to share the children’s creations and the impact of these types of events and programs to our youth, many who will be future artists! Hope you all get inspired to share these videos (they are available via Latinx Kidlit Book Festival YouTube channel) with your students, patrons, and children in your life or tune it next year. 

Image 3. Illustrators following the prompt of “draw yourself as an alebrije”.  

Image 4. Student creation of Edel Rodríguez’s cat alebrije.  

Image 5. Student creation of Ellia Ana Hill’s alebrije.  

Image 6. A drawing of Christina Rodriguez-Unalt’s character.  

Image 7. We can see a mix of all the characters here! 

Image 8. Ellia Ana Hill’s character: Lucy Ricardo of I Love Lucy. 

Image 9. Inspired by Edel Rodríguez’s The Mango Tree/La mata de mango. 

Image 10. Tito Puente! 

Image 11. Café Bustelo. 

Image 12. And sometimes we end up creating our own things in our own styles. 

Filed under: Communities & Outreach, Programs/Programming