HARNESSING THE IMAGINATION

December 2002
		Nick Clark, founding director of the Eric Carle Museum of Picture Book Art in Amherst, Massachusetts, takes your questions on the rewards and challenges of illustrating for children, and on the groundbreaking new museum, which opened in November 2002.

Online Special: Harnessing the Imagination: The Eric Carle Museum of Picture Book Art Extended Interviews: Eric Carle Maurice Sendak Online Special: Portrait of a Photographer: Wendy Ewald Online Special: So Long, Charlie Brown: A look back at Charles Schulz's artwork. Online Special: U.S. Design 1975-2000 August 10, 2000 A conversation with children's book illustrator Jules Feiffer. February 18, 2000 A conversation with children's author Christopher Curtis. Browse the NewsHour's coverage of Arts and Entertainment	Prior to joining the Museum, Clark worked in arts education at the High Museum of Art in Atlanta, Georgia; the Lamont Gallery at Phillips Exeter Academy in Exeter, New Hampshire; and the National Gallery of Art in Washington, D.C. Clark became nationally renowned in the field of picture book art during his eight years as Curator of American Art at Norfolk, Virginia's Chrysler Museum of Art. His exhibition Myth, Magic and Mystery: One Hundred Years of American Children's Book Illustration, co-curated with Michael Patrick Hearn and Trinkett Clark, toured the United States in 1996-97 and was wildly popular with visitors and critics. The exhibition was the first comprehensive survey of picture book art over the last century and the accompanying catalogue quickly came to be seen as a leading scholarly work in the field. Clark takes your questions on the founding of the museum, the challenges of capturing a child's imagination through artwork, and his experiences in the field of picture book art.