The Girl Who Made Rainbows and The Stripey Street Cat

WILLIAMS, Rachel & Robyn Chiles (illus.) Peter Warrington (text) The Girl who Made Rainbows 2013 ISBN 9780646903279 and WILLIAMS, Rachel (illus.) Peter Warrington (text) The Stripey Street Cat 2013 (2^nd (Ed) ISBN 9780646561882 Not Quite Newtown unpaged $15.00

Many techniques seem to have been involved to devise the illustrations.  It appears that photographs of city spaces and empty alleys decorated by graffiti art have been used as the background for digital images of characters in the stories.  Wonderful feline images have been stencilled on old walls and then photographed.

The stories involve a little girl who paints brilliant rainbows low down, for children, dogs and cats, on the dim stones and bricks of inner city walls while the street cat looks for its friend down a street that goes and goes.  Events progress in dense, deep toned illustrations given at the left; in strong contrast, the white pages on the right have little text.  A sophisticated effect is created by the artistry and predominantly black hard covers, but happy events emerge here from shadowed spaces.

reviewed by Elspeth Cameron