Michael McCurdy

Michael McCurdy is an award-winning artist, illustrator, author and publisher who has worked from his red barn studio in the hills of Great Barrington for the past twenty-five years.

Born in New York City in 1942 and raised in New Rochelle, New York and Marblehead, Massachusetts, he attended the school of the Museum of Fine Arts in Boston (which provided him with a traveling scholarship in 1966), and Tufts University in Medford.  Since then, McCurdy has produced an impressive collection of wood engravings, etchings and drawings which have appeared in over 200 books for both adults and children and at art galleries and museums nationwide.

From 1968-1985, under the auspices of Penmaen Press Books, Michael published many small-press first editions for leading American and European writers and poets, including William Saroyan, Joyce Carol Oates, Howard Norman, William Stafford, Allen Ginsberg, Lawrence Ferlinghetti, and the Nobel Prize-winning poet Vicente Aleixandre. He has also authored numerous publications himself, including his most recent book, An Algonquian Year: The Year According to the Full Moon.

McCurdy’s distinctive drawings, etchings and woodcarvings range from depictions of rural life to interpretations of historical events to whimsical scenes of fantasy. Compositions often include human or animal figures juxtaposed against magnificent vistas of land, sea, sky and water, conveying a powerful yet meditative sense of awe and reverence for nature.

Well known for works in black and white, McCurdy has also produced colored scratchboard drawings and paintings of acrylic and casein. He has passed on his skill to others through various adult printmaking courses and has taught at the School of the Museum of Fine Arts in Boston and Concord Academy in Concord.

Mr. McCurdy has been the recipient of numerous awards and accolades, twice receiving the New York Times Best Illustrated Books Award. He has been featured in Who's Who in American Art, Who's Who in America, Contemporary Authors, and Something About the Author. He will be listed in a new edition of Major Authors and Illustrators for Children and Young Adults and will be included in the next edition of Anita Silvey's Children's Books and Their Creators.

He is currently working on illustrations for a book of proverbs collected by Ben Franklin from Poor Richard’s Almanack called So Said Ben. An exhibit of McCurdy’s work is planned for the academic year of 2006-2007 at Adirondack Community College in Queensbury, NY.

Michael has served  on the Housing Authority and on the Arts Lottery Commission in Great Barrington.

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Links

Michael McCurdy’s Homepage – contains biographical information, information on past and forthcoming books, Michael’s online gallery and more

http://www.michaelmccurdy.com/

The Penmaen Press  - books in print from Michael McCurdy's literary press http://www.bcn.net/~mmccurdy/penmaen.htm

Galleries

Child at Heart Gallery, Newburyport, Massachusetts - the premiere site for Children's Book Illustrators and picture book illustration - Michael McCurdy Page

http://www.childatheartartgallery.com/products.asp?categoryid=104

Church Street Art, Lenox, Massachusetts - Outsider Art, Folk Art and Exceptions

http://www.churchstreetart.com/index.html

Elizabeth Stone Gallery, Alexandria, VA - Fine Art of Children’s Book Illustration - Michael McCurdy Page

http://www.esgallery.com/artwork_detail.php?id=mccurdy-a01.gif

University of Virginia Museum Traveling Exhibition (TEAMS) – Michael McCurdy’s Words into Images exhibit, featuring a selection of 31 original wood engravings created by Michael McCurdy for 2 books: My First Summer in the Sierra by John Muir and The Man Who Planted Trees by Jean Giono

http://www.vmfa.state.va.us/osp/michael.html

Wessel and Lieberman Booksellers, Seattle, Washington

http://www.wlbooks.com/cgi-bin/wlb455.cgi/index.html

Exhibitions

A Complete List of Michael McCurdy’s Exhibitions

http://www.michaelmccurdy.com/shows.htm

Books

Bibliography of Michael McCurdy

http://isbndb.com/d/person/mccurdy_michael/books.html

Alibris - new & used books by Michael McCurdy including rare signed and first editions

http://www.alibris.com/search/books/author/McCurdy,%20Michael

Press

Article from Berkshires Week by Leslie Ann Beck, August 2004 - Michael McCurdy's engravings mark "Walden" anniversary

http://www.berkshiresweek.com/082604/default.asp?id=article07

The Correspondence of Michael McCurdy and Robert Hauser from the Archives & Special Collections at the Thomas J. Dodd Research Center – University of Connecticut – includes detailed documentation of the their collaboration in the creation of Face to Face

http://www.lib.uconn.edu/

Other

Thoreau/McCurdy Notecards – created in association with the Thoreau Society, six note cards that combine well-known Thoreau quotations with six of McCurdy's wood engravings and drawings

http://bcn.net/~mmccurdy/notecard.htm

Meet Michael McCurdy - Houghton Mifflin “Authors and Illustrators Pages” for Kids - biography of Michael, and links to his books

http://www.eduplace.com/kids/tnc/mtai/mccurdy.html