Virginia lee burton museum
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Virginia Lee Burton
Biography
Virginia Lee Burton (1909-1968) was born in Newton Centre, Massachusetts on August 20, 1909. Her parents, Alfred Burton, an engineer, and Dalkeith Yates, a poet and artist, moved the family to Carmel-by-the-Sea, California in 1920. In 1925 Burton’s parents divorced. Following high school, Burton studied dance in San Francisco.[1] She hoped to become a dancer and had just signed a contract to be in her sister’s travelling dance troupe when, in 1928, her ballet career ended. Burton’s father broke his leg, and she decided to move back to Massachusetts to take care of him.[2]
In Boston, Virginia Lee Burton landed a position as a “sketcher” for the Boston Transcript, where she completed sketches of dancers and actors to accompany articles written by the drama and music critic. She enrolled in a drawing class at the Boston Museum School in 1930 and married her professor, George Demetrios, less than a year later, on March 28, 1931. They had their first son named Aristides Burton Demetrios on February 17, 1932. T
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Twentieth-Century American Children's Literature
Virginia Lee Burton, an illustrator of children's books known primarily for bringing inanimate objects to life and for her vivid scratchboard drawings, was born on August 30, 1909 in Newton Centre, Massachusetts. She married George Demetrios, a sculptor and teacher, in 1931. They had two sons.
Burton first studied art at the California School of Fine Arts in San Francisco, and later returned to the East Coast and attended the Boston Museum School. An early job as an artist was as sketcher for the music, dance, and theater sections of the Boston Transcript. She subsequently settled in Folly Cove, Gloucester, Massachusetts with her family.
Burton illustrated and wrote many books, the most beloved by children being Choo Choo: The Story of a Little Engine Who Ran Away (1937), Mike Mulligan and His Steam Shovel (1939), Calico the Wonder Horse (1941), and The Little House (1942).
Burton often commented that for her, writing was always the difficult part of creating children's books. But because she ne
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Virginia Lee Burton
American illustrator and children's book author
Virginia Lee Burton (August 30, 1909 – October 15, 1968), also known by her married name Virginia Demetrios, was an American illustrator and children's book author. She wrote and illustrated seven children's books, including Mike Mulligan and His Steam Shovel (1939) and The Little House (1943), which won the Caldecott Medal. She also illustrated six books by other authors.
Burton founded the textile collective Folly Cove Designers in Cape Ann, Massachusetts, which had numerous museum exhibitions. Some of its members' works are held today in the collections of Boston's Museum of Fine Arts, the Peabody Essex Museum in Salem, Massachusetts, the Cape Ann Museum, and New York City's Metropolitan Museum of Art.[1]
Biography
Early life and education
Virginia Burton[a] was born in Newton Centre, Massachusetts. As a child, she was called "Jinnee". Her mother was Lena Yates, a lyric poet and artist from England whose poetry was first published at age 20.[2] Ya
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