Soul of a Crow by Megan Mann

Ashley Bryan is not only an artist, but an author and illustrator. One of his most famous children’s books is Beautiful Blackbird, which is about appreciating one’s heritage and discovering the beauty from within. Soul of a Crow was inspired by the blackbird. I thought the message was absolutely beautiful and inspirational. Instead of using a regular black bird, I wanted to paint a crow. Crows symbolize transformation and change, and I thought that worked wonderfully. Ashley’s blackbird has rays of color emitting from its body while the other birds watch him in awe. Instead of copying that style, I wanted to make tears, scratches, etc in the crow’s body to symbolize beauty from within. The crow is sitting on a set of branches instead of being surrounded by a flock of birds. I wanted a simple background compared to the crow itself because that was the focal point of the message.

by Kadence Ahern

Eccentric Birds by Keilani Welch

My work is based on Ashley Bryans books Titled “Beautiful Blackbird”.  I thought Ashley Bryan’s style was really unique and interesting to look at so I wanted to explore it more. Not only is my artwork based on his book but I used his style to make the bird. I also wanted to make the artwork my own so instead of painting traditionally, like how Ashley Brysn did, I would paint and make a collage. I used acrylic paints to get the colors I wanted and then I cut up the paper into the shape of birds.

by Natasha Day

by Elizabeth Brecht

For my Ashley Bryan Project I drew flowers. The flowers are inspired by one of his stained glass pieces. I tried to do something different but like stained glass. I used neon sharpie for the flowers and black arcylic paint to bring everything out more.

by Caitlin Gorecki

by Cedona A’lessio

Juxtaposed Unity by James Petros

Ashley Bryan, a Maine artist who promotes the essence of prominent ideas of the inner child, happiness, and love, who studied philosophy and went to art school, oftentimes depicts subjects interacting with their environment, as well as utilizing bright colors interacting intricately in a unified manner, all to support and share his own ideas with the world. My artwork, Juxtaposed Unity, is connected to Ashley Bryan through the usage of style, color, and ideas articulated. I used the style of having figures that interact with the environment more than the viewer, to emphasize the message of what’s transpiring more than focusing on the appearance of the portrayal of the figures. The colors and the shapes of “Juxtaposed Unity” connect also through style, mood, and connotation by using similar colors, two sets of color schemes, and a message promoting happiness, positivity and the wonder within the inner child.

by Mary Thyer

My work inspired by Ashley Bryan is a collage. A lot of Ashley Bryan’s work focused on bringing out the inner child in a person, and some of his work also appealed to children.  Bryan often used materials in his children’s books that are familiar to children and that children can recognize. I chose to do a collage with kwik stix, a medium designed for children, to give my artwork a childish and free feeling to it. Ashley Bryan also used a lot of bright, solid  colors and shapes to make his images, which I took inspiration from. Birds and nature are often seen in Bryan’s work, and brought to life by him, which I used in my own artwork.

Only Then May We Grow by Madeline Myers

Ashley Bryan is an African American artist based in Little Cranberry, Maine. Bryan works with many different media’s and is a renowned illustrator for children’s books, he advocates for civil rights and general peace among various communities. He stands for love, prosperity, and personal expression among all individuals. On January 1st, 2003, Bryan published a children’s book Beautiful Blackbird. The book was designed to promote cultural learning and acceptance starting at a young age, and along with many of his other works, included a central theme of community and growth among all ethnicities. My work uses this central theme of growth and compromise through the presence of diverse races nursing a bonsai tree as a symbol of peace. This piece was made with chalk pastels on charcoal paper.

by Jingyi Luo

by Shakeya Douglass

Frederick the Puppet by Emily Butler

Hello! This is Frederick. He was inspired by Ashley Bryan who creates fantastic artworks in many different mediums. Frederick was directly inspired by Ashley Bryan’s puppets. To make them, He uses cast off materials that wouldn’t traditionally be used in the creation of artworks, let alone for delicate puppets. To create Frederick, I used an old envelope, a ruined sock, and many more cast off items.

Moe Le Grand Félin by Heidi Gonzalez

Ashley Bryand is an african american artist who captures love and unity in his work. Every character, every color, every shape in his work has a purpose and is unique. That’s what I wanted to capture in my own work, Moe Le Grand Félin. I made my work vibrant and full of color, like Ashley’s. While capturing his colorful style, I also wanted to include my own. My love for mixing colors and fading them into others, along with elegant patterns made its way into my work. What I want my work to mean is elegance and maybe even freedom of imagination. I like having the freedom to do something the way I want to, and I’m sure most if not all other artists would have it the same way.

by Olivia Davis

by Baylee Burgess

Ashley Bryan worked with stained glass and his work inspired me to create this painting. I used black acrylic paint to make texture and the illusion of a stain glass like painting. The textures in Ashley Bryan’s work stood out to me and that’s what I wanted to convey in my artwork. He also worked with varieties of bright, opaque colors which I also took inspiration from and decided to incorporate into my piece.

by Zoe Iobst

Equality by Jennifer Luc

Ashley Bryan involves lots  of varieties of colors, mostly meanings behind it, and  different aspects of art like his puppets, glass paintings, his illustrated stories and much more. I wanted to  included a meaning that is inspired by his works. So I made an art about Equality and drew some ideas from both Ashley Bryan’s works  and the finished poster project my last work which is about Inequality.  This art work I made is about Equality. I added some varieties of colors. I wanted to make it bright and colorful inspired by his illustrated story books The frame around  is sorta inspired by his glass paintings except I don’t have glass. The glass  is like a invisible shield  protecting Equality from Inequality.The flower inside is the growth which is strengthening the bonds of people together. The sun helps the flower to grow.  A balance of things instead of imbalance. A message on one of the person’s shirts says Be yourself.  A message if Equality and non judgemental was established and people learning about it. Hatred and Jealousy is still within,but we can break through the Boundary of our minds that is trying to take over. That is my quote.

by Amarachi Ikemba

My work is a portrait of Ashley Bryan and surrounding him are some flowers inspired by his art style in one of his artworks.  In most of his artworks involving flowers, you’d see that they are drawn in different ways than what you’d imagine a flower to look like.  I really like how it’s abstract and not applying ideas from anyone else.  I chose this because it was something simple and something that still related to him somehow.

Seaglass by Sadie Stubbs

I like how Ashley Bryan does all kinds of things like how he makes books with drawing, drawing with songs. He does a lot of stuff with black lives. I did sea glass because of how Ashley tells stories and how he made nine panels of them and made the people that he did as animals instead. I really like how they look when they are hanging in the sun when you could see what design it is.

Allow Your Own Peace by

Dreams by Rachael Wyman

Author and illustrator, Ashley Bryan, was born in Harlem, New York. He currently resides on Little Cranberry Island in Isles, Maine where he continues to write children’s books and make his artworks such as puppets, stained glass, stamps, and many other pieces. One of his most well known books is Beautiful Blackbird. He is also known to take poems or stories written by fellow authors(with their consent, of course) and illustrate them. This was the inspiration for mine as well as the connection of my piece to his works. I saw that he had a book where he illustrated a poem by Langston Hughes and since one of my favorite poems is actually by Langston Hughes, I decided to use it. I figured it was very close in style to some of Ashley Bryan’s work, which is why I took the illustrations approach rather than complete concept inspiration.

by Francine Wilson-Charuk