"In her extensive picture-book–biography oeuvre, Winter has proven to be particularly attuned to selecting the just-right elements of her subjects’ complex lives while making them both accessible to and readily understood by young children.... Winter both describes and employs Matisse’s signature, late-career technique of brilliantly colored, hand-painted, cut-paper compositions. She enlivens the simple text with liberal yet judicious quotes from Matisse’s letters and comments from contemporaries. This is a beautifully designed book that will certainly connect with readers...the book is a charming introduction to a widely reproduced, child-friendly artist, one that children will assuredly encounter and affirmingly embrace."

"In her latest picture book biography...Winter focuses on Henri Matisse’s later life, during which the painter took up collage.... With text that is straightforward and unflowery, Winter relies, successfully, on the strength of her own art to capture the essence of Matisse’s. A brief author’s note explains her specific interest in this portion of the artist’s oeuvre."

"The accessibility of cut paper makes it a particularly child-appealing medium, and Matisse is certainly the grand master of the art, so audiences will be pleased to see the championing of this oeuvre...the art is strong and vigorous, with a hat-tip to Matisse himself in the form of the open window (a famous Matisse subject) that allows the old man to view the sea; the playfulness and imaginative employment of actual Matisse collage shapes effectively convey the way art and life vision can blend together."

“In ‘Henri’s Scissors,’ Jeanette Winter rushes through the story of Henri Matisse’s childhood, but no worries: it’s his second (far more interesting) childhood that fascinates her. After becoming one of the greatest artists of the 20th century, whose only peer, it could be argued, was the aggressively prolific Picasso, Matisse has grown old. Now infirm and confined to bed, he reflects on his past triumphs in a room colored in the deepest blues and purples. But inspiration strikes, and using a pair of common household scissors as his magic wand, Matisse cuts shapes out of brightly colored paper and transforms his sick-room into a mystical garden full of flowers and birds. Then, in the final and greatest feat of his career as artist-sorcerer, ‘the rainbow of shapes cradled the old artist and carried him into the heavens.’”

“Winter captures the joy that Matisse found in cut paper, both through her acrylic and cut-paper illustrations and through quotes from his letters. The images are evocative of his art, with bright colors and rounded shapes…. The author addresses his death with a light touch…. Libraries with demand for picture-book biographies and art history will want to add this well-done title to their collections.”

* “Masterful picture-book biographer Winter (The Watcher, 2011) offers an elega