Melanie Hope Greenberg, author and illustrator of so many fantastic picture books, was kind enough to answer a few questions for Posterband. Check out more from Melanie at:
www.melaniehopegreenberg.com
Your books have a distinctive style - colorful and crowded with appealing detail. Could you name some of your artistic influences? Both broadly and as well as for children?I am admirer of most art. From the classics to the contemporary. For me art is about feeling and psychology. With adult art I enjoy mostly everything. If I do not like the art I still know that the artist poured their heart and soul into it, so I see it from that point of view too. Art is subjective.
In children’s books, I love the artists that take the time to portray a story thoughtfully with soul and sensitivity. Book art helps a child learn to read and also FEEL something through the mood and tone of the colors. I am not a big fan of trends. Originality is the job of an artist. I guess being self taught is why I have a distinctive art style.
Many of the books you have written or illustrated are set in New York. Is the city your biggest inspiration?
Dear Art Directors and Editors: please do not stereotype me as only urban, I can paint most any subject you need. That being said, I am a New York City native, originally from the Bronx, one year in Greenwich Village and 31 years in Brooklyn. Although I travel, nothing lives up to the energy and cultural diversity of New York City. I just received a letter from Mayor Bloomberg praising Mermaids On Parade as a part of New York City’s cultural legacy, so the mayor sensed my passion.
Another book I painted was A City Is, poems by Brooklyn’s first poet laureate, Norman Rosten. It took 14 years to get our collaboration published. I created many book prototypes in order to sell it. At first, I sketched cities around the USA. Eventually, the art became the reflected truth of Brooklyn native Rosten, as well as my own roots. I knew how to paint the our city’s moods and colors.
Coney Island where Mermaids on Parade is set is an icon of visual style. How did you approach this challenge as an artist?
Coney Island is an artist’s dreamscape. Surreal, child-like. flashing neon colors. Coney’s visual style reflects my own coming of age in the late 60’s, early 70’s. My heart is really into psychedelic art and music. Viewing ‘The Summer of Love’ exhibition at the Whitney Museum last year really helped me grasp the big influence that era had and still has on my innate art style. Coney's own history - from the 1800’s on - is also felt viscerally when you step foot in that neighborhood. A wild juxtaposition of old and new architecture. Truly diverse, which is Coney’s overall legacy in the tapestry of our country’s history.
Of the books where you have been both the author and illustrator (such as Mermaids On Parade), could you explain how these books generally originate? Do you typically have an artistic vision that inspires the story? Or do you begin with a story or theme?
Mermaids On Parade was an idea which grew out of community. In 2005, Brooklyn librarians Deloris McCullough and David Mowery told me what was missing on their bookshelf. About three months later, Tanya Rynd, who owns Superfine in Dumbo, Brooklyn invited me to join her performance art troupe, the Superfine Dinettes, and march in the upcoming Coney Island Mermaid Parade. I interviewed the Dinettes, asking them what the parade meant to them, why they marched. Then I experienced the parade first hand. The whole book was a synthesis of everyone’s good energy and ideas. I knew children would love the magic of the parade and costumes.
Your books seem to have a fairly elastic age-span. Do you have an ideal audience or age level in mind when creating for children?
I am lucky that my art has wide appeal. For children I try to be literal. (Although, A City Is is about silence and multi-dimensional consciousness!) For grown-up magazine art, I am more abstract and conceptual. My guess is that the art touches the spirit that exists in all age groups. Beauty contained in wonder, that child-eye vision.
Posterband covers music as well. We'd love to know some of your favorite music that inspires you creatively.
I am so lucky to have lived through the music renaissance of the 1960’s with the original musicians who started it. The Beatles, The Rolling Stones, The Doors (lately I am obsessed with their music once again). Jim Morrison was a visionary who was a grand emoter and not afraid to be openly anti-war. For Mermaids On Parade, there were mostly local Brooklyn band influences. I played their CDs at least once daily during production. The old timey sound of the Jug Addicts, the Wiyos, Jan Bell and Alex Battles really brought up that Coney Island honky tonk spirit from its hey day. The Gaijins A Go-Go and Les Sans Culottes added some feminine mermaid energy and color. A lot of these local musicians also march as characters in the book.
Thanks, Melanie!
This very hip picture book is perhaps the better place to start. You'll dig the retro illustrations, and you know the words by heart, right? 
These ramshackle recordings from Kimya Dawson (ex-Moldy Peaches) sound a little like those Sebadoh or Ween cassettes you wore out in college. And they'll probably give your kids the same unstoppable giggle fits. The askew acoustic strumming, barnyard harmonies, toddler yodeling and pocket change percussion make this a strange and wonderful listening experience for you and your child. Kimya's songs are full of wide-eyed innocence and fine-tuned flatulence. I Love You Sweet Baby captures perfectly that feeling of every new parent who is just gobsmacked with love for their child. Basically Kimya sounds like she's having a blast being a mom. It shines through on every track, so you can expect your kids to have a blast listening to this record. And if you can fart the alphabet, you can sing along. 
With beautiful choral harmonies, impressive arrangements, and Grimm nature themes, the Fleet Foxes debut full-length is a perfect album to spin for your little one for some quality - or quiet - time. For parents, this may remind you of The Band or The Byrds (also wholesome for the kiddies). 
In addition to contemporary picture books that rock, I plan to regularly feature some classic picture books on Posterband. Books like these need no introduction, perhaps, but it never hurts to be reminded of good thing. And of course some of these books may be new to you. Myself, I missed out on Caps for Sale as a child. But thanks to a gift from a friend, my son hasn't.
The Pixies for babies. Oh, BABY! It's EDUCATIONAL! Check out Rockabye Baby Music. They have lullaby versions of The Ramones, The Cure, Bob Marley...you name it. 
A friend of mine once said that all kids are on acid. Which I took to mean they experience life as full of magic and music, in vivid color, attended by dancing robots and monsters, and in thrall to a benevolent disco puppetmaster. Which basically describes this show. Yo Gabba Gabba! (hey!) I felt a slight prick of guilt as my son watched a Super Music Friend Show segment featuring Cornelius performing their heavy psychedelic number Count Five or Six while stars sprung forth from the forehead of -- was that a unicorn? I had to pinch myself. I was tempted to ask him if he was seeing what I was seeing. 
