The Hockaday Museum of Art announces a book signing and reading event with The Garden of Smiles author Kelly Potter and illustrator Ava Hall

.The Hockaday Museum of Art will be holding a book signing and reading event with a local author and illustrator for The Garden of Smiles on Tuesday, March 15, 6:00 – 7:30 PM, offering free admission for all.  The new children’s book is the first in a series of collaborations between author Kelly Potter and 10 year-old illustrator Ava Hall.  Copies of the book will be offered for sale in hardcover version in the Museum’s gift shop.
Author Kelly Potter discovered her love for writing at the age of 13, and has worked in Early Childhood Education for 15 years while her own children grew up. She was able to experience the type of writing and illustrations first-hand that kept young minds engaged and hooked them on the love of reading and art. While she wrote The Garden of Smiles in one afternoon, Potter struggled with the direction to take in illustrating the book.  After trying many things, she was struck with the idea to collaborate with her 10 year old cousin Ava Hall, whom she knew has shown natural talent in addition to having had taken many children’s art classes at the Hockaday Museum of Art.
Regarding the After School Art classes that Ava has taken since the age of 7, she says that “the Hockaday helped me with thinking about what colors would look like, or should I say not look like.  Like a tree in the mountains, if you’re far away, you can't see the yellow in the green, so the mountains look blue.”  Her favorite parts of creating illustrations for The Garden of Smiles were drawing the main character and “Bruce the Ticklish Moose”.