mail	2455 Islandsview Drive Gabriola, BC V0R1X7
ph	250-247-7476
e	simaelizabeth@gmail.com
web	www.stitchingforsocialchange.ca

Biography

Sima Elizabeth Shefrin played as a toddler in the galleries of Italy, and has been creating art ever since. As well as occasional curating gigs, she has been working professionally as a visual artist for 30 years, and has exhibited throughout North America. In the last few years, book illustration has really captured her heart.

She is particularly interested in the ways that artwork brings together people of different cultures. Her Middle East Peace Quilt <www.vcn.bc.ca/quilt> is an international community art project which has been touring North America since 1999. Other community art projects have involved creating art pieces with participants in schools and community centres and libraries around Vancouver.

Elizabeth has developed a hands-on workshop in which children create portraits of themselves as characters in the books she has illustrated. She frequently speaks publicly about her work.

Book types: picture books

Guest speaker/presentation information

School Program/Presentation:
Elizabeth works with all ages to create unique, memorable quilts and banners. Her specialties include drawing out participants' stories through paper and fabric, creating group art projects to illustrate social history or literature, (ie: group murals of Mid Summer Night’s Dream) and using art to facilitate cross-cultural understanding. She is offering workshops in schools and libraries, based on the illustrations from “Abby’s Birds”.

For more information see: http://www.stitchingforsocialchange.ca/workshops.htm

Presentation geographic range: Vancouver, Coast, Lower Mainland, Gulf and Vancouver Islands

Presentation audience age groups: grades K-3, grades 4-6, college/university/adult

Published work

Abby’s Birds, written by Ellen Schwartz, Tradewind Books, 2006
Latkes, written by Bob Bossin, Nick Books, 2007, Once Upon a Bathtime, written by Vi Hughes, Tradewind Books 2010

Awards & recognition

Abby’s Birds has been nominated for the following awards:
-The Shining Willow Book Awards
-The Chocolate Lily Book Awards
-The Christie Harris Illustrated Children's Literature Prize (BC Book Prize)
-The Marilyn Baillie Picture Book Award
-Long listed for the the Elizabeth Mrazik-Cleaver Award for Illustration.
--Selected for the Lieutenant Governor of Ontario’s Club Amick for Aboriginal Literacy Initiatives
Original illustrations for Abby’s Birds have been purchased by the Osborne Collection of Early Children's Books in Toronto. <www.tpl.toronto.on.ca>

Other awards in visual art include:

-Puffin Foundation Award, 2007.
-Canada Council for the Arts Travel Grant, 2003.
-Seattle Arts Commission Contemporary Textiles Purchase, 2002.
-Helen Zukerman Family Foundation Grant 2001.
-Puffin Foundation Award, 1999.
-British Columbia Tourism and Culture Visual Arts Grant, 1993.