Victor D. O. Santos & Anna Forlati | Italy
'Before I Forget' is a touching picture book developed in partnership with Brazilian picture book author Victor D.O. Santos.
The book deals with a very sad but common experience for children, namely that of having a grandparent who suffers from dementia and of watching a loved one lose, little by little, their memories and their ability to function normally.
In this story, we follow a young girl called Claire, her father, and her grandmother on a heartfelt journey through memory and time. A journey that highlights the power of love and of connection. A journey about cherishing our memories and our loved ones and appreciating the present moment before it is too late.
The metaphor that guides the representation of memory loss in this book is that of a house that is gradually emptied. The reader’s eyes move slowly through the grandmother's memories, traversing the rooms of her house through time, at the pace of the emotional recollections she shares with her son. During this journey, fewer and fewer elements appear around grandma, while elements from the outside world, as well as other memories, begin to mix (a typical symptom of dementia itself).
Eventually, grandma is left with a single flower, a forget-me-not, which formed the pattern of the wallpaper in her house and slowly starts fading away, just like her memories. As she clings to it during the transition to a nursing home, this little flower suddenly becomes a powerful part of the guiding metaphor.
The color blue represents memory: the need to preserve our inner emotional memories, as well as the need to be remembered. Blue is also the color of the forget-me-not flower, a symbol that represents remembrance and is widely used for raising awareness about dementia.
The illustrations seen in this version of the book, submitted to The Unpublished Picturebook Showcase 5, are still at a very early stage and all the images seen are just small studies. The research for defining the technique and final images, as well as the storyboard, visual narrative, and exact text placement is still in progress. The color tests are made with graphite, acrylic ink, and colored pencils. The book will be completed by January 2024.
'Before I Forget', which features information on dementia in the back matter, is the third picture book collaboration between Forlati and Santos, who previously collaborated on 'My Dad, My Rock' (a Kirkus Reviews Best Book of 2022) and on 'What Makes Us Human' (selected for the dPICTUS Unpublished Picture Book Showcase 4).
PS: The author (Victor D.O. Santos) is the main point of contact for this project.
https://www.instagram.com/linguacious_llc/
Education:
Ars in Fabula Macerata
Master in Illustrazione per l'editoria (Master’s degree in Illustration for the Publishing Industry)
Graduation: 2012
Published titles: 40