The International Board on Books for Young People (IBBY) recently unveiled the shortlist for the 2024 Hans Christian Andersen Award. Cai Gao from Changsha, Hunan Province, was shortlisted as an outstanding illustrator. She is the only Chinese illustrator on this shortlist, and this was her first participation in this award.

Cai Gao, born in Changsha in 1946, is a Chinese pioneer in picture book creation. She once taught in a rural primary school for a long time, and then worked in the Hunan Juvenile and Children's Publishing House. She has devoted herself into picture books creation since she retired from work. She was the first Chinese winner of the Golden Apples award of BIB (Biennial of Illustration Bratislava), and a member of the selection committee of the Bologna Children's Book Fair (BCBF). She was honored with the Special Contribution Award of the 2022 Chen Bochui International Children's Literature Award, and the Hunan Government Award for Publishing the same year. Her master works include: Chinese Beautiful Stories, Yueliang Baba (the Moon), Walk with the Moon, Story about Birth, and The Boy Who Outfoxed a Fox (named Bao'er in the Traditional Chinese version).

The Hans Christian Andersen Award is the highest international distinction given to authors and illustrators of children's books. Given every other year by IBBY, the Hans Christian Andersen Awards recognize lifelong achievement and are given to an author and an illustrator whose complete works have made an important, lasting contribution to children's literature. Children's literature writer Cao Wenxuan was the first Chinese winner of such honor, being awarded in 2016.

This article is from the Hunan Provincial Government www.enghunan.gov.cn.

Translator: Pang Yuehui

Chinese source: Voice of Hunan