{"id":156278,"date":"2019-11-12T09:53:02","date_gmt":"2019-11-12T14:53:02","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/today.uconn.edu?p=156278&preview=true&preview_id=156278"},"modified":"2019-11-07T14:27:21","modified_gmt":"2019-11-07T19:27:21","slug":"first-look-sendak-collection-items-night-kitchen-exhibit","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/today.uconn.edu\/2019\/11\/first-look-sendak-collection-items-night-kitchen-exhibit\/","title":{"rendered":"First Look at Sendak Collection Items: In the Night Kitchen Exhibit"},"content":{"rendered":"

The first public exhibition of items in The Maurice Sendak Collection at UConn<\/a> is \u201cInto the Night: Inspirations and Influences in Maurice Sendak\u2019s In the Night Kitchen,\u201d which celebrates the 50th anniversary of one of the most important books by the award-winning children\u2019s author and illustrator.<\/p>\n

The exhibition, curated by UConn\u2019s Archives and Special Collections, is on display in the gallery at the Thomas J. Dodd Research Center<\/a> in Storrs through Dec. 20.<\/p>\n

In 1969, Sendak wrote excitedly of In the Night Kitchen. \u201cI\u2019m mad for it-and it\u2019s mad,\u201d he noted about the book that tells the tale of a sleeping boy\u2019s dream about searching for milk to help bake a cake. Published a year later, the exuberant nakedness of its hero, Mickey, led to its being banned from certain libraries, and even today there are those who think it is inappropriate for children.<\/p>\n

The exhibition includes the multi-layered and various inspirations and influences found in In the Night Kitchen such as Walt Disney\u2019s Mickey Mouse and Winsor McKay\u2019s comic strip Little Nemo in Slumberland. Other highlights are the artwork and process materials for the book as well as an exploration of the book\u2019s censorship and public reaction.<\/p>\n

\"Final
Final artwork of frontispiece for In the Night Kitchen (New York: Harper & Row, 1970), The Maurice Sendak Collection. Archives & Special Collections, UConn Library. \u00a9 The Maurice Sendak Foundation.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

A symposium focusing on In the Night Kitchen will take place Friday, Nov. 15, from 10:30 a.m. to 6:30 p.m. in the Doris & Simon Konover Auditorium of the Thomas J. Dodd Research Center.<\/p>\n

\u201cThis exhibition really aligns with the themes that will be discussed during the symposium,\u201d says Clara Nguyen, archivist for the Sendak Collection, and exhibit curator. \u201cThen you have the childhood memories he had living in Brooklyn, New York and characters like Mickey Mouse and Little Nemo. He loved them both. They\u2019re all incorporated in In the Night Kitchen.\u201d<\/p>\n

The long display case in the gallery of the Thomas J. Dodd Research Center traces the development of the book and Sendak\u2019s influences for its storyline and characters, beginning with the Brooklyn, New York born author\u2019s dedication of the book to his parents, Sadie and Philip, who immigrated to the United States from Poland.<\/p>\n

There is a detailed sample layout of the primary character Mickey \u2013 named for Mickey Mouse — falling through the night and seeing his mother and father holding one an another in the bed. Other images refer to family history such as 1930s household items that include a hanging lamp and a radio cabinet with a clock on top that were referenced in notes from a Sears Catalog published during Sendak\u2019s childhood.<\/p>\n

Direct references to Sendak\u2019s creative influences can be seen in the opening comic book-style illustration panels of Mickey in his bed that mirror the opening scenes of McKay\u2019s Little Nemo in Slumberland, with Nemo sitting in his bed. Sendak was a fan of film legend Oliver Hardy and a sketchbook page of reference drawings of the comedian are near images of In the Night Kitchen\u2019s three bakers, who all share Hardy\u2019s likeness.<\/p>\n

The exhibit also includes examples of the scope of Sendak\u2019s prominence as an author, with multiple editions of the book in several languages including Spanish, German and Afrikaner, as well as commercial items such as a greeting card, T-shirt, and rubber stamp with themed images from the book.<\/p>\n

On the back wall of the gallery is a mural of an illustration from the book showing the three bakers watching Mickey flying above a milk bottle that is part of a skyline made of ingredients for a cake. A seven-minute video of the story made by Westin Woods in 1987 also runs continuously on two monitors.<\/p>\n

Participants in the Nov. 15 symposium will include Arthur Yorinks, writer and collaborator of Sendak; Katherine Capshaw, professor of English at UConn and president of the Children\u2019s Literary Association; Michael Lobel, professor of art history at Hunter College; Lara Saguisag, associate professor of English at Staten Island College CUNY; Barbara McClintock, award-winning children\u2019s book author and illustrator; Michael DiCapua, renowned book editor and art director; and Lynn Caponera, president of The Maurice Sendak Foundation.<\/p>\n

\u201cInto the Night: Inspirations and Influences in Maurice Sendak\u2019s In the Night Kitchen\u201d is open Monday through Friday from 9 a.m. to 4 p.m.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

In 1969, children’s author and illustrator Maurice Sendak wrote excitedly about his work on In the Night Kitchen. \u201cI\u2019m mad for it-and it\u2019s mad,\u201d he noted.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":18,"featured_media":156302,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"_crdt_document":"","wds_primary_category":0,"wds_primary_series":0,"wds_primary_attribution":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[1711,1914,2225,2234],"tags":[],"magazine-issues":[],"coauthors":[1918],"class_list":["post-156278","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-arts-culture","category-sfa","category-uconn-storrs","category-university-life"],"pp_statuses_selecting_workflow":false,"pp_workflow_action":"current","pp_status_selection":"publish","acf":[],"publishpress_future_action":{"enabled":false,"date":"2026-05-12 06:31:25","action":"change-status","newStatus":"draft","terms":[],"taxonomy":"category","extraData":[]},"publishpress_future_workflow_manual_trigger":{"enabledWorkflows":[]},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/today.uconn.edu\/wp-rest\/wp\/v2\/posts\/156278","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/today.uconn.edu\/wp-rest\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/today.uconn.edu\/wp-rest\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/today.uconn.edu\/wp-rest\/wp\/v2\/users\/18"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/today.uconn.edu\/wp-rest\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=156278"}],"version-history":[{"count":6,"href":"https:\/\/today.uconn.edu\/wp-rest\/wp\/v2\/posts\/156278\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":156299,"href":"https:\/\/today.uconn.edu\/wp-rest\/wp\/v2\/posts\/156278\/revisions\/156299"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/today.uconn.edu\/wp-rest\/wp\/v2\/media\/156302"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/today.uconn.edu\/wp-rest\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=156278"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/today.uconn.edu\/wp-rest\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=156278"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/today.uconn.edu\/wp-rest\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=156278"},{"taxonomy":"magazine-issue","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/today.uconn.edu\/wp-rest\/wp\/v2\/magazine-issues?post=156278"},{"taxonomy":"author","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/today.uconn.edu\/wp-rest\/wp\/v2\/coauthors?post=156278"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}