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Story & Pictures By

Director

Joanna Rudnick

Executive Producers

Jenifer Westphal, Joe Plummer, Hallee Adelman, Shizuka Asakawa, Ken Pelletier, James Costa, Bill and Ruth Ann Harnisch, The Harnisch Foundation, Brenda Robinson, Melissa Sage Fadim, Gordon Quinn

Producers

Joanna Rudnick, Tim Horsburgh, Korelan Matteson

Editors

Eli Olson, Davon Ramos

Cinematographer

Robin Mortarotti

Story & Pictures By is the first feature documentary to take audiences behind the scenes to meet the boundary pushers who create children’s picture books. The film follows Christian Robinson, Yuyi Morales, and Mac Barnett—the stars of the new “golden age” of kids lit— as they create experimental work that reflects the mysteries of childhood, champions the marginalized, and provides children with windows and mirrors, even when the creators’ own lives are not fairy tales. Through rare archival, untapped insights, and stop-motion paper animation, we also come to understand why classics such as “Goodnight Moon,” “Where the Wild Things Are,” “The Very Hungry Caterpillar,” and “The Snowy Day” changed the art form and stand the test of time.

Post-screening discussion with Arthur Bradford, director of To Be Destroyed (short preceding feature) moderated by John Williams, Books Editor for the Washington Post.

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Joanna Rudnick

Director, Story & Pictures By

Joanna Rudnick is an Emmy-nominated director with over two decades of experience directing and producing documentaries. All of Joanna’s films engage with ideas of family, the importance of the arts in society, human health and wellness, social justice, and youth issues. Joanna’s first feature documentary, In the Family (PBS|POV), took a personal look at the effect that testing positive for the breast and ovarian cancer mutation had on her and several others, as well as the bioethical implications of the new medical technology. The film was broadcast in over a dozen countries, shown on Capitol Hill, and used in a Supreme Court case brought by the ACLU on gene patents. Joanna directed the animated short Brother (Independent Lens|PBS), the Chicago Film Festival Audience Award-winning short On Beauty (Shorts TV), and an episode of the duPont award-winning Hard Earned (Al Jazeera America). Her producing credits include the Emmy-award-winning Robert Capa in Love and War (PBS|BBC), Crossfire Hurricane (HBO), Bill T. Jones: A Good Man (American Masters|PBS), and Prisoner of Her Past (PBS). Joanna has a master’s in Science, Health, and Environmental Journalism.