Tom Slaughter (1955-) Biography

Born 1955, in New York, NY; Education: Connecticut College, B.A.

Career

Artist, designer, and printmaker. Director, Horace W. Goldsmith Foundation.

Writings

(Illustrator) Marc Mayer, Tom Boat [New York, NY], 1987.

M Is for Moon, self-published, 1990.

(Illustrator) Jon Robin Baitz, Whatever We Lose, Durham Press, 1998.

One, Two, Three: A Counting Book, Tundra Books (Plattsburgh, NY), 2003.

(Illustrator) Marthe Jocelyn, One Some Many, Tundra Books (Plattsburgh, NY), 2004.

Work in Progress

Illustrating Over Under and a bilingual ABC.

Sidelights

New York City-based artist Tom Slaughter took some time out from creating museum-quality fine art to write and illustrate the children's storybook One, Two, Three: A Counting Book. Published in 2003 by Tundra Books, Slaughter's book offers children the opportunity to brush up on their counting while gaining an appreciation for modern art at the same time. His second book for children, a collaboration with wife and children's book author Marthe Jocelyn, was One Some Many, a counting book published in 2004.

One, Two, Three focuses primarily on exercising children's counting skills with easily recognizable objects and simple illustrations. Slaughter uses primarily colors to make his collage illustrations both engaging and fun for kids, and includes no text aside from Arabic numerals. A reviewer for Kirkus Reviews commented that, created by "an artist who already has work hanging in the Museum of Modern Art, the Whitney, and elsewhere," One, Two, Three "should prompt plenty of pointing and chortling from even pre-verbal prewalkers."

In addition to his work as a book illustrator—he has plans to produce several more books for young children—Slaughter has also designed posters, playbills, watches, and T-shirts. His artwork has been shown in solo exhibitions around the world, including New York, Los Angeles, Miami, Vancouver, Amsterdam, Cologne, and Japan. He has worked in collaboration with Durham Press for a decade and his prints are in the collections of the Museum of Modern and the Whitney Museum of American Art.