Kaylani Juanita on San Francisco Public Library

Kaylani Juanita McCard, professionally known as Kaylani Juanita, is an illustrator. Her work focuses on activism, empowerment of people of color, and LGBTQ+ people. Her work has appeared in publications through

Chronicle Books Chronicle Books is a San Francisco-based American publisher of books for adults and children. The company was established in 1967 by Phelps Dewey, an executive with Chronicle Publishing Company, then-publisher of the ''San Francisco Chronicle''. ...

, Cicada Magazine, and Lee & Low Books. Her first book illustrated, ''Ta-Da!'' by Kathy Ellen Davis, was released by

and nominated for an Young Readers award via the 38th Annual Northern California Book Awards. In 2018, '' ELLE Magazine'' featured her work and interviewed her at length in context of her memorial illustrations based on the murder of

Nia Wilson On July 22, 2018, three sisters, Nia, Letifah and Tashiya Wilson, were attacked by a man wielding a knife, later identified as John Cowell, after exiting a Bay Area Rapid Transit (BART) train at MacArthur station in Oakland, California. 18-year-o ...

, a black woman who was fatally stabbed in a suspected hate crime while exiting a BART train. In 2017, she illustrated "9 Books for Woke Kids," an article by Guinevere de la Mare.

Education

Juanita attended B. Gale Wilson Elementary School in Solano County's

Fairfield-Suisun Unified School District Fairfield-Suisun Unified School District is a public school district based in Solano County, California, and a portion of Napa County, California Napa County () is a county north of San Pablo Bay located in the northern portion of the U.S. ...

as well as Rodriguez High School. While attending Rodriguez, Juanita spent a summer studying at CalArts. She then attended Solano College before transferring to California College of the Arts. She earned her BFA in Illustration from California College of the Arts. As of 2019, she is working on a Master's in Design at the University of California, Davis.

Personal life

Juanita is based in

Fairfield, CA Fairfield is a city in and the county seat of Solano County, California, in the North Bay sub-region of the San Francisco Bay Area. It is generally considered the midpoint between the cities of San Francisco and Sacramento, approximately fro ...

and identifies as a mixed-race femme queer person.

Awards and honors

When Aiden Became A Brother

Kaylani Jaunita and

Kyle Lukoff Kyle Lukoff is a children's book author, school librarian, and former bookseller. He is most known for the Stonewall Awards, Stonewall award-winning ''When Aidan Became a Brother'' and for ''Call Me Max'', which gained attention when parents in T ...

published ''When Aiden Became a Brother'' in 2019. In 2020, the book was awarded the Stonewall Children’s and Young Adult Literature Award, landed a top spot on the

American Library Association Rainbow List The ALA Rainbow List is an annual list of "books with significant gay, lesbian, bisexual, or transgender content, and which are aimed at youth, birth through age 18" produced by the American Library Association's (ALA's) Rainbow Project, which is r ...

, and was named a

Charlotte Huck Award The Charlotte Huck Award for Outstanding Fiction for Children, established in 2014 and organized by the National Council of Teachers of English (NCTE), is an annual American literary award for children's fiction books. According to NCTE, the "awar ...

Honor Book.

Bibliography

*''A House for Every Bird'' by Megan Maynor, illustrated by Kaylani Juanita, (2021) * ''When Aidan Became a Brother'' by Kyle Lukoff, illustrated by Kaylani Juanita (2019) * ''Watch Us Rise'' by Reneé Watson & Ellen Hagan, illustrated by Kaylani Juanita (2019) * ''Ta-Da!'' by Kathy Ellen Davis, illustrated by Kaylani Juanita (2018) * ''Magnificent Homespun Brown'' by Samara Cole Doyon, illustrated by Kaylani Juanita (2020)

Podcasts

*''The Creativity Habit''

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Juanita, Kaylani American children's book illustrators American LGBT artists American women illustrators Year of birth missing (living people) American queer women Living people 21st-century American women