Hair Dance!

Johnson, Dinah. Hair Dance! Henry Holt and Company. 2007. This book is a wondrous celebration of female African-American hair in all its variety and beauty. The photographs are outstanding! They expertly show movement, demonstrate a mastery of light and shadow, reveal the texture of skin and hair, and capture the different moods of the girls: joyous, reflective, and pensive. The photographs are artistic: one shows hair spreading out with red highlights bordered by gold paper laced with hints of red; another shows a girl who has her hair gathered in little puffs, the pattern of the scalp shows. Some of the text is in rhyming verses "We play beauty parlor every day styling hair in all kinds of ways" but most is in phrases: "my nature hair real hair flower power strong hair". This book is an example of absolutely gorgeous book design. The photographs rest on color paper that sets them off beautifully: One page has a beautiful posed side shot and front shot of the same girl, her red shirt blends into a background of red that is artfully arranged with a gold strip, and a blue rectangle. Both the photographer and author describe how they view hairstyle as an art form. The author notes, "so we work with it (hair), play with it, style it, and treasure it as the art that it is."