21 May Fowler Families: Parker Looks Up

Parker Looks Up: An Extraordinary Moment

When Parker Curry came face-to-face with Amy Sherald’s transcendent portrait of First Lady Michelle Obama at the National Portrait Gallery, she didn’t just see the First Lady of the United States. She saw a queen—one with dynamic self-assurance, regality, beauty, and truth—who captured her imagination. A nearby museum-goer snapped a photo of mesmerized Parker, which became an internet sensation. In this moving picture book, Parker and her mother, Jessica Curry, tell the story of a young girl and her family whose trip to a museum turned into an extraordinary experience.

This New York Times bestseller follows Parker, along with her mother, baby sister, best friend Gia, and Gia’s mother, as they walk the halls of a museum, seeing paintings of everyone and everything: from George Washington Carver to Frida Kahlo, from exotic flowers to graceful ballerinas. As Parker walks by Sherald’s portrait of Michelle Obama, she almost passes it; but then she stops and looks up…

Parker sees the possibility and promise, the hopes and dreams of herself in Michelle Obama’s powerful portrayal. An everyday moment becomes an extraordinary one, and it continues to resonate with Parker and other girls like her.

Foreword by artist Amy Sherald.

Parker Looks Up: An Extraordinary Moment
by Jessica Curry and Parker Curry; illustrated by Brittany Jackson
40 pages
4–8 years
Published by Aladdin Books, 2019
Purchase here

Image courtesy Brittany Jackson/Simon & Schuster