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LUDMILA ZEMAN

Place of birth: Gottwadlov, Czechoslovakia
Place of residence: Montreal, Quebec

Ludmila Zeman's talent for painting, puppetry, and film-making was nurtured in her hometown of Gottwadlov in Czechoslovakia where her father, a famous film-maker, had his own studio. By the age of ten she was already painting and taking pictures for his prize-winning films. By her early 20s, as she continued to work with her father, she also began to study art and design at university. Later, she published a best-selling picture book and, with her husband, developed a successful yet personal and unique style of film-making by creating award-winning shorts. An offer to teach at the Emily Carr College of Art in Vancouver led to the family's eventual emigration to Canada in 1985. Ludmila Zeman became a Canadian citizen in 1988. Since coming to this country, she and her husband have made a film about West Coast Native peoples, for the television programme "Sesame Street". Another film, based on legends of the Pacific North West, was prepared for the National Film Board. The husband and wife team are presently working on a full-length feature-film presentation, based on her extensively researched, highly acclaimed picture-book trilogy about Gilgamesh, the mighty king of Uruk, in Mesopotamia at the dawn of civilization. For Ludmila Zeman, film is the ultimate art form which allows her to express her creativity in original and meaningful ways.

Awards

1995 Governor General's Literary Award / Children's Literature (for best illustrations) for The Last Quest of Gilgamesh.

Selected Bibliography

La Derniére Quête de Gilgamesh. Written and illustrated by Ludmila Zeman; translated by Michèle Boileau. Montréal: Livres Toundra, c1995.
24 p.: col. ill.; 27 x 30 cm.
ISBN 0887763294
(French edition of The Last Quest of Gilgamesh)

Gilgamesh the King. Written and illustrated by Ludmila Zeman. Montreal: Tundra Books, c1992.
24 p.: col. ill.; 27 x 30 cm.
ISBN 0887762832

The Last Quest of Gilgamesh. Written and illustrated by Ludmila Zeman. Montreal: Tundra Books, c1995.
24 p.: col. ill.; 27 x 30 cm.
ISBN 0887763286

La Revanche d'Ishtar. Written and illustrated by Ludmila Zeman; translated by Michèle Boileau. Montreal: Livres Toundra, 1993?
24 p.: col. ill.; 27 x 30 cm.
ISBN 0887763251
(French edition of The Revenge of Ishtar)

The Revenge of Ishtar. Written and illustrated by Ludmila Zeman. Montreal: Tundra Books, c1993.
24 p.: col. ill.; 27 x 30 cm.
ISBN 0887763154

Le Roi Gilgamesh. Written and illustrated by Ludmila Zeman; translated by Michèle Boileau. Montréal: Livres Toundra, c1993.
28 p.: col. ill., cartes; 27 x 30 cm.
ISBN 0887762883
(French edition of Gilgamesh the King)