Findlay, Ohio, July 10, 2000 – The University of Findlay’s Mazza Collection Galleria will award its Mazza Medallion of Excellence for Artistic Diversity to Leo and Diane Dillon on Thursday, July 27, at 7 p.m. in the Alumni Memorial Union on the UF campus.

The Mazza Medallion is a biennial award given by the Mazza Collection Galleria to recognize an outstanding artist of children’s books. The key criteria for choosing a recipient is the candidate’s sensitivity to the varying requirements of different stories. This award is given to an artist of children’s books who has demonstrated his or her willingness to experiment with both styles and media of illustrating. This is the third time the award has been given.

Leo and Diane Dillon have been illustrating children’s books since 1970. Each artist has a distinct style, but, when they work together, as they do on all of their children’s books, they achieve the kind of art that neither can produce separately. Whatever they are working on is passed back and forth from one drawing board to the other at different stages of the work. The artists feel as if they have created a “third identity” as they have worked together.

The Dillons have received many awards and honors for their children’s books. Not counting the hundreds of state and regional awards they have been granted, they have received more than 40 national and international awards and honors over the past 30 years. For example, they have received the Newberry Honor for The Hundred Penny Box, the Caldecott Medal for Why Mosquitoes Buzz in People’s Ears and for Ashanti to Zulu, the Lewis Carroll Shelf Award for Who’s in Rabbit’s House? and the Hans Christian Andersen “Highly Commended” citation for their body of work.

The Mazza Collection at The University of Findlay is the only teaching gallery in the world specializing in the art from children’s books. The Mazza Medallion award celebration is free and open to the public.