The Letters and Images Laboratories are an original model of activity within the programming of cultural spaces. These laboratories are a field of learning and discovery and an opportunity to showcase high-quality books both for what they tell and how they tell it. These laboratories unite play, reading and creativity.

It is a space for creation that invites experimentation around reading understood in the broadest sense of the term: reading with all the senses, the reading of images and sounds, literary creation as play and poetic imagination as an artistic form.

THE TREE: The tree is one of the richest and most recurring symbols in children's literature, laden with meanings that connect with emotions, nature and children's experiences. Its symbolism ranges from the protective and ancestral to the magical and transformative. It symbolizes wisdom, shelter, challenge, meeting point and community, strength and resilience, roots represent family, the cycles of life and so much more. The symbol of the tree is immense.

Coordinated by: Va de cuentos and María Maraña

This story laboratory for playing with lights and shadows was created on the occasion of Kara Walker's Burning Village exhibition at MACA.

Based on her work—known for the use of black silhouettes cut out of paper—, we explore together with girls, boys and their families themes such as racism, identity and gender, through illustrated books and artistic creation.

The activity is structured in three parts:

A selection of books on anti-racism, adapted to different ages, which helps us contextualize the content of Walker's work.

A selection of books about shadows and silhouettes, which brings us closer to her visual and aesthetic language.

A space for play and creation, where we experiment with silhouettes on a light table and create a collective stop-motion animation with black cardboard cutouts.

A proposal to read, create and reflect from childhood about the power of images and the stories that build memory.

Welcome to the Laboratory of Letters and Images: Books and Stories about Dreams, a unique space where books invite us to dream. Through creative readings, we discover how dreams represent desires, fantasies, and imagination. Join this journey with activities such as creating dream amulets with balloons, full of messages and colors. A laboratory for dreaming and enjoying the magic of books! The dream, a symbol of the subconscious, is associated with desires, fantasy, and surrealist imagination. In many cultures, dreams are also considered bearers of messages or omens, and can symbolize the connection with the spiritual or the unknown. It can also remind us of the warm moment before going to sleep: the bedtime story and the lullaby that precedes sleep.

In this Laboratory María Maraña immerses us in a multisensory literary journey, with a selection of books that explore the senses in creative and surprising ways.

From the in-person laboratory, where concepts such as synesthesia and kinesthesia were addressed, to the online version focused on touch, we discover how the sensory world can be enriched through literature.

In addition to reviewing works such as The Dance of Hands or The Forest, the article invites us to explore new forms of tactile connection through illustrated albums and the creation of sensory fabric books, opening a space where art, the senses, and imagination converge.

An inspiring proposal to discover the power of touch and creativity in children's literature.

Can you imagine reading a book and discovering that, with some simple colored glasses, the images come to life? That is precisely what happens with anaglyphic books, a unique proposal that combines art, technology, and literature to create surprising visual experiences.

These books not only tell stories, but they invite us to interact with them, exploring hidden images that seem to jump off the page. There are many albums that invite us to discover hidden images with color filters. These "magic filters" sometimes come in the form of viewers, other times they have the shape of a magnifying glass or glasses. They are generally blue and red and work by erasing red ink from our view and highlighting blue ink or vice versa. In this way, a visual effect is created that makes parts of the drawing appear and disappear, causing amazement and surprise in the person reading.

But today we want to go a little further and discover the ANAGLYPHIC EFFECT. There are few books designed with this 3D effect, but the ones that exist are amazing.

In this article we explain what anaglyphs are, how red-blue filters work to create this 3D effect, and why these works are true gems for those seeking something more than reading: they want to discover, be surprised, and play with reading!

They are flexible books that invite us to creativity, to share stories aloud, to "hack" their initial reading proposal to invent other ways of reading.

MYRIORAMAS.

Myrioramas are a type of illustrated book that consists of a series of images or scenes printed on independent cards, which can be combined in different ways to create landscapes or visual narratives. Each image can be placed next to all the others; it doesn't matter in what order you put them, they will always match and create a panoramic image that makes sense. This allows an "infinite game" of creating scenes and stories, by allowing us to combine the cards in so many ways.

The term "myriorama" comes from the Greek "myrios", which means "countless" or "innumerable", and "orama", which refers to a view or panorama. This type of book became popular in the nineteenth century and was used for both entertainment and education.

Interacting with sculptural books is a unique and fascinating experience.

A sculptural book invites the reader to explore not only its content, but also its form and structure.

The reader can touch, turn, and manipulate the book, which creates a physical and emotional connection with the work. Often, these books are designed to be very visual, which can inspire curiosity to discover more about the story or ideas they convey.

Furthermore, interaction with this type of books is freer and more creative; the reader can choose how to approach the work, whether by reading the text, observing the images, or simply enjoying the sculptural form.

A sculptural book transforms reading into a multisensory experience that invites exploration and reflection.

It's like an artistic and literary journey at the same time! In this Laboratory, María Maraña immerses us in a multisensory literary journey, with a selection of books that explore the senses in creative and surprising ways.

From the in-person laboratory, where concepts such as synesthesia and kinesthesia were addressed, to the online version focused on touch, we discovered how the sensory world can be enriched through literature.

In addition to reviewing works such as The Dance of Hands or The Forest, the article invites you to explore new forms of tactile connection through illustrated albums and the creation of sensory fabric books, opening a space where art, the senses, and imagination converge.

An inspiring proposal to discover the power of touch and creativity in children's literature.

ATTENTION! BOOKS FULL OF HOLES.

EXPLORATION, PLAY AND CREATION OF DIE-CUT BOOKS

Today we bring you a selection of varied books but with a common theme, all of them have holes between their pages. The authors of these books have invented diverse and creative ways to use the hole element in their books, thus awakening in their readers a playful perspective, surprise and wonder.

They are perfect books to enhance our imagination and our love for reading letters and images.

In this laboratory of letters and images we delve into the pop-up universe.

A technique that we find in some books in which three-dimensional elements made of paper unfold when opening their pages, generating incredible sculptures that fold back into 2 dimensions when closing the book. Reading a pop-up book is a unique sensory experience!

Pop-up books span a wide range of genres and topics, from children's stories to art and design books. Here we show you some reference titles and authors of this technique.

Books with windows and flaps are very attractive for children, as they offer an interactive and tactile experience while exploring their pages. By activating their paper mechanisms, we will discover hidden images or texts and reveal image games that transform. For this laboratory, we have gathered some books that invite us to play with the book object by activating its pages and inviting us to the game of creativity. We highlight here some that have captivated us:

Drawing books is what we're going to explore in this at-home laboratory, in which we'll choose one of them to make a super cool creative proposal: a collection of textures!

We've gathered some books that invite us to explore drawing in different dimensions.

Drawing is the foundation of visual thinking and manifests itself in a thousand different ways. It can represent the visible and the invisible, it helps us think and explain our ideas to others, and it can be expressed through multiple tools and supports.