Jan Michał Pieńkowski (8 August 1936 – 19 February 2022) was a Polish-born British author of children's books—as illustrator, as writer, and as designer of movable books. He is best known for illustrating the Meg and Mog picture book series. He has also designed for the theatre. For his contribution as a children's illustrator he was UK nominee in 1982 and again in 2008 for the biennial, international Hans Christian Andersen Award, the highest recognition available to creators of children's books. WorldCat reports that Pieńkowski's work most widely held in participating libraries is Christmas, the King James Version (1984; US ), a 24-page picture book that "[u]ses the words of the Gospels of Luke and Matthew to present the story of the birth of Jesus." Biography Jan Pieńkowski was born in Warsaw to Jerzy, a farm manager, and Wanda (née Garlicka), a scientist. He was three years old in September 1939 when World War II began in Europe with the invasion of Poland. He was in an air-raid shelter during a Nazi firebomb attack, when a Polish insurgent showed him paper cut-out techniques. He later used these in over 150 picture books. From 1944, the family moved through Bavaria, Austria and Italy, before settling in Herefordshire, England, in 1946, where Pieńkowski attended Lucton School. At the age of 10, he could not speak any English. However, a year later he passed his Eleven-Plus exam and attended the Cardinal Vaughan School in London and later read English Classics at King's College, Cambridge. It was here that he met his friend, and later agent, Angela Holder, who persuaded him to turn one of his poster designs into a greetings card. After leaving university, together they founded the Gallery Five greeting cards company. He began illustrating children's books in spare time but soon found it taking all his time. In 1968, Pieńkowski began working with children's author Joan Aiken. He won the annual Kate Greenaway Medal for their 1971 book, The Kingdom Under the Sea and other stories (Jonathan Cape), eleven "fairy tales from Eastern Europe and Russia" retold by Aiken. That award by the Library Association recognised the year's best children's book illustration by a British subject. In retrospect the librarians call it "brilliantly illustrated in a highly original and recognisable silhouette style". One year earlier he had been one of three Greenaway runners up for The Golden Bird (J. M. Dent,