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The Story of Young Artist Jean-Michel Basquiat

As my regular readers know, I don’t review many children’s books but I can’t resist reading the Caldecott winner each year. They are always excellent children’s books and this year was no exception.

The Caldecott Medal was named in honor of nineteenth-century English illustrator Randolph Caldecott. It is awarded annually by the Association for Library Service to Children, a division of the American Library Association, to the artist of the most distinguished American picture book for children.

From the publisher:

Somewhere in Brooklyn, a little boy dreams of being a famous artist, not knowing that one day he would make himself a king.

Jean-Michael Basquiat and his unique, collage-style paintings rocketed to fame in the 1980s as a cultural phenomenon unlike anything the art world had ever seen. But before that, he was a little boy who saw art everywhere: in poetry books and museums, in games and in the words that we speak, and in the pulsing energy of New York City. Now, award-winning illustrator Javaka Steptoe’s vivid text and bold artwork echoing Basquiat’s own introduce young readers to the powerful message that art doesn’t always have to be neat or clean–and definitely not inside the lines–to be beautiful.

I love Basquiat so this book was a natural for me. I didn’t know about how difficult his life was as a child, only that he died young of a drug overdose. Learning about his early influences and his compulsion to create his art was really interesting. I was reminded of Chaim Potok’s My Name is Asher Lev, about a Hasidic boy with a passion for art that is forbidden by his family and his culture. Nevertheless, as a young child he wakes up to find drawings on the wall next to his bed. Basquait also drew during the night.

My only criticism of the book is the child Basquait is inspired by Picasso’s “Guernica” when his mother takes him to see it. That famous, disturbing piece is reproduced on an angle in the book, but is not labeled in any way, so unless the reader is familiar with it, there is no way to tell what it is.

But that is minor criticism indeed. This is a gorgeous book and a fantastic introduction to art for the elementary age child.  “In his house you can tell a serious ARTIST dwells.” You certainly can.

3/17 Stacy Alesi, AKA the BookBitch™

RADIANT CHILD by Javaka Steptoe. Little, Brown Books for Young Readers; First Edition edition (October 25, 2016). ISBN 978-0316213882. 40p.

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The True Story of the World’s Most Famous Bear

Illustrated by Sophie Blackall

Winner of the 2016 Caldecott Medal

I don’t review children’s books as a rule, but every now and then something comes to my attention and I am compelled to share it. I absolutely fell in love with this book.  A short explanation first…

Every year I like to look at the Newbery Award and Caldecott Medal winners. They are always excellent children’s books and this year was particularly exciting. According to CNN, Matt de la Peña is the first Latino author to win the Newbery Medal for outstanding contribution to children’s literature for his book “Last Stop on Market Street,” illustrated by Christian Robinson. It’s a lovely book.

The Caldecott Medal was named in honor of nineteenth-century English illustrator Randolph Caldecott. It is awarded annually by the Association for Library Service to Children, a division of the American Library Association, to the artist of the most distinguished American picture book for children. Finding Winnie is beautifully illustrated, but it was the story that moved me to write about it here.

The author, Lindsay Mattick, is the great-granddaughter of Captain Harry Colebourn, and as the back flap of the book tells us, she “grew up thinking of Winnie-the-Pooh as her own great-grandbear.” Captain Colebourn was a veterinarian in Winnipeg, Canada, and went into the army during WWI to take care of the horses. On a train ride, he saw a trapper with a bear cub sitting at the station. He offered the trapper $20 for the cub, and named her Winnipeg, Winnie for short. She became the camp mascot. Eventually Harry was being shipped out overseas and took the cub with him, but he knew he couldn’t take her into a war zone.

Harry gave the bear to the London Zoo, where a little boy befriended the bear. That boy’s name was Christopher Robin and the rest, as they say, is history.

The book’s last pages are like a scrapbook, with photos of Harry, Winnie, the page from his diary when he bought the cub, and more.

If you’re a fan of Winnie-the-Pooh, (and who isn’t,) you will enjoy this amazing, engaging book.

I want my own copy – hear that, Little Brown?

2/16 Stacy Alesi, AKA the BookBitch™

FINDING WINNIE by Lindsay Mattick. Little, Brown Books for Young Readers; First Edition edition (October 20, 2015). ISBN 978-0316324908. 56p.