Portrait of an Artist

January 17, 2020

Gr 2-4-The French painter Claude Monet, one of the founders of French Impressionism, is the subject of this latest entry in the "Portrait of an Artist" series. This illustrated biography concentrates on his early years; his light-filled painting style; his courtship of his first wife, Camille; and his family. Brownridge's choice of details and the simplicity of her text make the book most appropriate for younger readers. ("Claude had lots of friends." "Eug�ne [Boudin] thought that a real artist needed to learn how to use serious tricky materials like oil paint, and paint landscapes instead of people.") The text appears directly on Bonne-M�ller's illustrations (likely painted with acrylics and digitally manipulated). Although she makes an effort to reflect Monet's interest in the landscape and natural world, Bonne-M�ller's depictions are rendered in her own distinctive style. In the context of the narrative, 14 of the artist's paintings are faithfully reproduced but, perhaps because of the size or the printing process, seldom convey Monet's mastery of light. As in previous titles in the series, the works don't necessarily appear in the story in the order in which they were painted, but the 10 described more fully in the back matter are arranged chronologically. VERDICT Useful where artist biographies are of interest. Monet's garden, the focus of Pia Valentinis and Giancarlo Ascari's graphic biography, The Garden of Monsieur Monet, is, here, simply the finale, but the two books would make an interesting pairing.-Kathleen Isaacs, Children's Literature Specialist, Pasadena, MD

Copyright 2020 School Library Journal, LLC Used with permission.

January 1, 2020
Grades 2-4 This latest entry in the Portrait of an Artist series covers the career of Claude Monet, briefly touching on his childhood before hitting on landmark moments throughout his development as an artist. As early as art school, Monet was desperate to paint the changing seasons and all the colors in the setting sun, and Brownridge cleverly frames the progressing biography around his pursuit of that goal. In between landmark paintings, we learn about Monet's romance, family life, and financial woes, until he finally found success in an exhibition featuring a picture called Impression: Sunrise, which brought about the term impressionism. Each spread?beautifully illustrated by M�ller in her own style?incorporates a copy of one of Monet's pieces into the background, exposing young readers to a range of his work; plus, the back matter rounds up all the included paintings, along with extra information on their specific histories. Clearly written, informative, and at times inspirational, this is another strong option in an outstanding series.(Reprinted with permission of Booklist, copyright 2020, American Library Association.)

October 28, 2019
Brownridge’s gloss on Kahlo’s dazzling vision and life covers the usual points associated with the artist in straightforward language: “Frida liked to paint lots of outfits or versions of herself in the same picture. She did this to show what it was to feel like lots of different people, all rolled into one body.” Combined with Dieckmann’s colorful pictures, full of sweet-faced characters and stylized flowers, the resulting biography has the effect of obscuring what’s essential about the artist: her rich, fierce, insistent originality. Kahlo’s own complicated, seductive, and often troubling paintings, inset in small format as part of the larger illustrations, reveal a fundamental mismatch between her idiosyncratic symbology and this book’s simplified approach, which explains magic realism as “objects from real life but with a big sprinkle of Frida’s special magic!” Ages 5–7.