20. Meowsterpieces

Meowsterpieces: A Cat's Guide to Art...and Life! Jenn Bailey. Illustrated by Nyangsongi. 2022. [September] 32 pages. [Source: Review copy]

First sentence: Come walk along with Mama Cat
and tour the works of art.
Inside each frame you're sure to find
your own creative heart.
Mama Cat is far from pleased:
Her Kits ignore their dishes.
Their supper's filled with Tangled Strings
and Mousey-Hunting Wishes.
And so she feels the time is right
to boost their kitten smarts.
"Gather roun, you cheeky Kits--
come learn the Feline Arts."

Premise/plot: A mama cat is "teaching" her kittens about how to kitten...or how to cat, if you will. This lesson comes in verses that rhyme. 

My thoughts: I love, love, love, love, love, love the illustrations. Thirteen artworks [one of the thirteen is a photograph] inspire the illustrations for this picture book.

The Study of a Student by Laura Wheeler Waring
The Last Supper by Leonardo da Vinci
The Birth of Venus by Sandro Botticelli
The Night Watch by Rembrandt van Rijin
Nighthawks by Edward Hopper
A Sunday on La Grande Jatte by Georges Seurat
The Dancing Class by Edgar Degas
Jockey on a Galloping Horse by Eadweard Muybridge
Bedroom in Arles by Vincent Van Gogh
Children's Games by Pieter Bruegel the Elder
Under the Wave off Kanagawa by Katsushika Hokusai
The Banjo Lesson by Henry Ossawa Tanner
New York Construction Workers Lunching on a Crossbeam by Charles Clyde Ebbets

The cats steal the show in this one.

As for the text, well, I am almost so distracted by how awesome the illustrations are that I neglect the text. I think the text is fine.

 

© 2023 Becky Laney of Young Readers