An Awfully Big Blog Adventure: Small Stories of Great Artists, by Laurence Anholt

This is an extremely beautiful book. It’s satisfyingly hefty, it has a cobalt and gold blue cover, and it’s full of good stories, gorgeous illustrations, and intriguing information about famous artists. It’s come out at the perfect time to be a gorgeous Christmas present.

I didn’t know this, but Laurence Anholt has been writing stories for children about artists for many years. Now they’ve been gathered together into one volume, with extra illustrations and notes.

I’ve taken the illustrations from the first story in the series, which is about Van Gogh.  Other subjects include Chagall, Degas, Monet, Frida Kahlo, Picasso and more. The clever thing – one of the clever things – about these stories is that each is told from the point of view of a child. And each child is – was – real. So for instance, in this first story, the child is the son of the postman in the Arles, the town in the south of France to which Van Gogh moved with such high hopes of forming a community of artists. His plans did not work out, but he produced some of his most extraordinary paintings here – and among them is a series of portraits of the postman’s family, including one of this boy. Through the boy’s eyes, we see the famous room which Van Gogh prepared for the man he hoped would be a close colleague and friend, Gauguin, and we see the artist creating that iconic picture of a swirling sky scattered with stars and a golden moon. And we see Van Gogh sadly accepting that what he hoped for has not come to pass, and that it is time for him to leave.

After each story, the artist ‘steps forward’ to relate a short autobiography about their life. There is also a ‘gallery’ spread, showing some of the artist’s most famous paintings: and a section which gently poses some questions about what we can learn from these stories – not just about art history, but about how to live.

This is a very special book. I thoroughly enjoyed reading it, and look forward to sharing it with grandchildren. I can imagine that it would be a stimulating source of ideas for work in primary schools, too. A book to treasure.