Book Description
for Uncle Andy's by James Warhola
From Cooperative Children's Book Center (CCBC)
Author/artist James Warhola’s very famous uncle, Andy Warhol, was just plain Uncle Andy to young Jamie and his siblings. In a funny and observant narrative that never strays from a child’s point of view, Warhola describes one of the many visits he and his family made to visit Uncle Andy and their grandmother, Bubba, who shared a five-story apartment in New York City with 25 cats, “all named Sam.” Young Jamie’s family lived out in the country, where their dad was a junkman who shared his famous brother’s artistic spirit. On their visits to New York, “Dad always remembered to bring Uncle Andy something interesting from the junkyard.” Warhola’s spirited, deliciously detailed full-page illustrations depict the creative chaos that defined Uncle Andy’s home and his unique approach to art. “I thought Uncle Andy and Bubba sure ate a lot of soup!” Jamie says when he wakes in a room towering with soup boxes. “But that wasn’t it at all. They were art, and really important too, because Uncle Andy told us not to touch any of it.” At the heart of Warhola’s narrative, with its understated, droll humor and childlike enthusiasm for the unusual, is the story of a warm and loving family, and a young artist who was encouraged and inspired by his singular relative. (Ages 6–10)
CCBC Choices 2004 . © Cooperative Children's Book Center, Univ. of Wisconsin - Madison, 2004. Used with permission.