This book is full of a chimpanzee's recreation of a number of famous paintings and under each painting is an extremely brief explanation of how Willy, the chimp, views his paintings. The author does an excellent job of recreating each painting and as in most of the books I have read by Browne, instead of the paintings containing humans as in the originals, these contain gorillas and Willy. The paintings in this book are awesome and outside of the obvious changes made by Browne, mirror the original very well. Each time I read one of Browne's books I'm amazed by his work and I am not even a fan of art.
This book would be great to use with any age group because of the versatility that art provides. In the back of the book the originals have been included and they each carry an explanation about that painting. So, It would be easy to introduce students to these famous paintings and their artist. I might choose to have students choose a piece of artwork and have them come up with their own story behind the piece of art they choose. Another possibility is having the students choose a piece of art and try to duplicate it like as Browne did by adding their own personal twists. This book creates the opportunity to explain to students that clearly artwork is about perspective, the way Browne changed the paintings to fit his own personal perspective on things is an example of this. I think it is important for students to understand art is in the eye of the beholder. With older students I might choose to have them research a particular painting or artists that they are interested in, creating a writing assignment. There are endless possibilities created by this imaginative book.
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