The Preschooler School of Modern Art

Smith studied the 20th century Avant Garde at design school. Meanwhile Baker steadily amassed a personal collection of paintings to rival Peggy Guggenheim. We are both fans of sorts, so let’s get one thing straight: The old ‘my child could have done that’ cliché has no place here, all those crazy paintings are fine by us.

However, while looking through a box full of artwork by our prolific young girls the other day, I couldn’t help but notice that some images recalled the signature styles of certain modern masters.

So for bit of fun, here is the artist paired with their soul buddy plucked straight from the overflow of our fridge door gallery.

Dubuffet

Rothko

Warhol

Matisse

Klee

Twombly

Stella

Schlemmer

Cooking up a story

An exhibition at the Museum of Sydney has engaging displays about our relationship food culture through the ages. My favourite bit is a wall inviting people to ‘share thoughts, fondest food memories or a favourite recipe’. Drawings of cupcakes and declarations of love for one recipe or another sit side by side. There are shout outs for mum and there is disappointment at not being able to replicate a taste as experienced in the note writer’s land of their youth. Rich memories, the ingredients for cooking up a tale. What’s your favourite food story?

Book Champion: Oliver

This week it is Oliver’s turn to be a Book Champion (his twin brother was featured last week). Oliver has chosen Dragonology by Dr. Ernest Drake.

What have you learnt about dragons from Dragonology?
How they share their gems, how big they are, different types and how dragons breath fire, how they hatch out of their eggs and how they become friends.

What does a dragon look like? Do they make good pets?
Pets for humans?! They’re not alive right now – but will be in the future.

What would you do if one came to visit you?
If it was a Chinese Lung I’d give it chicken then a hug then it would swim away.

What other types of dragons are there?
This book only has a few types.

What is your favourite?
My favourite flying type is the arctic frost dragon because my favourite power is ice.
I love the Asian Lung, their poo is called dung. It’s true!

What do you need to catch a dragon?
A net, a cannon and a thing-a-ma-jig …

What sort of things can they do?
The frost dragon can – he is the only one who can and he can breath ice.
They can swoop double loop-de-loops!

What do they eat?
They can eat anything except humans. They can even eat gems – that’s how they get their power.

How do you stop a dragon breathing fire?
You put water in it’s mouth and voila!

What is your favourite bit of Dragonology?
Chapter iii (that’s roman numerals). It’s about dragon biology and physiology.

What ages would like the book? Would you recommend it?
My age – 6 or 7. it’s a very cool book with lots of fold-outs.

Do any dragons live in Canberra?
They used to. Dragons are still alive… the good types.

Book Champion: Xavier

Xavier is seven and lives in Canberra. His book of choice is A Walk in New York by Salvatore Rubbino.

Why do you like this book?
I love New York! I love the flag, I love the Empire State, I love the Statue of Liberty, the Chrysler, those things that they eat. I really like the bridges, the Williamsburg, well, all of them. And the Guggenheim. I like the piece-of-cake building. I like the New York fire brigade. I also like the baseball symbol for the New York Yankees.

Who else would like this book?
A lot of people from New York: New Yorkers.

If you could walk around New York where would you like to go? Why?
Empire State, Guggenheim, Rockefeller Centre (for Lego), the Chrysler, Greenwich Village for yummy things.

What do you think the city would be like?
Very busy. Lots of noise, lots of buildings towering over you.

What games do children in New York city like playing?
Baseball and basketball

What is your favourite part of the book?
The Empire State building pages because the Empire State is my favourite building in New York City.

In the story it says that you can buy all kind of things at Macy’s. What would you like to buy from there?
Probably a t-shirt with ‘Big Apple’ or something on it. A New York cap… that’s it.

What would you buy for your brother?
Some Lego. Lego Chima, the Eagle’s Castle.

How many New York Hot Dogs could you eat in one pop?
In one minute? Probably about two…

How many taxis do you think are in New York?
2,569.

What sort of noises would you hear?
Honking, sounds of engines, sounds of shouting and talking, dogs woofing, maybe a little bit of music.

What other cities would you like to walk around?
Hawaii: lots of volcanos
Cairo: lots of ancient artefacts
New Zealand: so I can see the squirrels
Rio de Janeiro: for the night lights
Iceland: is there ice there? Does it snow?
Tokyo: great sushi and temples

I’ll think of some more later…

Telling tales

Six-year-olds learn about main characters and recognising problems and solutions in stories today. When I was six I was busy creating problems, not analysing text. Here is our six-year-old muse’s first attempt at a story arc:

One day the monster came.
He came on a sunny day.
He came from a castle.
He was fun.
He was a Dad.
But he was a monster.
It was his birthday.
But he was near road works.
He fell in a hole.
The end.

Messenger

From my hand
to a statue
by a tree
to a nest
on a rooftop
to a wire
then higher
to a peak
past a cloud
to you

Happy Dad’s Day

Today is Father’s Day in Australia.
So here’s to you all, everywhere.

The Apple Tree

Once a tree
grew ears (of wood)
and twisted knots for eyes
and two branch arms
with a leaf hairdo
and finger-sprouting twigs
put boots on roots
marched into town
to sell a crop of apples
‘Apples! Come and get them
Juicy, round and red’
it fed the town
then marched back home
to its apple orchard bed

We’re off to see the wizard … again!

Each morning, after I ponder what shirt to wear for the day (10 seconds) and what to eat for breakfast (0 seconds) my attention turns to a more pressing problem – how many productions of The Wizard of Oz are being staged at any given moment? I began to wonder recently after attending an impressive production by a grammar school that takes music and drama seriously. Our six-year-old reminded me she had already played a witch, last Christmas (tick that one off) and got to throw apples at the only little boy in the ballet performance (that’ll teach him). Yesterday, I asked a father what he was doing that evening, ‘Off to see the wizard … Xavier has a part as one of nine scarecrows’. I pondered how many munchkins this might equate to as I drove past yet another primary school with boards displaying a stage production of the famous yellow brick road for ‘Four Nights Only!’

A friend recently remarked, ‘I never could understand why Dorothy bothered going back to Kansas’. Well, if he had bothered to read book six in L. Frank Baum’s 26 book series just like I hadn’t he would know that Dorothy did return to Oz, along with Uncle Henry and Aunt Em, escaping the old dustbowl and Almira Gulch, the cranky windbag after the tornado left them mortgaged to the eyeballs. They were economic refugees, compassionately granted residency status in Oz by Princess Ozma and confronted new characters such as the paranoid Flutterbudgets and the anthropomorphic pastries of Bunbury. But I digress, the next time, like me, you wake up wondering exactly where the Land of Oz is geographically located, remember that’s it’s probably not somewhere over a rainbow – it’s somewhere around the corner.

A twisty tale

Neighbours used to pop next door and deliver one another home baked goods and the like, not so much anymore. Who bakes these days? What with all the food allergies floating about it’s hardly worth it. We’re lucky. Our friendly neighbour runs across the road and gives us balloons twisted into the shape of a snowman, or twisted into an oversized bracelet sculpted as an illuminated alien. I’ll take these offerings over surplus yo yo cookies any day. It does leave me wondering what kooky idea she will twist out of thin air next. Can’t wait to see it, better find out. Watch this space.