Q&A: Anthony Browne

Where did the idea for Willy's Pictures come from? I suddenly walked into a room [at the Art Institute of Chicago] and thought, "Look at these paintings!" I had seen only reproductions of some of them.... "American Gothic," the Grant Wood painting, that was the particular painting that I started with. That picture was [going to be] right at the beginning of the book. But it turns out that I can't use it, the image is copyrighted.... That's what triggered the book, walking into the gallery and seeing that particular painting.

There are a lot of funny scenes in this book. For example, Willy's version of Botticelli's "The Birth of Venus" depicts the goddess of love as a gorilla wearing a shower cap. Some adults say that young children won't understand the visual references--that the humor is too sophisticated for them. What's your take on that? The pictures that I created had to stand on their own. They had to interest or amuse children, even if they didn't know the art reference.... Obviously, I've added the original pictures at the end [of the book] for them to look up. In a sense, if the younger children don't get the references, or even if they're not particularly interested in comparing a Renaissance painting to Willy's version, it doesn't really matter.... The book works..., art reference or not.

When you were an art student, did you ever have an urge to make fun of the classic paintings? No.... Although it seems like I'm making fun of them, it doesn't feel as if that's what I'm doing. I'm hopefully encouraging children to look at paintings which they might [otherwise not see]. Some children find galleries and museums quite off-putting places. Sometimes I think they even find books of paintings off-putting, particularly books of old paintings. I hope I'm encouraging them to look at paintings with a fresh eye, and see that most paintings do have a story [to tell].