The Amazing Collection of Joey Cornell: Based on the Childhood of a Great American Artist

Though Joseph Cornell (1903-1972) "never had an art lesson," as Fleming quotes in her opening author's note, he became a celebrated artist renowned for shadow boxes of carefully curated and assembled objects. In this picture-book biography, Fleming focuses on his childhood, when young Joey "collected -- / everything... / anything... / that sparked his imagination or delighted his eye." The text enumerates examples of Joey's treasures ("a silver charm," "odd-shaped pebbles," "sheet music to long-forgotten songs") and circles back to the same response every time his habit was questioned: "'What do you want that for?'...Joey shrugged. 'Who knows?'" This simple, irreverent refrain captures a curiosity for life's small tokens and moments. And by book's end -- during which the death of Joey's father is marked by an emotional exhibition of mementos in the family barn -- Fleming has quietly shown young readers how this sense of curiosity, imagination, and passion for memories turned the child's pastime into art. The illustrations, rendered in whisper-soft acrylics and manipulated digitally, have an old-timey aesthetic that complements the story's nostalgia; as the years go by, DuBois occasionally marks the progress of Joey's collection with pictures that expand to fill the pages as the piled objects proliferate: "By the time Joey was [eight/nine/thirteen]...his collection looked like this." Like Cornell's own "Relic Museum," this book offers much to pore over visually and ruminate over emotionally. Pair with Jeanette Winter's Mr. Cornell's Dream Boxes (rev. 11/14) for a fuller introduction to the artist. Appended with a brief bibliography and source notes. katrina Hedeen