Dec 14, 2023 - Sale 2656

Sale 2656 - Lot 56

Price Realized: $ 1,375
?Final Price Realized includes Buyer’s Premium added to Hammer Price
Estimate: $ 700 - $ 900
JANE BRESKIN ZALBEN (1950-)
"Squiggles and Wiggles." Illustration for her book Mousterpiece: A Mouse-Sized Guide to Modern Art, (New York: Neal Porter/Roaring Brook Press, 2012). Mixed media, including watercolor, tempera, pen, with collage, on paper. 191x273 mm; 7 1/2x10 3/4 inches, matted to 11x14 inches. Signed "Jane Breskin Zalben" in lower right image. Archivally tipped to matte. Accompanied by a first edition of the book and a copy of the newly issued First Chinese Edition (2020), both signed by Zalben.

This image of Janson painting in the style of Kandinsky and Klee appears on page 14. Zalben's book Mousterpiece was a runaway hit, especially at museums where art programs for children regularly use the story of a small mouse named Janson (after art historian H. W. Janson) to introduce them to the modern masters. Janson lives in a museum and learns to paint in the style of Albers, Rousseau, Warhol, Picasso and others until she creates her own original work, her "mousterpiece," and thus "arriving" as an artist. The book was listed on The Horn Book's "Calling Caldecott" list among other accolades.