Action Jackson by Jan Greenberg and Sandra Jordan. Illustrated by Robert Andrew Parker

My kids only know Jackson Pollack as a page in Olivia. We've read that so often that when I showed them Action Jackson they said "Oh! The Olivia picture."

Anyway, I saw Action Jackson recommended on What Do We Do All Day and got very approving looks from the librarian when I requested it. Apparently it has been sitting on a shelf for a year and I was the first borrower. I couldn't say my kids absolutely adored it, but my youngest did enjoy it and the elder ones (and their parents) now have a sort of idea how Jackson Pollack painted. I could certainly say the older guys liked it. (I just asked my eleven year old and he said he did, and was particularly taken with the idea that he kept going with a painting, even when there was an insect stuck to it.)

So how did he paint? Well, this book gives us a day in his life, as close to how it really was as the authors could manage. 

Its pretty straightforward for nowadays; working on the floor in a barn with house paints and sticks and dried up brushes, but I suppose for the time it was very different.

I found it fascinating and am now dying to see one of his works in the flesh. Theres a a bit of a bio in the back of the book, with photos, which is nice, but sad; he died at 44 for goodness sake. But overall, a very nice, very interesting book. I'm not sure what age I'd say its for, its in a picture book format but what it's explaining is really for ages six or seven and up.