April 08, 2006

Art history revisited

Kelly at Big A little has been poking around tomorrow's Sunday Times Book Review for kids' lit and found, among other things, Randy Kennedy's round-up of new art books for children. The highlight is The Art Book for Kids, published by Phaidon Press, publishers of Sir Ernst Gombrich's classic, The Story of Art, which I wrote about last month. As Kelly helpfully points out, Kennedy includes an online audio slide show with some of the art works featured in the book.

While The Art Book for Kids seems to be a deal at under $13 (our library system doesn't have it in yet), it's only 80 pages long, there's an awful lot of art -- much of it good -- in this world, so you might want to consider another art history book or two for your shelves; last month's post has a list of one-volume art history surveys, for adults and children, at the end. I tend to think you can't go wrong with art books, for any age, from Phaidon or Harry N. Abrams, which includes Abrams Books for Young Readers (see below).

Other titles reviewed by Kennedy include Faces, Places and Inner Spaces: A Guide to Looking at Art by Jean Sousa, published by Abrams Books for Young Readers in association with the Art Institute of Chicago, where Sousa is deputy director of museum education; and Masterpieces Up Close: Western Painting From The 14th To 20th Centuries by Claire d'Harcourt, to be published by Editions du Seuil in late June. D'Harcourt has written several other lovely and useful art books for kids, Art Up Close and The Louvre in Close-Up.

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