Visiting the Art Museum
A family wanders through an art museum discovering famous works from all eras.
As a child of the suburbs who lived hours from a major museum, my art education came from my mom (an artist) and books. Visiting the Art Museum was a dog-eared favorite that features a family’s day-long wander through a large art museum, discovering famous works across many eras–from Greek statues to early American painting to Warhol’s pop art. Annotated through museum-goers and through the voice of the family, the book is both a museum-guide and extended comic strip. The children (a boy, his younger sister, and a baby) are introduced to famous works like John Singleton Copley’s “Watson and the Shark” and Henri Rousseau’s “The Sleeping Gypsy” confronting age-old art themes of nudity, violence as well as processes and concepts that have evolved as art techniques over hundreds of years. Each of the kids take to different work, and the family has a full day where emotions and experiences range from curiosity to fear to humor to boredom to intrigue.
