I was thrilled to win this book at the Goodreads First Reads giveaway program. In fact I was too excited to wait for it to arrive and so I read another similar book by the same author called Discovering Great Artists: Hands On Art for Children in the Styles of the Great Masters:

http://www.goodreads.com/book/show/38...

Both of these books are outstanding and I see the author has other similar books as well. When this book arrived, I ended up putting down all my other currently reading books and read the whole thing, and I really enjoyed it.

This book includes so many of my favorite American artists (Ansel Adams, Louis Comfort Tiffany, Mary Cassatt, Edward Hopper, and so many others; I hate to even mention any as I’m leaving out so many others who are included) and also artists that kids are likely to enjoy such as Wayne Thiebaud (I love him) and Andy Warhol (not so much.)

The book is designed for kids ages 4-12 to learn about the many artists featured and to create art in the same style or using the same media, without at all diminishing the opportunity for creativity for the young artists.

This is a perfect book for adults and young adults who work with children as tutors, teachers, group leaders, counselors, parents, babysitters, etc. etc. It’s a great book to use with those children who are interested or not yet interested in art and artists.

The book is very well laid out so that it’s easy to choose appropriate and interesting projects. The artwork (of the featured artists and of children) and the photos are terrific.

The book features artists and an example/examples of their work and it generally goes in chronological order. There’s a lot of interesting information about all the artists including a birthday calendar at the back of the book.

Each artist usually gets 2 book pages. On each there are icons that give information about the featured project.

The icons are:

child experience
adult plan & prep
art technique (such as draw, paint, clay, computer)
artist style (such as abstract, cartoonist, illustrator, installation art, potter, realist)

I could go on and on about all the artists (some I learned of for the first time or learned new things about them) and the projects. These projects in general do take a certain amount of time, but they look well worth it. Unfortunately, most of the projects require a certain amount of supplies and most cost money. I’d love to see this book and the needed supplies available at schools and youth groups and camps, and ideally in homes, but I realize not every child is going to have easy access to all. Luckily (as in the other book mentioned) some of the art projects require just a minimal amount of supplies that are available to virtually every child in some setting to which they have access.

I’ve known children interested in art but who struggle with reading and following directions, and this book would be a great resource for them, allowing them to learn in a fun and effective manner. I also have known children who don’t feel confident enough to create art and this book could be a help for these children as well.

I am so grateful to own this book. (The other book I borrowed from the library so unfortunately don’t have it handy.) I wish my teachers and Camp Fire Girls leaders, and my parents had had a resource such as this. Older kids can read this book on their own and can also do many of the projects on their own too.