Dan's Angel

Attempts to introduce children to famous works of art have been coming off the presses with increasing regularity in the past couple of years. The idea of carrying out detective work in order to explore why an artist painted particular objects or in a certain style has been used effectively before. Dan's Angel certainly has a lively narrative as Dan, the boy detective, is guided through an art gallery by an angel who has escaped, temporarily, from a 15th-century masterpiece by Angelico. In colourful spreads, techniques and symbolism used by Jackson Pollock, Picasso, Botticelli and Van Gogh, amongst others, are explained to Dan. The problem with such books is how they bridge the fiction/non-fiction gap. There is a danger in falling into it. Primarily this book aims to explain symbolism in art to a young audience. But how young? Children who are mature enough to understand such symbolism probably don't need Lauren Child's very striking cartoon characters to gain access to this area. The contrast between Child's artwork and that contained in the masterpieces is purposefully stark, but the fiction element is a distraction from the non-fiction element.