Animals: A First Art Book

Animals is an introduction to art through paintings of animals from across the centuries and cultures. The animals are divided into pairs with appropriately simple descriptions accompanying each full colour spread – Bouncy, Stripy, Feathery, Scaly. The artists, from around the globe, span five centuries and include Renoir, Hockney, Warhol, Stubbs, Rubens, and Hokusai. An index at the back provides some information for adults about the paintings.

Other titles planned in the series feature colours and children. The author’s previous books on art for children include A Child’s Book of Art and Discover Great Paintings. I can’t help feeling that £9.99 is a lot of money for just 18 pictures no matter how well chosen they are. It may be best to wait for the paperback version to be published. A more generous approach might have been to have included sections on Colours and Children within one book rather than have separate titles in a series.