Alice Harman

Modern Art Explorer is a witty and brilliantly illustrated introduction to modern art for children that takes readers undercover to discover the stories behind thirty famous artworks from the Centre Pompidou's collection in Paris. By going behind the scenes and turning each artwork inside out, young readers will see that artworks aren't remote monuments but real things that are shaped into being by ideas, inspirations, human lives, world events and the materials artists use. Children will be entertained and intrigued by a variety of engagingly specific details and buoyed by their ability to understand what these works of art are all about. Award-winning illustrator Serge Bloch's cheeky, comic and energetic illustrations serve to illuminate the information and the ideas in each artwork. The thirty featured artworks themselves represent the work of a diverse range of modern and contemporary artists from one of the world's most celebrated modern art museums. Modern art has never seemed so exciting!

A witty introduction to the Louvre’s many masterpieces, told from the perspective of the subjects themselves – including resident superstar Mona Lisa. Millions of people visit the Louvre Museum every year to gaze and gawp at its all-star art collection. But there’s one star who gets a lot more attention than anyone else – and her very own special queuing system, if you can believe it! Well, the Louvre’s many other masterpieces aren’t too happy about being overshadowed – and they’re here to tell everyone what makes them just as worthy of the Mona Lisa’s teeming crowds. With a focus on portraits and other person-centred artworks, Mona Lisa and the Others reveals the stories behind some of the Louvre Museum’s most famous artworks. Napoleon Bonaparte takes readers behind the scenes at his own coronation; the Venus de Milo explains what happened to her missing arms; the Seated Scribe lets slip some gossip about the ancient Egyptian royal family; and Madame le Brun has a polite moan about juggling the demands of being Marie Antoinette’s portrait painter and a working mother. But perhaps most intriguing of all, Mona Lisa reveals that there’s more to her portrait than her mysterious smile… Written in a light-hearted and contemporary style by Alice Harman, and illustrated with the energetic artwork of Sir Quentin Blake, Mona Lisa and the Others is an entertaining introduction to the Louvre Museum’s collection that will appeal to children, parents, guardians and teachers from all walks of life.