Can You Find It?: Search and Discover More Than 150 Details in 19 Works of Art

I spy great art! Here's a seek-and-find book that invites youngsters to look at art in a special way: very closely! For each of the 19 paintings reproduced in full color here, a list of intriguing hard-to-find details sets readers off on a journey of art discovery.

With major works from the collections of The Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York City, this book offers a close, closer, closest look at works from early Egyptian to 20th-century American. Included are paintings by Bruegel, Canaletto, Tiepolo, and many other artists. Whether children are hunting for four pink shoes, seven blue parasols, a chair in the air, or a man who looks like a rock, they are sure to find a wonderful new way to look at art. Published in association with The Metropolitan Museum of Art

Grade 2-5-Nineteen paintings from New York City's Metropolitan Museum of Art were chosen for careful scrutiny in this book. Next to each striking, full-color reproduction is a list of items to search for: e.g., "2 cats, 6 lotus blossoms, 3 eye amulets," etc., for a painting from ancient Egypt. The works of art are from around the globe and range from illuminated manuscripts to 20th-century canvases. Designed to encourage discovery, the tiny, sometimes indistinct details will keep children engrossed for hours. Fortunately, an answer key is appended. Every part of the book is utilized, including the title page and back cover. For an older audience than Lucy Micklethwait's "I Spy" series (Greenwillow), this lovely volume will be a popular and entertaining addition.
Robin L. Gibson, Perry County District Library, New Lexington, OH
Copyright 2003 Reed Business Information, Inc.

Gr. 2-5. The author of What Can You Do with a Paper Bag? (2001) invites graduates of Lucy Micklethwait's simpler "I spy" art series to play seek-and-find with works of art from the Metropolitan Museum's collections. The selections include landscapes, crowd scenes, and portraits from a wide range of eras and artistic traditions; each comes with a list of eight details or items to pick out. A closing key both pinpoints the items and supplies brief additional information about the works and their artists. Viewers will have to be very sharp to spot some of the tinier figures in a folk artist's view of an entire town, or in Pannini's depiction of a riotously overstocked eighteenth-century art gallery; and Tiepolo's Dance in the Country needs a better reproduction before anyone is going to spot "5 blue bows" on its figures. Still, along with deriving pleasure from solving the puzzles, children who pore over the pictures may be willing to give art encountered later more than cursory glances. John Peters
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