MEET ME AT THE ART MUSEUM

True to the subtitle, this book’s cover delivers an amusing yet informative tour of an art museum.

Once inside, endpapers reveal a museum floor plan complete with iconic signage to both orient youngsters and welcome them to a lively behind-the-scenes tour of an imagined museum. The guides are an old-school–style, green-paper entry ticket named Stub and a pink-and-white “Hello my name is” sticker called Daisy, the museum docent’s helper. Daisy takes Stub on a wonderful wander from the coat check through storage, galleries and more. Security and art protection are pleasingly detailed by the anthropomorphized museum security badge (Badge), even as the two continue to check out the museum’s kid-pleasing innards: temperature and climate controls, the cafe, water fountains, escalators, museum shop—even the art library. But when Stub wanders off into the conservation lab, a fan blows him into a freshly varnished collage (a humorous takeoff on Matisse’s Dancers).  Stub gets his wish. Firmly fixed on canvas, Stub is now part of the museum’s permanent collection. Author, illustrator and fine artist Goldin collages in a number of iconic, favorite works of art and cleverly enlivens the collection with his own appealing and marvelously amusing sculptural assemblages.

An engaging and enlivening introduction for kids and adults alike.