Squares & Other Shapes: with Josef Albers

Description

An introduction to shapes through the acclaimed art of Josef Albers The influential art of Josef Albers is used to teach shapes in this stylish read-aloud board book, which takes children through Albers' range of geometrics, one artwork per page, beginning with squares and returning to them as a familiar refrain throughout. The variance of colour, scale, and quantity adds to the richness of the visual arc, and the accompanying text provides a humorous and engaging commentary. Readers will not only learn their shapes, but also grow familiar with fine art in this second title in the 'First Concepts with Fine Artists' series. Includes a read-aloud about the artist at the end.

Josef Albers was a leading pioneer of 20th-century modernism, best known for his Homages to the Square paintings, and his publication Interaction of Color. Albers was a teacher, a writer, a painter, a colour theorist, and the first living artist to have a solo retrospective at the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York (in 1971).

[Brings] to life each work with personality and character. Page 20 encapsulates this perfectly... Without fail this results in an ear-splitting cackle of delight from my three-year-old son. My only regret reading this book is I didn't have it several years ago when he was a baby, as the enjoyment our five-month-old daughter gets from the images alone shows how versatile this book can be. My son makes me read every single word, cover to cover, which in this case is a pleasure... Albers made the majority of the works in this book more than 50 years ago, but from the enjoyment they offer my children I have little doubt his work will continue to be influential for generations to come. Indeed, we recently visited a friend who has two Albers prints on her wall, and my son spotted them without prompting from m - Art Quarterly