|
By Carol Strickland, Ph.D.
A
Crash Course in Art History From Prehistoric to Post-Modern
 This
is the second edition of The Annotated Mona Lisa. What is the difference? First,
the publisher is different. The cover art is different. There are eight new
pages at the end which cover new things in the art world since the first
edition.
"Takes art history out of the realm of dreary textbooks to a
world of dynamic design, succinct page-length essays, and instructive sidebars."
With more than 300 illustrations (about 1/3 in full-color),
The Annotated Mona Lisa "draws on the very elements of art--composition,
movement, balance, color, and design--to achieve a visual and textual approach
to the subject that no ordinary textbook could approximate."
Each section begins with side by side world history and art
history timelines which helps place the art events into the era. The author does
a brief biography for each famous artist and discusses the major styles of art
(baroque, impressionism, etc.) You'll learn how to analyze a painting and read
about paintings.
The Annotated Mona Lisa is a good choice for homeschool art
history course. A high school student could read this independently. You could
read this book to younger students for a multi-level art history curriculum. If
you need to keep young hands busy, I suggest using Dover's
Color Your Own Art Coloring Books, or the
Renaissance Painters Coloring Book.
You can add hands-on art projects from the
Discovering Great Artists
book or from Visual Manna's
Teaching History Through Art.
|
You are here: 
The
Renaissance Painters Coloring Book includes 45 images of the most famous works
of the Renaissance for you to color. Unusual to coloring books is that the back
of each page is blank! There is a short paragraph about the artist of each
painting. This will be an excellent addition to any study of the Renaissance.