Ben & Gracie's Art Adventure

Mark Wilson (author/illustrator)

Lothian, Australia: April 2011

ISBN: 9780734411426

Genres: picture book, art

Issues: imagination

Ben and Gracie go to the Art Gallery after school to collect their mum from work, as usual, but find themselves spending a night inside a painting.

Given a special ticket by the mysterious new man at the desk, Ben & Gracie are drawn to a particular room, a particular painting. Before they know it, the children are caught up in a dust storm, travelling with a young couple who are moving into the mountain forest. They spend the day there but become lost when exploring the forest with the couple's daughter and have to stay overnight. The next morning, having gathered a bunch of wildflowers for their mother, Ben & Gracie find their way back to camp – and out of the painting.

Frederick McCubbin (1855-1917) was an Australian painter of the Heidelberg school and his paintings hang in the National Gallery, several state galleries and are popular for private collections. Wilson is himself a remarkable artist and has done an astonishing job of capturing McCubbin's style in the illustrations, giving the reader the impression that they, too, have just 'stepped into a painting'. Wilson's story links several of McCubbin's paintings (listed at the end of the book) and also references stories popular at the time – the traditional 'babes in the wood' tale and the Cottingley fairy photographs (1917). Although the text is somewhat pedestrian, Wilson's illustrations are outstanding, especially given that he has such a strong personal style of his own that had to be submerged in order to mimic McCubbin's.

Enjoyable enough in its own right, Ben & Gracie's Art Adventure is a perfect text for teachers looking to introduce their students to a particular period of art and one of Australia's best-loved painters.