If you’ve ever wondered whether learning about Canadian art can actually be fun, this kid-friendly book proves it can be. Meet the Group of Seven is packed with information presented in easily digestible units, and gloriously illustrated with colour reproductions of the Group’s paintings.

After briefly introducing the painters themselves, the book plunges into a discussion of their art with the double-page spread entitled “What the Group loved to paint” – water, seasons, skies, trees. Examples of their work invite readers to see past the bold colours to their subjects. The next page extends the discussion by asking “Why did the Group of Seven paint landscapes?” and sets colour photos of scenes alongside paintings of the same locations. Later sections discuss the painting techniques and the ideas about nature that set these artists so radically apart from many of their contemporaries.

The book’s focus alternates between the art and the painters’ lives. We’re told of their difficult sketching trips in the wilderness, and the unsolved mystery of Tom Thomson’s drowning is described in enough detail to leave young readers intrigued. Other artists of the time (like Emily Carr) and of later years (like Alex Colville) are profiled, and there is even an amusing selection of contemporary critics’ opinions. Later spreads involve the reader in learning about nature by looking at the Group’s paintings, asking questions like “If the wind is blowing from west to east in this painting, The West Wind, can you figure out what direction Thomson was facing when he painted it?” This book is a wonderful resource for teachers and parents alike.