We go to the gallery, with a Ladybird satire

One of my favourite Twitter accounts is @OverheardMuseum, so often filled with the witty and strangely wise things that children have been heard saying to their parents in a museum or gallery. The phrase 'out of the mouths of babes' seems particularly apt in such spaces over-brimming with complicated history and meaning. I once heard a small boy saying to his elder sister 'it's okay, art isn't supposed to be scary'. Many might disagree with him, but few would have failed to smile at his solemn words.

It's this combination of simple wit and wisdom which also makes artist Miriam Elia's charming and whimsical book We go the Gallery. Aping the classic 1960s Ladybird books which taught children how to read and write, this is the first of a planned series of satirical works in the 'Dung Beetle reading scheme'. Illustrated by Elia, We go to the Gallery takes an irreverent walk through the world of contemporary art on a visit with Mummy, John and Susan.

The book advertises itself on the fly leaf as helping struggling parents to explain contemporary art to their children. 'The jolly colourful illustrations will enable your child to smoothly internalize all of the debilitating middle class self-hatred contained in each artwork' we're told. True to form, as John looks at Richard Wilson's famous sump oil piece 20:50, '"the oil is all the blood shed by the US government in its illegal wars" says Mummy.' When he wants to play with one of Jeff Koons' Balloon Dogs '"only venture capitalists can play with this balloon" says mummy'.

The bottom of each page introduces three new words for children reading the book, not, of course, necessarily the difficult words, but the ones that distill the message 'so that they may repeat them at dinner parties to impress educated guests'. So, on the Koons page, the words are 'capitalist, play, balloon', while on the Wentworth page they are 'oil, government, blood'. Other consecutive pages introduce 'penis, sex, painting' followed by 'vagina, big, feminism' and 'man, woman, confused'. John and Susan each react with varying interest and horror to these works.

Elia wryly critiques the contemporary art world through both its own language and the criticisms that are aimed at it. Looking at a Matisse-esque painting, John comments 'I could paint that', '"But you didn't" says Mummy'. A feminist jibe is also added at the end, commenting on the fact that it is, of course, Mummy taking the children on this trip, and probably doing the reading. '"Are you an artist?" says Susan. "I couldn't because I had you", says Mummy. John and Susan feel guilty.'

Any art world enthusiast will enjoy the self-deprecating humour of this deceptively simple book, where John, Mummy and Susan gaze smilingly on the cover at a gloriously technicoloured blank gallery. In a very few words it says some very big things.