ROSLYN HARBOR, NY.- Nassau County Museum of Art (NCMA) launches the new Ridder MiniArtMuseum for Children with one of the most delightful exhibitions ever designed to intrigue young museum visitors. Babar’s Museum of Art, featuring Laurent De Brunhoff’s illustrations, opens on January 18, 2009 and remains on view through May 26, 2009. The interactive exhibition installation is designed by Paul Orselli.

Babar’s Museum of Art offers a very engaging introduction to some of the world’s greatest art works – but with a real twist! These artworks have been reinterpreted in a most unusual way: all of the human subjects in these works by Goya, Velázquez, Botticelli, Manet, Cezanne, Munch, van Gogh, Rousseau, Picasso, Dali, Rodin, Degas, Seurat and many others are seen as elephants. Likely inspired by the conversion of Paris’ Gare d’Orsay from a railroad station to a museum of art (Musée d’Orsay), Queen Celeste and Babar decide that since everyone’s is motoring these days rather than using the train, they might as well use the station house for a new museum to showcase the many works of art they’ve collected. In Babar’s Museum of Art, the adult elephants guide the young elephants through an appreciation on different perspectives in art.

NCMA is sponsoring two free parties during the run of Babar’s Museum of Art; families are invited to attend both. The party on Sunday, January 25 at 3 pm celebrates the opening of the exhibition and the party on Sunday, February 15 celebrates the new Ridder MiniArtMuseum for Children which is devoted to exhibitions and activities to serve young people and their families. This space, formerly the Tee Ridder Miniatures Museum, continues to offer programs and activities for miniaturist artists and hobbyists.