Posted in art, Art Lessons, Arts Education, tagged 5th grade, Alaska, art, education, elementary school art lesson, painting, still life, teaching, tempera paint on January 13, 2017| Leave a Comment »
A Still Life by Henri Matisse
The very beautiful still-life paintings by Ms. Love’s Fifth Grade class in 2015. I’ve been meaning to put these up for a while. The students first learned about color mixing. They did these paintings in one session, painting from still lifes set up with colored cloths and fruit. They are done with tempera paint on canvas board (just because the teacher had some she wanted to get used!).
Posted in Art Lessons, Arts Education, tagged art, art project, children, children's art, fifth grade painting, fourth grade painting, Painting with Children, tempera paint, third grade painting on June 19, 2015| Leave a Comment »
At the 2015 Elementary-age Sitka Fine Arts Camp, I got to work with the 3rd through 5th graders. The first day we made abstract paintings, after looking at slides of paintings by Wasilly Kandinsky. Then we drew for two days, and the next, we painted their counselor modeling, or, if they wished, a figure, or anything they wanted.
Each group of 15 kids rotated through four classes: music, theater, dance and visual art through the mornings during one week.
The only thing I asked on this one was that they mix three new colors for their picture.
Their work:
Posted in Art Lessons, tagged art project, color complements, elementary school art lesson, Kandinsky, Painting with Children, sitka fine arts camp, tempera paint on August 11, 2012| Leave a Comment »
In June I taught at the Sitka Fine Arts Camp mini camp elementary school session. Sixty children rotated through in groups of 15. The kids I had were going into third through 6th grades. This is what we did on day one – we had under an hour, and some ace parent helpers – we had no running water, so used five-gallon buckets.
The first day I showed them some slides of Kandkinsky. We worked on color complements – the colors that are opposite each other on the color wheel. When you put them next to each other, each makes the other look more intense. We didn’t have time for all the kids, but we had different children tell what they liked about the picture in the slide, or find where complementary colors were next to each other. I demonstrated color mixing, mainly to show how you rinse and blot the brush between dipping into colors.
The kids were instructed to mix at least one new color, and encouraged, as they went along, to try color complements.
We used big paper, and each kid got a palette with primary colors and white, two brushes (large and small), and water and folded paper towels for blotting. They got a second paper plate for mixing.
A trick for cutting a lot of (institutional) paper towels off a roll: use a utility knife to cut the roll on opposite sides.
This went really well. It also helps to have the kids get their brushes, apron, and paper as they come in the door.
Posted in Art Lessons, Arts Education, tagged art education, children, fruit, Matisse, painting, Painting with Children, Second Grade Art Project, still life, tempera paint on February 19, 2012| Leave a Comment »
This was the most challenging project to date: to paint a still life of fruit – and to mix colors, and to try to use color complements. The children were a little hesitant at the beginning, but worked hard.
A color’s complement is the color that is opposite on the color wheel; so red’s complement is green, and yellow’s is purple and so on. Any color when it’s placed next to its complement appears brighter and more intense. It’s a great trick for artists of any age.
Probably none of the kids got that far, but each time we’ll talk about that idea. 4th and 5th graders are ready to add more shading, shadows and highlights; they like that. It’s fun to do in the style of Matisse – big dark outlines of things.
This session we looked at pictures of still lifes by Matisse, Van Gogh, and Cezanne, all of fruit. We chose one to talk about, going around with each kid saying what they liked or noticed about the picture.
A Still Life by Henri Matisse
The kids all had tempera paint in primary colors and a paper plate for mixing, as well as brushes, water, and folded paper towels for blotting their brush after washing.
For subject I’d brought in apples, Satsumas, bananas and green pears, and colored cloth napkins.
The kids did great! The one photo of all the work on the bulletin board is funky because we could not get the Promethean Board to move. It knows I wish the district had got projectors instead.
Posted in Art Lessons, Arts Education, tagged mix colors, Painting with Children, Second Grade Art Project, Tempera, tempera paint, Wassily Kandkinsky on December 13, 2011| Leave a Comment »
I recently went into my son’s second grade class with some digital pictures by Wassily Kandinsky, a famous Modern painter born in Russia in 1866. He is known for creating some of the first completely abstract Modern art – art that is not a picture of any thing, but conveys its message purely through color and form.
We then had the kids paint their own abstract paintings, using tempera paint. I had the kids mix colors, but that was the only suggestion. Each piece was unique. This is a neat bunch of kids, very thoughtful and creative.
We listened to music while we painted, classical music from the time Kandinky lived – including a March by Piatigorski, and The Swan from Saint Saens’ Parade of the Animals. We ended with a violin partita by Bach. I’m not sure how much the music affected the children, since the music player was not very powerful and the kids were excited to paint.
Wasilly Kandinsky's painting Composition VII, 1913
Kandinsky painted several giant Compositions (named as if they are music). We went around and said what we liked or noticed in Composition VII, painted in 1913, which is 6 1/2 feet tall and 10 feet wide. The actual painting is in Moscow. It is an incredible picture, and I told the kids how I’d read it is about the Last Judgement, the Resurrection, the Flood, the Garden of Love, basically the end of the world. They loved it.
The children saw ladders, bridges, flowers, suns, hearts and butterflies – the energy, and imagery of war and destruction but also delicate beauty.
Kandinsky saw art as spiritual – that the artist is the prophet of a new age. He “saw” music, which is called synesthesia.
In 1903 Kandinsky painted a small, energetic, expressive, and mysterious picture of a person on a horse, called the Blue Rider, which was taken for the name of a group of painters in the 1900s.
He eventually developed a much more serene way of painting, with geometric shapes – circles, and lines.
Sitka Art Blog 