Kathy Perkins SEW 2009
“Calling All Artists” Grades K -1 / “What’s Your Style?” Grades 4-5 p.4
Items applicable to both classes are written in black; differentiated activities are highlighted in appropriate colors.
SEW 2009
"Calling All Artists" K/1
"What's Your Style?" 4/5
Unit Summary
In this unit students will examine art prints from the Impressionist, post-Impressionist, Cubist, Abstract-Expressionist, and Pop Art movements, and will compare and contrast the styles of famous artists such as Monet, Degas, Cezanne, Van Gogh, Picasso, Kandinsky, Pollock, O'Keeffe, Lichtenstein, and Warhol. They will read and hear stories about these artists' lives and works to better understand the role that current events and their personal lives played on their art. They will learn the basic elements of art and use this vocabulary in discussing artworks viewed in prints and digitally through PowerPoint presentations and the Internet. They will also have the opportunity to explore artistic media such as pencils, colored pencils, tempera paint, watercolors, acrylic paint, and markers to produce their own artworks in the styles of these great artists. The students will use a class wiki both to research artists and to post photographs of their completed artworks and their own research findings.
Focus Area #1: Art Criticism / Analysis of Art Elements
· There are 3 basic types of art: emotionalism, formalism, and imitationalism (realism).
· Art is composed of four basic elements: line, shape, color, and texture.
· Warm colors appear to advance and cool colors appear to recede. Analogous colors are next to each other on the color wheel; complimentary colors are across from each other on the color wheel.
· The composition or design of a work is the way the art elements are put together. The principles of design are repetition, variation, proximity, focal point, balance, space, and value (dark and light)
· The subject matter is all the objects seen in a work of art.
· The theme is the underlying meaning the artist was trying to convey. / · Read art comic from Smart Art by Patricia and Steven Hollingsworth to introduce different types of art.
· View art prints in the classroom and describe the art elements found in each.
· Watch Art Start: Mood Painting video from United Streaming. Experiment with mixing color and brush strokes to create moods.
· K/1- Mix colors to create a color wheel. Show how artists use a palette.
· K/1 - Create crayon rubbings using texture boards. Students can create texture boards by making designs with glue on cardboard and letting them dry.
· 4/5 - Compare / contrast actual texture of collages and impasto paintings (such as van Gogh’s Sunflowers) and paintings with only visual texture. Create collages from various materials.
· Watch Art Start: Collage video from United Streaming.
· Read art books: Getting to Know the World’s Famous Artists: Georgia O’Keefe and Salvador Dali by Mike Venzia. / · Communication 1- Use many, varied single words to describe lines seen in art prints. Have students draw lines that express these emotions. (also see Smart Art p. 37)
· Productive Thinking – Finish lines to make shapes. Turn shapes into pictures.
· Visualizing – Turn art prints upside down to more clearly see the shapes in the pictures. 4/5- Draw the shapes in the picture and fill in with color. K/1 – Fill in outlines. Compare / contrast how different students’ choices of color affected the feeling of the shapes, even though the shapes were the same.
· Analyze the balance of an art print by deciding if it has symmetrical balance asymmetrical balance, or radial balance. K/1 - Create faces or animals with symmetrical balance using carbon paper (see Smart Art p. 74 – 75) 4/5 – Create designs with radial balance. (First show using tie-dye technique with coffee filters.)
· Productive thinking – Give many, varied, usual examples of systems and list the parts of each. If a work of art is a system, have the students name the parts of the system.
Focus Area #2: Impressionism
Content Knowledge / Type 1 Activities / Type 2 Activities· Impressionism was a French painting movement in the late 1800’s in which artists painted their impressions rather than emphasizing details. This was not a set group, but rather composed of artists who had the same stylistic elements. Some of the artists who are considered leading Impressionists denied being so.
· Edgar Degas and Claude Monet are known as known as “the fathers of Impressionism.”
· Eduoard Manet, Mary Cassatt, Paul Cezanne (at the beginning of his career), Camille Pissarro, and Pierre-Auguste Renoir are some of the more famous Impressionists.
· Impressionist painting is characterized by:
· Short, thick strokes of paint. Colors are applied side-by-side with as little mixing as possible.
· Grays and dark tones are made by mixing complementary colors. Black paint is avoided.
· Wet paint is placed into wet paint without waiting for successive applications to dry.
· The play of natural light is emphasized. Paintings are often made outdoors. / · View Monet and Degas teaching posters in learning center.
· Read Degas and the Little Dancer by Laurence Anholt. Discuss how Degas got his inspirations for his paintings and pastel drawings and try some chalk pastel drawings.
· Watch Degas and the Ballet (2:10 minute video clip from “Discovering the Arts: Impressionism and Beyond”) from United Streaming.
· Watch One Minute in a Museum: “The Magpie” by Claude Monet (1:22 minute clip) and Styles of Renoir and Monet (3:09 minute clip) from United Streaming.
· Watch Mary Cassatt 1:18 min.video from United Streaming.
· K/1 - Read Mary Cassat: Family Pictures by Jane O’Connor.
· K/1 - Read Linnea in Monet’s Garden by Cristina Bjork. 4/5 – Allow students to browse these books independently in learning center. / · Take a picture of the front of the school at different times of day. Have students observe these pictures and see if they can tell what is different about them from the lighting (observing and perceiving). Discuss the subject matter of Monet’s paintings and his focus on light and dark (such as his haystack studies at different times of the day). Go outside and paint a watercolor picture of something outside.
· 4/5 – Teach students to use class wikispace to obtain information on artists. Give students time to browse the space and related links and have them report back on their favorite artist to the class.
· Take photos of students’ work or allow them to scan their artwork if it is 8 ½ x 11 or smaller. Teach students to upload photos to class wiki or other posting sites to create a virtual gallery.
Focus Area #3: Post-Impressionism (Including Expressionism, Fauvism)
· The post-Impressionists came after the Impressionists and continued to use bright colors, but they differed in many ways. Roger Fry was the first to use the term Post-Impressionist, and he was a leading painter who also believed in women’s rights and peace (he lived around WW1).
· Expressionism describes art which distorts reality through exaggeration, vigorous and visible brushwork and strong colour, in order to express an artist's ideas or emotions. Van Gogh was a leader in the expressionism movement.
· “Fauve” is French for “wild beasts. Henri Matisse was a member of the fauvism movement because he and his fellow painters did not use conventional colors for their subject matter.
· Cezanne was a French painter who is said to form the bridge between the Impressionists and the later Cubist painters like Picasso. He used short brush strokes and complex fields of color. / · Show Roger Fry teaching poster / art prints.
· Have students explore Van Gogh puzzle, Van Gogh dominoes, and art matching cards in learning center.
· View Van Gogh video clips from Discovering the Arts: Impressionism and Beyond from United Streaming.
· K/1 - Read Van Gogh and the Sunflowers by Laurence Anholt.
· K/1 -Read Vincent’s Colors by Vincent Van Gogh (a compilation of his quotes and artworks put together for children by the Museum of Modern Art). 4/5 – Allow students to browse these books independently in learning center.
· Listen to “This Starry Night” from Hey Picasso CD by Jessica Harper.
· Read Henri Matisse: Drawing with Scissors by Jane O’Connor. Make cut paper collages.
· View Cezanne teaching poster / art print. Paint still life and use outlining technique. / · Observing details – show students Roger Fry’s woodcuts and discuss the concepts of positive and negative space. Write words and show them in a mirror – see how the same occurs in a print by making prints with Styrofoam meat trays and printing ink.
· 4/5 – Show students how to copy images of art from a site on the Internet and post it to the class wiki. View Power Point on copyright and demonstrate how to site sources.
· Communication talent 3 - Use similes to compare Matisse’s painting “Woman with Hat” to wild and bright. Draw pictures and paint or color them in colors that are not the colors of the actual objects.
Focus Area #4: Pointillism
· Pointillism is the method of painting in which small dabs or dots of paint are used to create a picture.
· Pointillism differs from the commercial dotting technique used for printing today, because in pointillism only the three primary colors are used. The eye mixes the colors, not the artist. There are no lines or shapes in true pointillism, only dots.
· Televisions and computer monitors currently work on a pointillist technique.
· The term was originally coined in the late 1800’s to mock artists such as Georges Seurat, but now continues without its mocking tone. Pointillist artworks can only be appreciated from a distance. / · View Georges Seurat teaching poster and Afternoon on the Island of la Grand Jatte print in learning center.
· Read Getting to Know the World’s Greatest Artists: Georges Seurat by Mike Venzia.
· 4/5 – Create pointillist pictures, first using only primary colors. Do the students want to be able to mix their colors? Why or why not? Discuss.
· K/1 – Create pointillist pictures, allowing all colors, but experimenting with different size dots and media (fine and wide-tipped markers, paint). Do the students want to make their pictures smaller? Why or why not? Discuss. / · Show students how to access and view two pointillist pictures by Seurat (Le Cirque and La Chahut) on class wikispace. Have students enlange the image as much as possible to observe the details. (learning how to learn: using technology; noting details).
· 4 / 5 - Have students go through the steps in the art criticism process and judge which of the Seurat paintings they like best.
· Have students survey peers about their preference and construct graph to report which painting was preferred by classmates (surveying/ reporting data).
· 4/5 - Before students create pointillist pictures, have students use their forecasting talents to predict the many, varied effects that using primary colored dots instead of lines and shapes will have on their pictures.
· After students create pointillist pictures, display them and have students see if they can tell what each others’ pictures are. Discuss why pointillist artists might have faced ridicule during their lifetimes (logical thinking).
Focus Area #5: Picasso’s Different Styles: Blue Period, Cubism, African-Influenced Period
Content Knowledge / Type 1 Activities / Type 2 Activities· Pablo Diego José Francisco de Paula Juan Nepomuceno María de los Remedios Cipriano de la Santísima Trinidad Ruiz y Picasso was best known for founding the Cubism movement, but he had many different art styles.
· Picasso’s work is often categorized into periods. While the names of many of his later periods are debated, the most commonly accepted periods in his work are the Blue Period (1901–1904), the Rose Period (1905–1907), the African-influenced Period (1908–1909), Analytic Cubism (1909–1912), and Synthetic Cubism (1912–1919). His later works were often called neo-expressionism, or abstract works of art portraying objects that were recognizable using vivid colors that were often violently emotional.
· When asked about his use of symbolism, Picasso said, “It isn’t up to the painter to define the symbols. Otherwise it would be better if he wrote them out in so many words! The public who look at the picture must interpret the symbols as they understand them.”[ http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pablo_Picasso#Classicism_and_surrealism / · View Picasso teaching poster and prints of The Guitarist and Don Quixote.
· K/1 - Read Picasso and the Girl with the Ponytail by Laurence Anholt. 4/5 – Allow students to read independently in center.
· Listen to “Hey, Picasso” audio CD by Jessica Harper.
· K/1 - Cut magazine faces into pieces and rearrange to make “cubist” faces.
· 4/5 – Make construction paper cubist portraits with face pieces in different colors and in different places.
· Read Pablo Picasso: Breaking All the Rules by True Kelley.
· Listen to “African Playground” audio CD while looking at art from Picasso’s African-influenced period.
· 4/5 – Make paper-mache’ African asks or sculptures.
· K/1 – Paint cardboard mask cutouts to make African masks or layer cardboard to make African collages. / · Compare two pictures painted during Picasso’s Blue period (The Guitarist and Le Gourmet). List feelings words to describe moods in each painting. (Comm -2) Make monochromatic paintings and discuss the difference in mood warm colors make versus cool color schemes.
· 4/5 - Analyze Picasso’s Dora Maar using Smart Art format. Make cubist portraits using oil pastels with multiple facial views and bright colors to express emotion.
· View Picasso’s Guernica. Discuss Picasso’s quote about symbolism. Have small groups list many, varied unusual meanings for the symbols in the pictures. Give them more background information about the painting, and then have them brainstorm again. Have the students create their own symbolic paintings.
Focus Area #6: Abstract Expressionism