Happy Birthday Paul Klee!

"One eye sees, the other feels." -Paul Klee

I'm not sure how he got his other eye to do that! Mine just see, although I'm pretty grateful they do that. This birthday boy was born Dec 18th, 1879 in Switzerland. And the artist himself provided us with the perfect birthday painting: 

It's just missing candles and a cake. He's really a fantastically fun artist to teach to kids because of his bright colors and simple shapes and his love of children's art. Everybody likes feeling appreciated and validated and he totally saw children's art as valuable, preferable even possibly when it comes to imagination and creativity. 

 I've used his "Head of a Man" painting before to draw fun self-portraits by tracing a circular plate for the outline and then dividing the face and neck into simple geometric shapes. We used oil pastels to get bright colors - you could even recommend trying different color schemes like warm for the face and cool for the background. Try to get them to really simplify and not worry about even including all the normal facial features or about symmetry. Some kids might take issue with leaving themselves bald but no worries, it's up to them! The goal isn't to copy Klee's head but to start with his idea and make it your own. For younger kids: be silly! For older kids: work at making it feel balanced and practice your technique. Can you get a feeling across in such a simplified form? How can you use the other principles of art to work for you?

However, my really favorite project can be found here on my personal art blog. It was a BIG hit. 

Guess Who in Two #2

I'm super excited to introduce you to our new mystery artist. But he or she really needs no further introduction, since it's all in the video anyway. Let me know if you guessed it!

What was your favorite fact about our mystery artist? 

For additional and current information, check out these articles:

"David's Ankles: How Imperfections Could Bring Down the World's Most Perfect Statue"

"Leonardo or ___________: Who is the Greatest?"

"The Hidden Meaning of _________'s Creation of Adam"

"Art and Symbolism: The Creation of Adam"

Also, I definitely recommend the book "______________ and the Pope's Ceiling" for serious students. Not a quick read by any means but FASCINATING details about the artist, his methods, the times, the Catholic Church, and anything else at all possibly related. Lots of stuff I haven't found anywhere else.

Happy Birthday Edvard Munch!

All right, so this is not one of the most festive of projects with which to celebrate but Happy Birthday anyway man! Ha. Munch was born December 12, 1863 in Norway and died there in 1844. Norway's pretty fond of the guy. No offense guys, but they don't have a lot of world famous artists to brag about. He never married, called his paintings his children and said, "For as long as I can remember I have suffered from a deep feeling of anxiety which I have tried to express in my art." Again not a happy birthday thought, but a really serious issue many people struggle with in their lives. Kudos to him for being willing to talk about it and for finding a way to let it out.

Here are some of my favorites of his works that aren't The Scream:

Dance on the Shore

Train Smoke

Melancholy

The Sun - a huge mural

I have wanted to do this project on The Scream by Edvard Munch (not pronounced munch, more like munk) ever since I saw it on Pinterest years ago but have never managed to get around to it. So glad I finally did! Here are some fun or interesting facts I learned about the artist and his incredibly famous painting:

- the first version of The Scream was painted without a figure in front! Can you imagine how much less attention it would've received if that was also his final version?

- The Scream does not refer to the figure standing in the front. It's nature that's screaming. Munch wrote, "I was walking along the road with two of my friends. The sun set. The sky became a bloody red. And I felt a touch of melancholy. I stood still, dead tired. Over the blue-black fjord and city hung blood and tongues of fire. My friends walked on. I stayed behind, trembling with fright. I felt the great scream in nature."

- The Scream was embarrassingly stolen, a horrible blow to national pride revealed during the opening ceremonies of the 1994 Olympics in Lillehammer. In 50 seconds. The thieves left a note, which read, "thanks for poor security." One of my students said "that sure was snotty!" It was thankfully recovered although the thieves got off on a technicality.

- 10 years later, it was stolen again! In daylight by men in ski masks with weapons. It took them about 20 seconds! They didn't take as good of care of the masterpiece and it was pretty badly damaged when it was recovered two years later. 

- M & M launched a campaign to sell dark chocolate M & Ms using the popularity of The Scream because of the second theft, unveiled like a masterpiece at the Guggenheim, and promised a reward of 2 million dark chocolate M & Ms as a reward for its return.

- The Scream sold for $119.9 million in 2012, during a recession!

I used these books: Famous Works of Art and How They Got That Way, Edvard Munch, The Modern Life of the Soul (has lots of great images to share), and Get Into Art People, Discover Great Art and Create Your Own! 

We then studied a few different versions of The Scream, noting the intense "blood-red sunset," the way his lines flow and the variety of color in every part of the painting. They recreated it with Nupastels and glued the picture of them self screaming on top. 

My first group:

The second group:

I so rarely have students try to copy a painting but I love how different these turned out while still being the same. And with all of them having the same 12 colors to choose from, while doing them side by side. And they had a blast, so I win!

This next year, I might try to do projects that try to achieve that amazing smoothness in some of the above paintings or the feeling in others. I'll let you know.