"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.
No comments:
Post a Comment