Art Lesson For Kids - Inspired by Faith Ringgold!

Check out my new art lessons for kids videos on my YouTube channel Art Immersion @Art Lessons For Kids - Inspired by Famous Artists!

First up - Faith Ringgold:

Materials needed:

Option #1 - Paper (light, colored, or dark), pencils or whatever coloring material you would like to use, colored 1 inch paper squares

Directions:

1. Think of a place that you love, somewhere really cool that you want to be yours (Disneyland, Hawaii, etc.

2. Draw a colorful picture of you flying over that place, leaving a one inch border for the squares

3. Glue the paper squares on inside the border

4. Optional: Decorate the paper squares with fun patterns! 

 My kids' finished products:

 

 

Happy Birthday Emily Carr!

I was late in finding Emily, but couldn't be happier to know about her now. What a cool, resilient, determined, independent, talented woman to study! She lived in Victoria, British Columbia from December 13, 1871-March 2, 1945. At a time when women just weren't famous artists, she rose to become a Canadian icon. And cool fact, she was a writer AND a painter! Also cool fact, she met Georgia O-Keeffe (another strong and famous female painter) in New York in 1930. And in 1971 and 1991, Canadian postal stamps were made in her honor!

But enough with the random cool facts. Watch this video for a quick biographical introduction. Or read about her here and look through a gallery of her works.

Project time!

Looking at her work with your kids, ask questions like these: what do you think makes her art unique? How would you describe her style? What colors did she use most often? What subject matter(s) do you see? What kinds of lines did she use for her skies? For her trees? 

Really emphasize the organic, flowy nature of her lines. And then this is a great opportunity to discuss value (the lightness or darkness of tone and color)! You can find tons of value exercise worksheets to print out online to get warmed up. And then doing a painting like Emily Carr provides a great practice at mixing their own colors! I told my students we were doing a landscape, but keeping it simple. Three trees at most, some grass and maybe a mountain at most. We first focused just on the sky. I only gave them blue, white and if they insisted, purple and told them to think of her lines, think about gradually changing color from light to dark, and to fill all or most of the page with their sky. We let that dry. After it had, I gave them more colors and encouraged them to add trees/mountains/land on top. I LOVE their paintings!!! Look at how awesome and unique they are: 

Best of the Best Michelangelo

Here's my second, longer video on Michelangelo that goes into more depth on what I believe to be his 5 best artworks. Watch and then let me know if you agree! What would you choose instead?

5 - _____________________ - Why is it so significant (2 reasons)?
4 - _____________________ - How was it made? How big is he?
3 - _____________________ - Why is his head so big?
2 - _____________________ - Why was it so difficult to paint? How long did it take?
1 - _____________________ - Why does it need to be protected?

Bonus questions:
What is mannerism?
What did Michelangelo think of "constructive criticism?"
Why do you need to know the rules of art?
Did Michelangelo paint the Sistine Chapel lying on his back?

More biographical info:
-For elementary aged kids try here
-For more, including a cool interactive panaromic view of the ceiling, try here or here
-Khan Academy's section on Michelangelo can be found here

Michelangelo in the News:
-For an in-depth article on The David and his weak ankles, try here
-Leonardo or Michelangelo: Who is the Greatest? (it would be great to follow-up this article with one of your own answering the same question!)
-For more about the attack on La Pieta, read here

Videos to watch:
-Mati and Dada's animated short story on Michelangelo
-Artrageous' fun, in-depth look into the difficulty of painting the Sistine Chapel
-Crash Course's look into whether the Renaissance was really a thing

Happy Belated Birthday Alma Thomas!

I believe I actually discovered Alma Thomas thanks to Pinterest. See?! All those hours I've spent losing myself in a Pinterest vortex were worth it! Ha. No probably not, but I do really love Alma Thomas. And I have to admit that I missed the chance to post this on her actual birthday, so here is a Happy Belated Birthday to Alma Thomas (9/22)! I just couldn't stand to miss it (although technically I suppose I did miss it) because this is one of my favorite lessons of all-time. So let's begin with a little background on our famous, but little-known artist.

Alma Woodsey Thomas is another inspiring artist, who like Grandma Moses, didn't get her start until later in life. She taught art for 38 years in Washington D.C., and occasionally showed her work in shows featuring African American artists, but didn't begin to paint seriously until she was 69 (she was born in 1891 so what year would that have been?). However, by then she had painful arthritis, which made painting difficult. Most people would've given up at this point but when a museum wanted to display her art, she went about creating a new, more abstract style with bright pure color in shapes or lines that still hinted at natural forms.  Instead of telling you what her art does or how it makes you feel, why don't you take a look at the following images (and find lots more online) and pretend to be an art critic writing an article about her for the paper? Have fun and be descriptive!

The Eclipse

Moving Heaven and Earth

Starry Night and the Astronauts

Untitled from Music Series

So when I was preparing the art project, I knew the younger kids in particular would have a super hard time resisting the urge to paint large strokes with their paintbrushes instead of making small dashes close together. No chance most kids would have the self-control to be so deliberate as to leave the nice white lines in between colors. And that's what makes it really pop! So I put away the paintbrushes and got out building blocks:

We looked at examples of her work, talked about what made it unique, and what they should strive for if they wanted their painting to look like hers. I really emphasized her use of repetition and variety. I then demonstrated how to use the blocks to print the shapes on the paper and let them go to town. It worked so well, that I did it the same way for my older group of students, except I gave them Legos so they could make smaller dashes. A few of them resisted, so I let the older students use brushes if they promised to leave white :) Look at how awesome my 8 year-old daughter's turned out:

Later, we tried it again but with gluing pre-cut scraps shapes on. This worked really well too and was good for the pre-K/kindergarten crowd in particular. Here's my son's finished project (it used to have nice, bright colors but has been hanging in a window and the sun sadly bleached them out):  

So much fun! One last cool fact - her painting Resurrection is the first painting by an African American woman to hang in the White House's permanent collection. So Happy Belated Birthday Miss Thomas!

Check out the article here for a more in-depth history.

Inspired by... Leonardo Da Vinci!

Continuing with our first artist, Leonardo da Vinci, I have finished our first project video! It can be a fun, short project for young kids that I can almost promise will get them giggling. For older, more serious students it can be that as well as a longer study that could really improve their observation and drawing skills. I'd recommend getting them a sketchbook if they're really getting into it. But for starters, you'll just need paper, pencil and a partner (or a mirror or camera). It will take anywhere from a few minutes to a whole week to complete! Hope you enjoy!

Inspired by ... Leonardo da Vinci (Project 1):

If you need to use my photos for reference, here they are thanks to my willing volunteer model (although I really recommend drawing from life if you can because it's just a whole different experience to change something 3D into a 2D drawing)!

Also, here's a link to a really fun Mona Lisa parody project that I've done with my kids and students before. They LOVED it. I recommend explaining what a parody is and doing a quick Google search of Mona Lisa parodies. Lots of giggles. My personal favorite is still my daughter's Hulk-A-Lisa. Hahahaha.

Have fun and keep being creative!

Best of the Best: Leonardo da Vinci

Here's my second, longer video on Leonardo da Vinci that goes into more depth on what I believe to be his 5 best artworks. Watch and then let me know if you agree! What would you choose instead? 

For notebooking pages that accompany the "Best of the Best: Leonardo da Vinci" video, click HERE.

But that doesn't have to be the end!

"Art is never finished, only abandoned"

If your learning about Leonardo da Vinci isn't finished yet either, I've compiled lists of places you and your kids can go to read or watch more.

More biographical info:
-For elementary age kids try here
-For focus on his scientific interests try here
-53 interesting facts here

For a whole unit worth of at-home study and activities, "Leonardo da Vinci for kids: His Life and Ideas" is awesome. Buy it here.

For reading about Leonardo in the news:
-Scientists Reveal Cause of Red Spots Ruining Leonardo Da Vinci's Self-Portrait
-Lost Leonardo Da Vinci Painting Found in the Swiss Bank Vault
-An Art World Mystery Worth of Leonardo

Videos to watch:
-Animation about Leonardo and his flying machine
-10 Worst things to happen to the Mona Lisa
-Interested in how science helps solve art mysteries? Watch here
-If you read "The Da Vinci Code" and have some time, watch this documentary to learn the truth

Guess Who in Two: 1

Here is my very first "Guess Who in Two" video! It's my new series where I try to stuff as much information into 2ish minutes while hopefully making it into a fun guessing game. Because art history doesn't have to be boring (despite my personal experiences in college in a dark sleepy room with a slideshow and a monotone voice droning over the microphone)! And there's so many great gems we can learn from these artistic geniuses. I'm having fun making the videos, and hope they're just the beginning of my many ideas coming to fruition. Enjoy and let me know if you have any feedback! Thanks!

And click HERE for a downloadable notebooking page to go along with it! 

Creativity: Coloring Books?

Loving this multi-colored horse and especially
how the brown mane becomes the brown cloud!

When I was getting my degree in Art Education, I was warned against the many evils of coloring books. Ha. No, seriously I was. Apparently they kill creativity because they tell a child the way something is supposed to look (instead of allowing them to come up with their own way of representing it) and teach them to color inside the lines "or else." I'm not entirely certain where the "or else" comes from but I suppose it means or they get in trouble or they'll disappoint or maybe it means or they will lose confidence because they'll recognize that they're bad at what they were supposed to do. I'm grasping at straws here honestly because after having kids, I discovered that coloring books are not in fact "evil." I resisted, as I had been brainwashed, I mean trained to do. I tried to refuse to allow them in my home but somehow they crept in. And I discovered that my 2 year-old loves scribbling all over Elsa's face (get free Elsa printables here). She gets so excited to have a piece of paper with her beloved princess on it, and that excitement moves her to pick up crayons and go to town. And she is thrilled with the results. Sometimes she pokes holes all over the page with a pencil. Sometimes she ends up ripping the center because she goes over the same spot so many times. Honestly, she's doing exactly what she should be doing in the manipulative stage of art development (usually in ages 2-4 or 5). Experimenting with art materials and making her mark on the world. I'd prefer she do it on a blank page so it's all her, but whatever gets her to start experimenting has got to have some good in it, doesn't it?

See how she even carved her name in the side?

Take my 4 year-old. She's currently making her mark everywhere - her bed cover, my wall, a
squash from the farm, whatever she can find. She scribbles, she creates, and she is so proud of everything she does. And she gets super excited to color in an outline of Tinkerbell I print out for her (find some here). Sometimes she tries to color inside the lines, developing her fine motor skills and sometimes she lets loose. Also, she often will bring a coloring book to me and ask me to color with her, on the same page. It is a fabulous bonding moment that always ends in giggles as our crayons collide. It's not about the end product, it's about the process. Is it promoting creativity? Perhaps not, and I guess that's where the supposed "evil" lies. But is it laying a foundation of art experimentation? A habit of adding color to the world? A love of adding their "mark?" Yeah, I think it does.

Grid drawing might not be the most creative way to
draw but super famous creators like Chuck Close 
have used it to create their paintings and it didn't
 keep my daughter from giving Iridessa her own flair! 

I do think there are situations in which coloring books can cause problems. Those would be ridiculous situations in which a child is marked down or criticized for not coloring inside the lines or for "doing a better job." Or when an adult or older child deflates their happiness by informing them that Elsa's skin is not supposed to be purple and that the sky should really be blue. Have you ever seen that happen, whether it's with a completed coloring page or a unique drawing? Oh it's so sad. So just as money is not the root of all evil, the love of it is, coloring books are not the problem, we are. Our response is key. Our attitude may just determine whether they pick that crayon up again or not. Coloring books can be a vehicle to get a child excited, especially one who lacks the confidence to confront a blank page because they don't yet have the skills to properly compose what they see in their heads. It would be a problem if coloring books were their only exposure to "art making" (And don't even get me started on adults calling their coloring in the recently trendy adult coloring books "art"). Coloring books can relieve tension and can be good-old-fashioned screen-free fun. In fact, I'd venture to say that coloring books only squash creativity when we take the creative part (i.e. purple-skinned Elsa) away as an option.

Argument for Arts #1: Opening Our Eyes

"To my young friends out there: Life can be great, but not when you can't see it. So, open your eyes to life: to see it in the vivid colors that God gave us as a precious gift to His children, to enjoy life to the fullest, and to make it count. Say yes to your life."  -Nancy Reagan

The United States, the country most in which most of this blog's readers reside, is a nation that has been cutting funding for arts education for years. Why? Well, quite frankly, it's not going to be on the test. And it's not on the test because it's not deemed to be essential. While I heartily disagree, it's probably more important that my view is supported by countless studies conducted by people who are much smarter than I am. (For a quick overview, check out the 10 studies compiled here). I am an art educator, so my bias is clear. But my background also means I see first hand what art can do to improve our lives.
So thus begins my series: Argument for Arts. The arguments that follow in this series aren't necessarily ranked in order of importance because that's just not something I'm up to doing--but I have to start somewhere.
Argument #1: Opening Our Eyes.
A study of the arts by adults and children alike opens the eyes to a better understanding and appreciation of the world around us. Why do people go to the theater? Because it allows us to see a life, a situation, or an event from somebody else's perspective. If you're the actor on the stage, the only way to adequately connect with the audience is to fully understand the character yourself--to see the world through your role's eyes. How do they feel in the situations that are presented to them? The performing arts teach us, both as actors and audiences, to see--and feel--from a different perspective. Is there anything this world needs more of than its inhabitants to have this skill? (Not to get too controversial here but, for example, think racism and acts of violence towards and from police). I mean, amazingly enough, the uber-popular musical "Wicked" has inspired international throngs to feel sorry and root for the "Wicked" Witch! I certainly never saw that coming after "The Wizard of Oz" scared and frankly scarred me as a kid.
Photography is another apt example. Photographers learn to see what others overlook, or aren't patient enough to wait to see. In a really cool way, you could say that their camera becomes your eyes. I may never get to see Antarctica in person, but professional photographers Michael Snedic and David Burren have. Just look at their photos! Breathtaking. I can see what it looks like without getting off my couch. And thanks to them, I now want a pet penguin; although, I could also blame that on having read Mr. Popper's Penguins as a kid.
Then take my forte: painting. My grandma once told me how her painting teacher had asked her to look at a tree out the window and tell her what colors she saw. My grandma said it was green. Her teacher responded, "but how many shades and variations of green do you see? I see dozens!" Wise words. I see so much more variety, so many more marvelous details, and so many more colors and shapes than I did before I spent time painting them. My husband often asks me to point out different colors I see in a shadow or a cloud. He then squints and gets excited when he can see them too. Without my art training, I'd never see this deeper beauty. On family walks, I tend to be the one who points out a funny-looking bug or a cool-looking rock on the path--but only because I've been trained to look. And because of this training, I am able to see the beautiful in the mundane and I appreciate the richness of my life so much more! Sure, it might drive my kids a little crazy when I pull the car over and point out an amazing cloud formation, or tell everybody to stop what they're doing and notice the way the sun is highlighting that crazy-shaped mountain. But I don't want to miss it, and I want to train them to see it too.
Whether it's to appreciate the beauty in the world that surrounds us or to better understand the lives of our fellow humans, we all need our eyes opened in a way only the arts can accomplish.