High School Grid Art Project

We just finished a summer painting project! They started off with a picture of their choice and added a grid to both picture and canvas. Then we drew our picture onto the canvas using the grid as our guide. Here are our results:

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Middle School Art Projects

The middle school students got to pick which project they wanted to paint. They each wanted to paint their projects as gifts for Christmas. They turned out very well! We used a grid to draw out the painting, then we created an underpainting.

Artists Around the World

Netherlands- Vincent Van Gogh

Japan- Katsushika Hokusai

“From the age of six I had a mania for drawing the shapes of things. When I was fifty I had published a universe of designs. But all I have done before the age of seventy is not worth bothering with. At seventy-five I’ll have learned something of the pattern of nature, of animals, of plants, of trees, birds, fish and insects. When I am eighty you will see real progress. At ninety I shall have cut my way deeply into the mystery of life itself. At one hundred, I shall be a marvellous artist. At 110, everything I create; a dot, a line, will jump to life as never before. To all of you who are going to live as long as I do, I promise to keep my word. I am writing this in my old age. I used to call myself Hokusai, but today I sign myself The Old Man Mad About Drawing.”

“If heaven had granted me five more years, I could have become a real painter.”

The kids worked on their version of the wave with Mt. Fuji in the background. The younger kids we used Bingo blotters to fill in our colors. We used red for the sky. The older kids followed my instructions on how to draw the wave and then paint it. We watched a video with the younger kids on Hokusai here. I found a video for the older kids here!

France- Henri Matisse

“What I dream of is an art of balance, of purity and serenity, devoid of troubling or depressing subject-matter, an art which could be for every mental worker, for the businessman as well as the man of letters, for example, a soothing, calming influence on the mind, something like a good armchair which provides relaxation from physical fatigue.” -Matisse

Henri Matisse’s art at the National Gallery of Art in Washington D.C.

Henri Matisse was a 20th century painter, collagist and draftsman. We learned about his love of color. He was a master! When he couldn’t walk and was in a wheelchair, he painted a mural with his brush attached to a stick.We watched a video about Henri Matisse here! Some of his works were seen last summer at the National Art Museum in Washington D.C.

We worked on a project of his post impressionism “Goldfish. 1911″painting. We made our fish bowl and painted with watercolor. We learned how to add salt to the paint to make a watery texture in the fishbowl.

Russia- Kasimer Malevich

“The square= feeling, the white field=the void beyond this feeling.” – Kasimer Malevich

Kasimer Malevich was a 20th century Russian painter and pioneer of geometric abstract art. We learned about the artist from the video here! We worked on a project with our own geometric shapes!

The youngest group (ages 5 and 6) used geometric shapes to make their pictures.

Germany- Hannah Hoch

“It was not very easy for a woman to impose herself as a modern artist in Germany… Most of our male colleagues continued for a long time to look upon us as charming and gifted amateurs, denying us implicitly any real professional status.” -Hannah Hoch

Hannah Hoch was a female photomontage photographer in the middle of a male dominated Dada movement. We learned the dad was anti-art or opposite of art. Once Dada became mainstreamed and considered art, these artist chose not to take part of it anymore. We made our art project out of magazines. The kids had fun making their “non-art” projects.

USA-Kara Walker

“One of my earliest memories involves sitting on my dad’s lap in his studio in the garage of our house and watching him draw. I remember thinking: ‘I want to do that, too,’ and I pretty much decided then and there at age 2½ or 3 that I was an artist just like Dad.” -Kara Walker

Kara Walker Biography

Italy- Amedeo Modigliani

“Every great work of art should be considered like any work of nature. First of all from the point of view of its aesthetic reality and then not just from its development and the mastery of its creation but from the standpoint of what has moved and agitated its creator.”- Modigliani

Amedeo Modigliani was a 19th century Italian Jewish painter and sculptor born in 1884. He was sick as a child and stayed home with his mother until the age of 10. He was often found drawing and painting. He worked and studied at Micheli’s Art School. This is where he found his passion for art. Amedeo was inspired by Romanian sculptor, Constantin Brancusi, and his studies of African sculptures. This African style had a tremendous influence on the rest of his paintings.

Amedeo died of tuberculosis meningitis. He died poor. His works drew interest after his death in 1920.

We watched a kid-friendly video of Modigliani found here and learned more his works.

With Modigliani’s elongation of faces style in mind, this week we worked on a portrait with a long neck and mask-like faces.

France/Tahiti- Paul Gauguin

Paul Gauguin was a 19th century French artist. We studied this week about his post-impressionistic paintings from the island of Tahiti. We watched a child friendly video found here. We talked about how the bright colors in his paintings helped the viewer feel the warmth of the atmosphere. We learned how Paul Gauguin’s art was rejected until after his death.

We worked on a project using the same type of bright colors Paul Gauguin would have used. We tried to vary away from our normal thinking of what colors the sky or water should be.

The 4-6 yrs. used a washable paint, and the colors didn’t turn out as bright. We used their hands as the leaves of the palm tree.

The 7-12 yrs. had a limited time to finish their painting, but they had fun experimenting with the different colors.

Turkey- Mimar Sinan (Architect)

We learned this week about Mimar Sinan. Mimar Sinan was a 15 Century architect and the chief Ottoman architect and civil engineer for sultans Suleiman the Magnificent, Selim II, and Murad III. He designed the Selimiye Mosque in Edirne. We watched a short video about Mimar Sinan found here!

Ages 4-6 yrs. made our own type of architecture with gummy candy and wooden sticks.

Ages 7-12 yrs. worked on a design of a house and map collage. We talked about how we would design the interior of the house if we were there to make those decisions.

Spain- Pablo Picasso

Our class learned about Pablo Picasso. Picasso went through a period known as the Cubist period. Although the kids thought his work looked scary and funny, we learned that we could replicate his art by using a smashed soda can as the face. It was fun watching the kids learn that they could use objects around the house for art inspiration. (I found this idea on Pinterest.)

The younger ages 4-6 class traced their profile to make their Picasso face. They added eyes and a mouth then painted over the picture with watercolor.

Mexico- Frida Kahlo

Our inspiration this week was Frida Kahlo from Mexico. Her full name is Magdalena Carmen Frieda Kahlo y Calderón. Frida was the queen of self-portraits."I paint self-portraits because I am so often alone, because I am the person I know best." She liked to paint the world around her. She painted her pain. She painted animals. We were inspired by her parrots!

Ages 4-6 “Parrots”

This class listened to the book Frida by Jonah Winter.