Art Friday - Being Monet (or not)
Remember to write and call the IL senators hearing the Adoption Reform Bill (HB 3079). It is so important that everyone contact the senators so we can help change the adoption laws in Illinois. I did speak with the Sen. Harmon's office staff today (he is now the bill's sponsor) and it looks as though the committee hearing will be postponed a week giving us more time to rally our forces. Keep sharing the information and encouraging people to call.
And now back to our regularly scheduled post.
For many years now, we have been doing picture studies as part of our homeschool curriculum. Each year we take an artist or two and spend time learning about him or her and looking carefully at some of that artist's paintings. Once we have looked at a painting, I then hang it up on the wires we have strung in the kitchen so people can keep looking at them. It is a great way to expose my children to art and the artists who create it. All of this became infinitely easier when I discovered Simply Charlotte Mason's art guides. Before, it was a big pain in the you-know-where to find the photographs of the paintings I wanted and I often ended up buying huge art books at used book sales just to make it easier. With these guides, they've done all the work for me and I love them. (This is just my humble opinion and I have not been compensated. Darn.)
Anyway, this year we have been looking at Monet. When I did my homeschool planning I came across a painting project that imitated Monet's water lilies paintings and decided to try it. The actual project used paper and tissue paper to create the water lilies on the painted background, but though I offered this, everyone wanted to paint all of it. So we did.
Here are the results (in age order).
And now back to our regularly scheduled post.
For many years now, we have been doing picture studies as part of our homeschool curriculum. Each year we take an artist or two and spend time learning about him or her and looking carefully at some of that artist's paintings. Once we have looked at a painting, I then hang it up on the wires we have strung in the kitchen so people can keep looking at them. It is a great way to expose my children to art and the artists who create it. All of this became infinitely easier when I discovered Simply Charlotte Mason's art guides. Before, it was a big pain in the you-know-where to find the photographs of the paintings I wanted and I often ended up buying huge art books at used book sales just to make it easier. With these guides, they've done all the work for me and I love them. (This is just my humble opinion and I have not been compensated. Darn.)
Anyway, this year we have been looking at Monet. When I did my homeschool planning I came across a painting project that imitated Monet's water lilies paintings and decided to try it. The actual project used paper and tissue paper to create the water lilies on the painted background, but though I offered this, everyone wanted to paint all of it. So we did.
Here are the results (in age order).
L.
G. (She likes to add people to her paintings... see the stick figure?)
K. (We've decided this is as close to drawing a truck when painting water lilies as you can get.)
D.
TM
This is mine, but I have to do a little explaining. I had shown everyone what we were doing and for the most part, people got it. I thought that H. seeing the picture would be enough as she is usually quite happy to have something to color. Well, entering weird brain territory here... yes, she's great at copying when someone else is actually drawing it, but seeing the different components in a completed painting is evidently very different. She can't seem to take it apart and figure out how to do it a part at a time. She was getting frustrated, so I decided to try making one myself while sitting next to her. That did the trick and she was able to see how each part was added on and do the same thing on her painting.
It makes me think this is a new avenue to pursue with her. Looking at bigger objects and seeing the different parts. I'll have to think about how to do this, but I find it all extremely fascinating.
H. (As you can see, she figured it out. When TM asked her about the two bridges, that stumped her for a moment, as if she had no idea how that second bridge got there. When we said it was OK and that it was her painting, she decided that the bridge at the top was a railway bridge.)
Comments
I love the way all your kids' versions are so different!
Think of a piece of wood with a wood gingerbread man glued/nailed to it. Then there was the complentary piece of wood with the gingerbread man in negative.
To put clothing on the various figures you layered swatches of fabric, and for example, you put a red piece on first for the shirt on the upper body, then blue for pants on the lower body, then a strip of black for a belt. If you didn't do it in that order, it wouldn't look how we dress.
In the painting, the background should be done before the bridge and the lillies, otherwise they would get covered.
I have no idea if this will help you and H but it just popped into my mind, the layering of fabrics, mentally deconstructing then reconstructing. I'm sure you could use shapes other than human forms.