Wolf Kahn Inspired Landscapes

There's a little, independent bookstore we like to poke around in whenever we visit Woodstock, VT. I tend to gravitate to the kid's section since I can't resist a good picture book. Right next to the kid's section are spinning racks of beautiful stationary. The bright colors of the Wolf Kahn prints have caught my eye on numerous occasions so I knew I needed to create a lesson and pass on my inspiration to my students. After a visit to the MFA, I purchased (with my student discount!) a calendar of prints and began formulating my ideas.

I think this lesson is suitable for all age levels, but I geared it towards my eighth grade students. One of our "units" of study in this grade is Invented Worlds. The formal elements I attempted to teach here were meant to carry over to the next lesson which is one point perspective. (We've been working on one point perspective cities and rooms now for over a month! I also added a surreal twist and hope to post some soon)

I began this lesson with a Power Point. I think slide presentations can be ineffective, so I try to make them interactive by asking students questions about what they see and calling on students to read the brief informational texts. I've also started developing "viewing guides" to go along with my presentations. Not only does this encourage students to be more accountable for the information being presented, but it also promotes literacy. This is a big buzz word lately in education. I'm currently enrolled in a graduate class (one of my last!) focused solely on "new literacies." While initially nervous about taking a course so focused on reading and writing, I am excited about the possibilities and the new ideas I can bring to my classroom.

I know I am digressing from the lesson, but after two short years in my school system, I really want to validate art as an integral component in the well rounded education of my students. Right now, the arts are supported, but sometimes I feel like its only because the work "looks good." Like, "thank you for beautifying the school" and "how awesome are those art works!" In reality, it needs to be more about the process, thinking creatively, learning skills that can apply in other situations outside the art room and an appreciation.  A LOT needs to happen, like getting a department head, before the system can get there. But I feel like the more I learn, the more I can try, the more my students will get out of art class. Back to Wolf Kahn...

After viewing the power point, students were asked to use the vocabulary to fill in the blanks. I gave students a hand out that looked like this:

Name:

Grade/Section:

Wolf Kahn

LANDSCAPES

 

Extraordinary	Foreground	Unusual
Middle ground	Horizon line	Background

1.     Where water or land meet sky is the  _______________ and at the viewer’s eye level in a work of art.

2.     Parts of a work of art that seem closest to you are called the _______________.

3.     Parts of a work of art that seem to be between objects in the foreground and the background are said to be in the _______ _________.

4.     Wolf Kahn’s artwork became famous because of the ______________ or _______________ colors that he uses.

5.     Using ________________ can also create the illusion of space in a work of art.

Use the above vocabulary to create 2 landscape sketches. You may use color pencil to experiment with unusual or extraordinary color combinations. Attempt to BLEND colors.

The presentation, vocabulary and sketches took about one and a half classes. During the second class, students were told that they had a choice of materials for the final image. They had a choice of oil pastels (I had florescent available), chalk pastels or watercolor with oil pastel to create a resist. There was scrap paper so that they could experiment with the different materials first. The only real requirement for their image was to include foreground, middle ground and background. During each class, I put laminated calendar pages at their tables so they could have a visual as well.

I feel like the landscapes most reminiscent of Kahn's were the ones completed with chalk. The florescent oil pastels I had were terrible if blended with any thing else and not very opaque. The mixed media images came out with more softness and a nice balance but the colors were not as bright. Overall, I think it was a successful lesson. I am confident that when my students go on to high school, that they will know what a horizon line is (I have students at that level now who do not). I was happy to see that the majority of my students did NOT put the horizon line right, smack in the middle and only a handful had the happy little sun in the corner. By choosing their own materials too, they had some more ownership. For some the openness was overwhelming, but I'm pleased with the results and proud of my students.

Middle School Art "Choice" Day

First of all, this was the longest week on record! I was as bad as the kids, anxious for Winter Break, but had a crazy schedule and a cold to contend with before making it to Friday.
As I looked around my classroom yesterday afternoon though, I realized how lucky I am. Despite my hemming and hawing trying to figure out what to do this week, my kids were so content with what they were doing in the art room. That was a good feeling. And as I took a step back and observed, I realized that I am so lucky: I have a job that I love, great students and a supportive staff. The tragedy in the news mixed with the feeling of the holidays made this week surreal for me, but in the end I'm glad I had that little moment to step back, enjoy and be thankful.
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Sunflowers

I know reproducing "Sunflowers" by van Gogh is a pretty standard lesson. I have only done it twice in the last four years though, and I could not resist reading another Laurence Anholt book to introduce my second graders to the artist.

• first we read "Camille and the Sunflowers" then looked at van Gogh's "Sunflowers." we talked about what we saw in general, then narrowed it down to the elements of art. for the first class, we specifically paid attention to the shapes and lines.  one class thought some of the flowers looked like fuzzy donuts!
• we drew with black crayon on 12x18 manila paper. something that I think helped with the composition was asking the kids to draw all the flowers above the vase first, even having some go off the paper, then adding the stems. for some reason, I think because of a lesson we did back in the fall, my second graders love using overlapping. so when it came time to add the stems, they knew some would overlap before making their way into the vase.
• the second class we began by revisiting the painting and this time looking for as many colors as we could. the kids realized that the flowers were not painted with only yellow!
• with oil pastels, we began to add color. I went from table to table, demonstrating how to layer the oil pastels, and how to add all the little lines and different colors we saw, especially in the fuzzy donut :)

some kids really got into this lesson. so much so that they needed an extra class. about every six weeks I have a "choice" day for second grade. its an earned treat for good behavior. so what I have done the last few choice days is have the students who need more time on an assignment finish first and then pick a choice...

choices are things like "free" draw, using my how to draw books, sometimes a little "special project" with me (watercolor, extra scratch art paper etc.) art games like cloodle or "the word game" (I have a deck of cards with adjectives, nouns, verbs and places. the kids pick one of each to make a silly sentence and have to illustrate it) pattern blocks, crystal climbers and if I am feeling particularly nice, legos... again, it has to be earned and we have a chart to keep track of our good listening and behaving day. having never taught as young as second grade, its been a learning experience, but rewarding. I would like to take the idea of the earned choice and use it next year with other grades.

back to Sunflowers.... it totally worked out that we did this the week of van Gogh's birthday. our principal talks to us about "this day in history" during the morning announcements and I could almost hear the second grade cheer from down the hall when she mentioned it was van Gogh's birth anniversary over the loud speaker. a simple, yet awesome lesson. I can't wait to see what these little ones will be able to accomplish when they are older.

p.s. LOVE my new camera! can't stand loading and formatting pictures in blogger though. so frustrating!