Instructors who teach introductory art studio courses face the task of covering large quantities of diverse content in a short amount of time. Developing material and technical knowledge requires time-consuming practice. Yet these courses are essential for launching a relational studio practice embedded in critical thinking. The awkward leap from…

Many painters use lines to express powerful emotions. Both Vincent van Gogh and Jean-Michel Basquiat had difficult lives filled with hardship, and died at a young age. They both used art to deal with their emotions. It seems like the stronger the feelings were in them, the faster the strokes were put down in their work. In this article,…

A humid summer haze covers the River Seine and the grassy bank where young men and boys go swimming on Sunday. Everything seems so quiet, still, and very hot. They wear hats to protect them from the hot sun. The artist Georges Seurat used warm tones to give viewers the feeling of the hot sun. Seurat was trying to catch the dazzle of hot sunlight…

Romero Britto is a wonderful artist for young students to study when learning the building blocks of art and design. Colorful, linear, and full of bold patterns, Britto's work blends a contemporary cubist style and pop art commercial appeal. Themes of this contemporary artist's work include animals, flowers, still life, and people in joyful…

This article features the painting "View of Toledo," based on Toledo, a very old city located on a high plateau in Spain. By the time the artist El Greco painted the picture, he had lived there for 31 years. When one looks at the picture, one will see a storm approaching and will see the city as if it were lit by a flash of lightning. What main…

In this article, second-graders create a sunflower drawing using pastel techniques that produce similar effects to Vincent van Gogh's brushstrokes. They also learn how layering colors and using white to lighten colors creates depth in their flowers.

A great start for the semester, this pinwheel project provides a good dose of art history, and a variety of media and techniques. It also teaches students how to clean up and store things properly. Five artists are introduced, each with a different art medium and technique. In this activity, students are expected to: (1) study works by five famous…

When he painted a portrait of Holy Roman Emperor Rudolph II (1552-1612), Giuseppe Arcimboldo used his imagination, and portrayed him as "Vertumnus," the Roman god of vegetation and the seasons. It's fun to find the different fruits, vegetables and flowers he used: pea-pod eyelids, a gourd for the forehead. Court painters of the time usually…

The technique of what people today call "collage" is not new. In Victorian times, elaborate art was created from bristly horsehair as a type of collage. The modern collage dates to the early 1900s when Picasso pasted newspaper on a drawing. In 1919 Karl Schwitters, a German artist, developed collage into an art form that was as important as…

On perusing American collage artist Eric Carle's book, "Rooster's Off to See the World," at an annual school book fair, the author, mesmerized by the carnival of colors and collage on each page, thought "What a wonderful visual aid for a combination painting and collage unit." Her first-graders were involved in a painting unit, and knowing their…

In this creative challenge, Surrealism and one-point perspective combine to produce images that not only go "beyond the real" but also beyond the ubiquitous "imaginary city" assignment often used to teach one-point perspective. Perhaps the difference is that in the "atypical cities challenge," an understanding of one-point perspective is a means…

Abstraction can be hard for older students to understand, and it usually involves simplifying or rearranging natural objects to meet the needs of the artist, whether it be for organization or expression. But, in reality, that is what young artists do when they draw from life. They do not have enough experience--and sometimes the patience--to see…

This article presents a lesson on abstract expressionism. The author describes how to create an original, personal, Rothko-like artwork with water-soluble oil pastels. (Contains 2 online resources.)

A new traveling exhibition and catalogue produced by the Smithsonian's American Art Museum features works by 31 artists from the United States who came to maturity in the mid-20th century. These artists have become the most significant and influential artists over the past 50 years as their works adorn the modern galleries of hundreds of museums.…

The wonderful book, "How Are You Peeling? Foods with Moods" by Saxton Freymann and Joost Elffers inspired a lesson on feelings and expressions for this author's second-grade students. Many students at her school have difficult lives and lots of emotional baggage, resulting in behavioral problems at school. Using the example of Fauvist portraits by…