Volcano inspired Artwork Lessons

While we studied about Pompeii as a part of our unit study on Rome we incorporated another bit of Art by taking a look at a few artworks that depict various volcanoes.

Katsushika Hokusai's did a series of prints together titled, "Thirty Six Views of Mt. Fuji".  This Squidoo Lens shows "The Great Wave" a number of times.  This particular piece is FABULOUS for teaching kids how lines in art help the eye move around the composition.

If you keep scrolling down you will also see, Mt. Fuji, Mt. Fuji in Summer, Mt. Fuji Pilgrimage, Boy on Mt. Fuji, Fuji above the Lightening and more.

Hokusai made wood block prints so you can use it as a lesson in print making (you can cut potatoes in half or use foam and carve shapes and patterns out and then use them like stamps in tempera paint to create your own prints if you wish to use this as a way to introduce how prints work if you wish) or, you can study the paintings for different kinds of line, or different uses of color.

We also had the opportunity to visit The Getty Villa again while they had an exhibition about "The Last Days of Pompeii".  Before going, we made sure to look at The Getty's Page about Sir William Hamilton.  The page discusses Hamilton as an amateur Vulcanologist and displays four images of different paintings he created in an effort to record the eruption of Vesuvius he witnessed in 1767 and even the "curious specimens" of rock he collected after the eruption.

We compared the paintings by Hamilton with "The Eruption of Mt. Vesuvius" by Pierre Jacques Volaire who was famous for his depictions of Volcanic eruptions at night.  I LOVE how the apricots and oranges (meaning the colors not the fruits) in this painting juxtaposed against the greyness of the sky is an absolutely GORGEOUS color combination - but then, he was an artist.

For contrast, we also made sure to take a look at how Andy Warhol depicted the same volcano in his cycle  "Vesuvius."  Take the opportunity to discuss line, color choices and the difference in motivations between the more abstract Warhol and the more scientific Hamilton.

Alice painted a picture of a volcano her way (shown above).  Since we are currently studying early Christianity, apparently she also felt the need to litter the landscape with Chapels.

We pointed out lines in the artwork, discussed color choices, looked at how different colors change the "mood" in the painting and really just had a good time talking about what we were seeing.  It was more of an art appreciation set of lessons than practice at creating art.

Lastly, we discussed the recording of volcanic eruptions and how our ability to view and record this phenomena has changed.  We've discussed Pliny's descriptions of his viewing of Vesuvius and even were able to read his description (translated into english).  We discussed how photography and videography have made it a lot easier for us to truly see what happens during an eruption and read this brief article on the subject.

The Art of Rome

Roman Art offers a lot from which kids can learn by checking out examples and then trying out the art themselves.  I recommend viewing examples of any of the types of art listed here first and discussing any of the associated vocabulary or techniques that would have been used while you look.  Alice and I saw a number of Roman sculptures in the antiquities collection when we visited the museum.  When we came home, Alice used play dough to sculpt a goddess.  We discussed how a sculpture made with the same technique she was using was still a sculpture, but the technique was different from what the Greek and Romans had done.  Since I happen to have a potter's tool kit, we also used a block of wood and cut away pieces to make another sculpture.  If you have access to the right tools (which can be purchased at your local craft store), they might think it is fun to use a "chip away" technique for sculpting instead of molding, folding and shaping.  Whatever technique for sculpting your child uses it might be fun to make sure they know other ways of sculpting exist too.  Here is a link to how modern bronze statues are made from "How its Made".

If you do have the chance to visit an antiquities collection, or if you will be discussing the differences between Roman and Greek Art, make sure to point out that the Romans loved how "real" the Greeks could make their sculptures look and emulated the way Greeks depicted the human form.  However, the Greeks didn't actually make most of their sculptures all that "real" after all.  Their sculpture tried to idealize the human (or God's) body and features.  The Romans included things like large noses, wrinkles and other features the Greeks would have tried to eliminate in their artful renderings. 

Here are a few things we tried:

Projects to Try:

Make your own relief:

Much of Roman art is in relief sculptures used in their architecture and on grave stones.  Use tag board, cardboard and craft foams to stack pieces up in such a way that they make the "sculpture" for which you are aiming.  This project takes a lot of vision and fore planning, so kids Alice's age (early elementary)  may have a pretty tough time with it.  The one I did with Alice was more like a craft where I had pre-designed and cut the pieces and allowed her to stack and glue them together.  She then made lots of her own leaves to add.  In some ways it means this was more of an art history project rather than her own art, but since my objective was for her to remember what a relief was, it worked well.


This is stacked bits of tagboard and craft foam and two pieces of felt.

 Make a Story Column like Trajan's:

Use a paper towel roll to tell your story or that of something else, maybe a favorite myth as you spiral around the roll.  We didn't make ours a relief, but You can see how the story develops as you follow the spiraling seam on the roll around the column.  On cardboard, I recommend sharpies OR crayons specifically made for construction paper or both as is the case with ours.

 

Complete a Mosaic:

First, look at some examples of mosaics so your child or children understand the range of what is possible and what a mosaic looks like.  Alice's mosaic was completed with a kit by the metropolitan Museum of Art.  It is actually a reproduction of a Byzantine Mosaic, but again, my objectives were more about learning the vocabulary word "mosaic" and less about developing her artistic skills for this one so it worked.  To order, visit the Met's website at www.metmuseum.org.  Our kit was "The Personification of Ktisis" from the "My Masterpiece" collection. 

If you'd rather do your own mosaic (or have your child do his or her own), you can use any number of things to complete a mosaic.  First, have your child draw a picture on graph paper and color it in.  Then choose which media you will allow your child to use for his/her mosaic.  Torn scraps of paper will work just as well as actually going out and buying the tiles, adhesive and grout to actually make the mosaic AND be a lot less expensive, but harder to preserve.  It just depends on your goals for the project.  Other items that can be used instead of tiles can include, buttons, broken bits of plastic from toys, food  containers and other items, art foam cut into small squares or rectangles, dyed nut shells (I am currently collecting pistachio shells for a mosaic project we will be doing), dyed egg shells . . . your imagination is really the only limit here.  Really, your imagination is the only limit.  Check out the combination relief/mosaic made from SCREWS to the right.  Incredible! 

Here is a video about the Lod Mosaic's discovery.

The Book Shown Here is: St. Valentine by Robert Sabuda.  We used the book as Inspiration.

Make a Signet Ring:

For little fingers, get an old plastic play ring that won't be terribly missed.  Older kids can make the ring part out of clay themselves.  Make a block of air-dry clay for your child (or have older child make one) that will fit the ring and child's finger in size.  Roll it or press it so it is somewhat flat on both sides and then using toothpicks, have your child carve out his or her "signature symbol" of choice.  Without destroying the carving, turn the clay over and gently press the ring into the signet charm.  Allow the ring to air dry and your child now has a signet ring.  If the carving is wide and deep enough, you can use play dough, silly puddy, or more clay to demonstrate to your child how it molds the other substance to its own shape.  Here is video of a collection of Roman Rings and signet stones.  If you have explained the function sufficiently, this should solidify the child's understanding of how a signet ring worked to communicate who letters and documents were from.  As an aside and FYI, authentic rings were sometimes actually made so the signet portion was worn against the skin.  The ring was removed and the signet turned outward on the ring for use!  Wow!  (For more about Roman Clothing and related projects, click on the link).

Complete a Fresco:

Here is a Youtube video by Blick Art supplies with how to do dry plaster fresco with your kids.  Frescoes were used for centuries so this activity can be a great reference later too.

Don't Forget the Architecture:

Architecture can also be art - especially the way the Romans did it (when it comes to their public spaces such as bath houses, theaters, circuses, government buidings and palaces for their emperors and upper crust anyway).  To really get a look at the buildings of this talented group of builders, check out this link to the Master Builder's Lesson Resources.

Sculpt a Bust or Statue:

Let your child mold clay into a bust of themselves or someone they love OR carve a block of clay or play dough into a sculpture of themselves or someone they love.

Augustus

 

A Few More Videos:

Plebeian Roman Art

An Introduction to Roman Architecture - Lecture from Yale Professor Kleiner - If you enjoy it, more from the same professor will be listed by Youtube to the right of the movie.

Virtual Tour of Roman Collection    Virtual Tour 2 

Different Ways to do Self - Portraits

The curriculum we get through our online school (k12) includes a lesson that asks Alice to do a self portrait at least once/year (so far, it has been more like a few times each year).  They suggest right upfront the idea of keeping the self portraits so the child is not only making a record of their advancing artistic skills but also of how they perceive themselves and how they change every year.  I LOVE the idea, but Alice has begun to feel it is a bit tedious to do a self portrait every six months, so I've come up with a list of different media that can be used as well as a couple of "fun" or at least "different" ways to do the self-portraiture and change things up for her a little and thought I'd share those ideas with you. 

Media:

Just changing what you are using to make the art can dramatically change how the art turns out.  Of course there are all the usuals like crayon, pencil and the different paints (water color, tempura and oil), but oil pastels, mixed media, torn paper collage (collages in general) and even mosaics can all be pretty cool too.  Some of these require a lot more advanced planning than others, but that's just it, you are introducing your kids to many different ways to see and experience art if you give them all the options over time. 

Sand painting is a nice way to give the kids a little difference in texture as can giving kids a sheet of sand paper and chalk to do their portraits.

Here is an idea I haven't done yet, but plan to do when Alice is eight or nine and a little more able to plan ahead successfully:  Take a hole bunch of seeds, veggies or fruits, stones of a variety of colors or even leaves and have your kids construct their portrait by placing these items as if a mosaic is being made that is a self-portrait.  When completed, take a photo as Andy Goldsworthy would do and then let nature run its course with the original. 

For kids that love working with their Lego's, you could even have them construct a portrait out of Lego's.  This also takes a lot of planning and careful vision.  Alice had a lot of help with "ideas" here.

It is amazing what it can do to give kids a real canvas on which to work.  Although plenty of artwork is done on other materials, kids begin to see paper as nothing special when it is what they always do their work on.  Along those same lines, having different weights of paper with different levels of roughness and/or glossiness can change things up a little too.

Another one that can be fun and switch things up is to give your kids paper that is a different color.  Starting with white all the time means that younger kids with lighter skin tones, don't even think about their skin color in their artwork.  Kids with darker skin are stuck using "chocolate" or some other equally inappropriate color that doesn't really reflect their skin color all the time.  Sometimes, give them paper that does in fact, echo their own skin color along with coloring tools that are designed to give a range of skin color options (Crayola has these in both crayons and markers.  They call it the "multicultural" line).  It can also be really fun to make them think about it and figure out how to represent their skin tones by mixing colors.  Give your kids a green, dark red, blue or other color that would never be the actual color of skin to illustrate themselves on and oil pastels or paints, then see what they do with it. 

Different Views:

Different Views can work really well.  Start simply with front views and then profiles, but as your kids advance there are a variety of ways to "add" to the mix.  Use the work of famous artists as inspiration.  Introduce them to the masters, a little art history and appreciation AND a new way of thinking about their self-portraits all at once.

It can be fun to do a profile painting in the style of "I and the Village" by Chagall.  Have your kids draw their own profile and then add a memory into the background.  Encourage them to use color to depict the mood of the memory.  Bright colors might represent a happy memory, while dark colors with lots of blues might represent a sad memory.

A self-portrait in the style of Picasso where kids mix a front view with a profile can be a great way to introduce one of the greats AND a few giggles while encouraging a new look at themselves and art altogether.

Kids might think it is really fun to do a "Where's Waldo" style self portrait.  They draw themselves small on the page a million times, but always with slight changes and different views.  One of themselves is wearing a scarf, another is not.  One of themselves is holding shopping bags while another one is practicing the fiddle.  Perhaps one is sliding down the back of a dinosaur while another version of oneself flies an airplane overhead.  Maybe the child wants to include some imaginary versions.  What would she look like as a fairy, mermaid and witch?  The child chooses ten versions of themselves to draw again (identically) along one of the margins of the picture.  Then a family member has to find that version of him/herself in the vast and busy selection of a whole bunch of self portraits (This one can get tedious.  You might want to break the paper surface up into six or more smaller squares and then just have them fill in one square each day over the course of a week or two).

Then there is the self portrait that requires thought about perspective Alice did for the article, "A Lesson in Perspective" during the summer months.  In this self portrait, the kids start with a tracing of their hands and feet (which are closest to the viewer).  The kids then, have to figure out how to show their faces and then bodies behind the hans and feet as well as further away.  The picture below was Alice's first attempt at this challenge.

Different Ways to "Compose" the Portrait:

Of course there are different styles of art to try out too.  Pointillism stands out as one that may feel very similar to mosaic for your kids.  I also haven't mentioned any sort of sculpture (except perhaps the Lego's, depending on how one interprets it).  Kids can try to do a very real looking painting and alter that with a much more abstract version of themselves the next time they try. 

Portraits and Self-portraits were also used at times to say something about the person in the portrait.  Take a look at Judith Leyster's self-portrait, 1630.  Ask them to talk about how she shows her love of painting.  Huge tennis player?  Ask your child to use tennis paraphernalia in their art about themselves.  Dancer" Make it Dance paraphernalia instead.

Angelica Kauffman did a self portrait that told the story about how she felt about having to choose between a career in music and a career as an artist.  Show your kids a copy of "Self Portrait, Hesitating Between The Arts of Music and Painting".  Tell them the story behind it and ask them to use their portraits to tell the viewer something important about themselves as Kauffman did.

Caricature can be a great exercise for the teenager - and eye opening for you.  Have your kids decide which features should be the "stand outs".  Encourage your teen to choose two of his or her best features to exaggerate in the caricature

Of course a self - portrait using photography can be a lot of fun too.  Ask them to experiment with lighting, props, colors, poses and even choice of clothing to give you a collage of photos that tell something about who they are at this moment in time.