Kandinsky Tree

This week in the art room (...well actually it's the same room as the other subjects), the kids and I studied the art of Wassily Kandinsky. Our focus was on Kandinsky's use of color to represent emotion.

While doing some personal research into Kandinsky's art I found that he is considered to have painted the first piece of purely abstract art. What I found most interesting was that Kandinsky began his career by painting realistic images. As he progressed and grew as an artist he began to paint progressively abstract images. This was a shock to the kids as they thought an artist would develop in the opposite direction.

We studied Kandinsky's painting  Farbstudie Quadrate to look at his use of color and shape. I asked the kids to study the painting and then assign emotions to the individual circles in the painting. The kids came up with emotions such as happy, sad, joyful, excited, scared and angry.

Once again I looked to the website What's Happening in the Art Room? Mrs. VandenBush has some incredible ideas for art projects. I highly recommend her blog if you are looking for  fun things to do with your class.

We decided to create Kandinsky circles by using the technique of collage. I offered the kids many colors of construction paper and asked the to be mindful of their color choices in order to represent an emotion. The kids then tore or cut the paper into various sized circles which they then pasted together. They also wrote the emotion their circle represented.

brave

calm

happy

sad

The class displayed their circles in a group collage by putting them on a large tree in the hallway. It took forever to make the tree but I think it was worth the effort.

Next week is a ski trip but who knows what we'll get up to next week.