A Study in Art

The last couple of weeks we have been looking at Van Gogh's fourteen Sunflowers. We talked about Vincent Van Gogh and showed some of his art to the children. The first week we had a vase of large sunflowers set up with some pastels and card stock so that the children could draw and rub their pictures. The next week we had a directed painting exercise set up at the easel with just four paint colors and an example of the painting done by a teacher. The day I made the painting it was so very funny. The children were packed in tight to me at the easel so much so that I had to ask for arm space. The demand to make a painting was so great you would think that we never allowed painting at mt. What struck me about the exercise is that the children were so very keen to replicate the painting in their own way and they had questions about why I was using green the way I was and what would I use the brown for and how could I make my petals with out my paint running down my paper? So many question and it was truly delightful to answer all of these questions and to offer advice and guidance with the project. I remember one child becoming upset that the brown center was muddying up the yellow petals. I said that it made the picture more beautiful and that it was nice to see it like that and perhaps we could imagine that the sunflowers had been in a shower of rain. I have tried to showcase these paintings in the coat area and I have not rolled them up to send home I just can't bring myself to bend them. Please find them by the art file and take them home. They would make beautiful note cards for Christmas if you had them copied.