art class— Piet Mondrian

We are studying the 1930s right now and the The Great Depression. For art, we were looking at artwork made from The Art of the New Deal, and I thought it would be interesting to show them a completely different art movement that was taking place somewhere else in the world at the same time. So we made some Pierre Mondrian inspired pieces. This idea came from the book mentioned in this post.

We decided to draw light pencil lines first establishing the verticals and horizontals. We used acrylic paint on bristol paper

We debated how to achieve the black lines—using black tape, black paint, or thin strips of black paper. The black paper strips are what we used and I think they were the perfect choice. They were easy to cut on our little paper trimmer thingy (safe for kids to use!) and then when the paint dried (which was fast) were glued with a glue stick. The black strips covered the pencil lines and they cleaned up any messy corners of color.

These turned out great and the girls were very excited with how much they looked like Mondrian's pieces. A quick look on google images showed cars, dresses, cakes, and even an apple covered with this type of pattern, which they loved.

I had to bring the art hammer down a little for this—they were super excited to start with diagonal lines and pinks and purples, but I made them stick to the primary colors and straight lines for their first pass. They were a bit grumpy, I could tell, but then once the parameters were set, it was like a game and they really got into it.

I feel, when teaching from other artists, it's important to have them learn by trying the art technique with the same rules that artist used. It forces the kids to do something different and possibly get kind of uncomfortable—but then they learn something new. They get this concept. They draw, paint, sew and create all day, with whatever supplies they like. They know how to be creative on their own. Our art classes are something different. They are for stretching and trying new things and that isn't always what they are in the mood for, but I gently stick to my guns and am always so happy I did. I can see them bring in skills/concepts they have learned from these projects into what they do on their own, which is thrilling. They are always really proud of what their hands have made—especially when they didn't think they could do it at first.