Winter Landscapes (Monet)

CLAUDE MONET (1840-1926)

The Magpie 1868-1869

Pronounced: Moe-nay

Art Style: Impressionism

Art Terms: cool colors, light, shadow

Activity: Painting

Medium: Watercolor

Materials: liquid watercolors, watercolor paper, masking tape, cups/bowls for water, brushes, salt

(*this fantastic art lesson can be found all over the internet, but the specific process we used came from Deep Space Sparkle's version)

Slideshare presentation found here

Meet The Artist: Idea - Read the kids the Smart About Art book about Claude Monet (in art closet). 

If you opt not to read the Smart About Art book and would like additional biographical information on Claude Monet, here's a great link to a youtube video which is a quick overview of his life. This link from the Musee d'Orsay, where the painting Magpie hangs, will give you a great overview of the painting and its reception in Paris when Monet painted it. 

Discussion Ideas: Begin with the discussion questions - (1) What's going on in this picture? (2) What makes you say that? (3) What more can you find?

Other ideas you may want to bring out in your discussion: 
(1) shadows. To help make this discussion more concrete, I brought along a flashlight and a stick. With the lights off, I shone the flashlight on the stick from different sides, making it really clear that a shadow falls on the opposite side of the light source. It's nice to point out to the kids that all of your shadows in a painting will usually fall the same direction (if you are trying to make a picture that is realistic rather than abstract).

(2) cool colors. The colors Monet chose to paint this landscape are part of what tells the story of this painting - they are cool, like winter. Talk about examples of things that are cold and find those colors in this painting… (i.e. ice and snow - white and gray; shadows - blue; etc.)

Activity: Before you begin, it helps to tape a length of masking tape to every kid's desk. Have them use the tape to make trees on their papers, ripping tape to add branches with irregular edges (the torn edges of the tape). (*note: I was concerned that it was going to take a long time to distribute masking tape and that it would be difficult for kids to tear (I did this lesson for both second and fourth grade classes). It turned out not to be a problem - I walked around and taped a length of tape on the sides of everyone's desks (maybe 3 minutes); and all of the kids were able to tear the tape on their own.) Once their trees are down, have them draw a horizon line with a pencil. Then have them paint their sky with the liquid watercolor, and shadows with the same color. If you want you can encourage them to add in a second color (see sample below) *note: I used the liquid watercolors - love them. Every desk had a little plastic bowl and I alternated water, blue paint, and purple paint (we kept the tones cool for winter) in the bowls for the kids to share, which worked fine. Just make sure and remind them to rinse their brush in the water bowl before changing colors - or it might be a better plan to keep the brushes with the colors.. We sprinkled salt on the picture to create a snow-flaky texture (you can see this in the example above). I have since found out that using salt this way makes the picture not totally archival - FYI - but it's really fun to throw on and see what it does to the paint. 

Variation:

Instead of cool winter tones, use warm red, yellow, brown to make an autumn background if you are looking for a seasonal fall lesson. Maybe after the tape comes off the kids can use gold liquid watercolor to add a few gold leaves, still on the birch/aspen trees and on the ground.

Student Work: