The emperor's new clothes

 

The Emperor's underwear, by students of grade 3

You need:

1. drawing sheet A4 size
2. colour pencils

The Emperor's New Clothes is a fairytale by Hans Christian Andersen, first published in 1837 in Andersen's Fairy Tales Told for Children.

The story is about an emperor, who cares for nothing but his appearance and attire, hires two tailors who promise him the finest suit of clothes from a fabric invisible to anyone who is unfit for his position or 'just hopelessly stupid'. The emperor cannot see the cloth himself, but pretends that he can for fear of appearing unfit for his position. When the swindlers report that the suit is finished, they mime dressing him. Then the emperor marches in procession before his people. A child in the crowd calls out that the emperor is wearing nothing at all and the cry is taken up by others. The emperor cringes, suspecting the assertion is true, but holds himself up proudly and continues the procession.

Read the fairytale. Tell students they have to draw the emperor. The emporor , who is recognizable by his crown, is almost nude. The only cloth he wears is beautiful underwear. Colour the drawing with colour pencils.  

Fairy tale comic

Hansel and Gretel

You need:

1. white drawing sheet A5 size
2. pencil
3. markers or colour pencils
4. fine black marker

The goal for this lesson is to convert a famous fairy tale into a comic. Students may draw only four pictures, so they should think very carefully about the most important scenes in the story. The story should be obvious from just those four pictures!

Divide the sheet into four sections. Draw four scenes and use speech bubbles if you want to. Colour the drawings with markers or colour pencils. Outline them with a fine black marker. You can choose to colour the drawings completely, but also a black and white strip with a single accent colour is nice.

All artworks are made by students of grade 6

In the style of Gaston Chaissac

You need:

1. drawing paper A3 size
2. tempera paint in primary colours
3. brushes
4. jar with water
5. paper towels
6. bold black marker
7. black construction paper
8. glue or stapler

The French painter and writer Gaston Chaissac was born in 1910. He came from a poor family and was often ill. In 1934 Chaissac moved to Paris and worked as a shoemaker. He lived in the same house as the German artist Otto Freundlich. It was through the friendship with Freundlich that Chaissac developed the desire to become an artist. He trained himself as an autodidact, supported and promoted by Freundlich. Freundlich also introduced him to the Parisian art scene.

Chaissac exhibited his works in 1938. During his stays at a sanatorium because of his tuberculosis in 1938 and 1939, Gaston Chaissac used the time to paint and draw. After his wedding he moved to the Vendée.

The artist bridged this isolation in the countryside through lively correspondence with gallery owners, authors and artists in Paris. Although Chaissac endeavored to establish a connection with the artist community, he was only valued as an artist by a small circle of gallery owners, journalists, and friends.

As a result, he didn't receive the expected recognition during his lifetime. Chaissac worked as a tireless experimenter and used materials that he found for his works of art - newspapers, shells, peels etc. He painted on every substrate available to him, created pen and ink drawings, watercolours, oil paintings, collages and unusual three-dimensional works. The artist was sometimes classified by Jean Dubuffet with the 'Art brut'. Chaissac himself called his work rather rustic modern.

Gaston Chaissac died in 1964.

Without title, © Gaston Chaissac

View photos of the work of Chaissac and especially the work above. Discuss the salient features: bold black lines that separate colour planes, little depth, simply drawn faces, white planes. What would those white planes mean?

I chose this painter also to repeat colour mixing skills. The students draw on their sheet one head and one or more limbs. Put a pencil mark in these planes, because they have to stay white. Then divide the sheet with wavy lines into small areas. Students choose two primary colours and use them to mix several colours. Paint the different planes with these mixed colours. Start with the brightest colour and and add more and more of the darker colour.

When the work is dry, outline every colour with a black marker. Bumps will disappear. Finally draw eyes, nose and mouth in the face. Paste or staple the work on black paper.

In the style of Gaston Chaissac, by students of grade 3

Clowning around

You need:

1. coloured construction paper 32 by 23 cm
2. white drawing paper A5 size
3. oil pastels
4. scissors
5. glue
6. tempera paint

Look at pictures of clowns on the digiboard and talk about how they recognize a clown.

Give each student a coloured construction paper and a white sheet of A5 size. Let them cut the corners of the white sheet, and let them paste this clown's face on the coloured sheet. Draw a clown using oil pastels: eyes, nose, mouth, hair, hat, bow etc. Colour the different parts with oil pastels. Outline everything with black.

Use toilet rolls and tempera paint to stamp coloured circles around the clown. Hang them all together on the bulletin board: ready for carnival!

Artworks made by students of grade 2

The man with the apple - like René Magritte (2)

Made by Tyra, grade 6

You need:

1. white drawing sheet A4 size
2. aquarelle pencils
3. jar with water
4. brush
5. fine black marker

Rene Magritte is born in 1898 in Belgium. When Magritte is 13 years old, his mother commits suicide. She jumps in the river Samber and is found with her dress covering her face. This image has been suggested as the source of several paintings from Magritte: people hiding their faces with several objects.
In 1924 Magritte became friends with members of a surrealism group in Brussels: André Breton, Joan Miró and Salvador Dalí. These artists influence Magritte's work. In the end Magritte became famous with surrealistic paintings.
Magritte gave his paintings a realistic effect of surrealism. He painted simple objects, like a shoe, an apple, a pipe or a tree. Magritte took these things out of their ordinary environment and placed them in a special surrounding.
One of Magritte's most famous works is "La Trahison des Images" (The Treachery of Images). This is a very realistic painting from a pipe, with the text: Ceci n'est pas une pipe (This is not a pipe). The painting is not a pipe, but rather an image of a pipe. As Magritte himself commented: "The famous pipe. How people reproached me for it! And yet, could you stuff my pipe? No, it's just a representation, is it not? So if I had written on my picture 'This is a pipe,' I'd have been lying!" By putting us constantly on the wrong track, Magritte forces us to think about art. Magritte thought it the task of an artist to place reality in a different context.
Links: Magritte museum, Brussel See also the other lesson In the style of René Magritte (1) on this blog.

Made by Debbie, grade 6

Students draw a part of a man or woman, from about chest height. Like Magritte, we see no face. And, like Magritte, the person has something on his head. In stead of the face, students draw an object of their choice. The drawing, person and background, has to be coloured with aquarelle pencils. Use water and a brush to create the effect of aquarel paint. Wait until the artwork is dry and outline everything with a fine marker.

Foreshortening fun

You need:

1. white drawing sheet A4 size
2. colour pencils
3. coloured paper for background

Sneakers have beautiful soles; sometimes the soles better than the shoes themselves! This art lesson is about foreshortening, soles and the inside of hands. Foreshortening occurs when an object appears compressed when seen from a particular viewpoint, and the effect of perspective causes distortion. Foreshortening is a particularly effective artistic device, used to give the impression of three-dimensional volume and create drama in a picture.

Tell students a story about a scary monster. "Imagine a terrible scary monster approaching you. The monster is much bigger than you and is running fast. You are scared and your try to run backwards. This does not work and you fall. The monster leans over you and you try to ward off with your hands .... "

Students draw the bottoms of the shoes on about the half of the drawing sheet. Then they draw their hands, overlapping the tops of the shoes. They drew their head in between the hands, and add their body. The arms need to be drawn directly to the hands, and the legs have to be drawn to the bottoms of the shoes. Students draw details on the shoe bottoms, and lines on their hands.

Use colour pencils to colour the drawing. When finished, paste it on a coloured background.

All artworks are made by students of grade 5

Totem poles

Made by three students of grade 6

You need:

1. drawing paper A4 size
2. coloured markers
3. coloured cardboard
4. pencil
5. potlood
6. scissors
7. glue

A totem pole is a wooden statue that was made by native tribes and was seen as a sanctuary. The pole was usually made of wood from the cedar tree and was often painted in bright colors. Show different pictures of totem poles. View and discuss the images that are cut in the totem poles.

In this lesson groups of students draw a totem pole together. To make one drawing together, some appointments should be made: the width, the colours, which drawing on which place etc.

Create groups of three or four students. Each student draws a portion of the totem pole and colours it in with coloured markers. Outline each colour with a thick black marker. Each student cuts his totem pole piece. The parts should be pasted into a whole picture on coloured cardboard. Finally, outline the exterior of the totem pole with a thick black marker.

Photo fun

You need:

1. copy of a photo of the student in black/white, A4 size
2. coloured construction paper A4 size
3. ruler
4. scissors
5. glue

Take a digital photo of each student and print in black and white on A4 paper. Students draw on the back of the picture horizontal lines with 2 cm space between them. Cut the lines. Paste the strips with half a cm between the on the coloured paper.

With the name of the student and his birthday under the arwork, this is a nice birthday calendar for in the classroom.

Mirror faces

You need:

1. white drawing paper A4 size
2. ruler
3. pencil
4. markers

Which facial expressions do you know? How do you draw the expression of a face? Talk about faces and emotions and show students with pictures or quick drawings how faces can change with certain emotions. Consider the state of the mouth, eyes and eyebrows. Divide the sheet into four sections by drawing three diagonal lines from top to bottom to bottom. Then draw a diagonal line from about the middle of the short side to the first vertical line. Do the same to the second line, third line and go through to the other short side of the sheet. See picture a.

Picture a.

Then pull vertical diagonal lines from top to bottom; be sure the lines go right through the middle of the sections. See picture b.

Picture b.

Draw the half of a face to the red line of the first upper left section and draw the mirror image on the other side of the red line. Choose two colours markers. Colour the facial parts of one half. Colour the background or the other half, leaving the facial parts white. Draw another face in the section below and colour it as written above, but change coloured in white. See picture c.

Picture c.

Finish the drawing and draw as many facial expressions as you know. Colour everything, alternating white and colour as a checkerboard. See picture d.

Picture d.

Selfportrait in manga style

You need:

1. half A4 size drawing sheet
2. colour pencils
3. black marker

Manga consist of comics and print cartoons in the Japanese language and conforming to the style developed in Japan in the late 19th century. In their modern form, manga date from shortly after World War II but they have a long, complex pre-history in earlier Japanese art.

The name comes from 'uncontrolled or random brushstrokes'. This refers to the loose style of drawing. Anime is the term used for manga style cartoon films. Ask students some examples of anime films. They probably know Pokemon and Dragonball Z. Show them some manga style drawings, there are lots of them on the internet. Discuss the remarkable things about manga:

• the characters tend to be slim and attractive
• in the comics for kids, the characters have large expressive eyes
• nose and mouth often consist of a smooth line
• the hair colours are striking and often unnatural
• the heads are large in proportion to body

There are numerous internet sites where you can learn to draw manga. Google op 'how to draw manga'. For almost each body part you can find sites. During this lesson the students make a portrait of their face in manga style. Give them the schedule for the head (on the blackboard or a copy).

Discuss how students can make the manga figure look like himself. Discuss how the head itself can look like a manga self portrait. Think of appearance as a hairstyle, glasses, moles, colour of the eyes, jewelry etc. Students draw their own head and shoulders in manga style. Colour with coloured pencil, outline with black marker.

Selfportrait in black and white

You need:

1. canvas
2. digital photograph
3. acrylic paint
4. brushes
5. carbon paper
6. pen

Show portraits made by Andy Warhol and discuss them. What is remarkable about those portraits? Would you recognize a Warhol? Why is that?
To make this selfportrait each child needs a digital portrait of himself. Use a photo editor to make the photo black and white. I used Corel Paint Shop Pro. Choose for 'image' and then 'grayscale'. Then click on 'effects', choose 'artistic effects' and then 'posterize'. Choose for four or five layers.
Print the photograph and trace it with a pen and carbon paper on a canvas. Paint the portrait with acrylic paint in greyscale. Paint the background in your choice of colours.

A day at the beach

Made by students of 12 years old

You need:

1. white drawing paper A3 size
2. markers, aquarelle pencils or colour pencils
3. water paint
4. glue
5. coloured paper for background
6. brushes
7. jar with water

I'm going to the beach and I take …… Children draw themselves on a beach towel. On the towel are also the things that they are carrying when they go to the beach: sunblock, an Ipod, a book or magazin, a ball, a can of soda etc. The towel has bright colors and is recognizable for the person on it. Start colouring with the face and body. Use waterpaint or watercolour pencils to be sure to get a good skin colour. Colour the rest of the drawing with colour pencils (press firmly)or markers to make a colourful sunny artwork.

Comic strip hero

You need:

1. picture of a comic hero on A6 size
2. drawing paper A3 size
3. ruler
4. pencil
5. markers or colour pencils
6. scissors and glue
7. coloured paper for background

Ask kids to bring a picture of their favorite comic strip hero. Bring it back or enlarge it to A6 size on a copier. Create a 1 cm on the picture using a ruler and a pencil. Number each square starting across the top from the left corner.

Draw a 2 cm grid on the large drawing sheet. Number in the same fashion all the squares. Begin drawing the line created by the picture in each square. Sometimes it helps to go over the outline of the head with a pencil so you can see the line clearly. As you do this the head will begin to show up as an exact copy of the picture. Finish the drawing this way. Use colour pencils or markers to colour it. Outline everything with a black marker.

All works are made by children of 10-11 years old

Hairstyle

You need:

1. drawing paper A4 size
2. indian ink
3. dip pen
4. drawing board
5. black construction paper

Ask children a day before you want to do this lesson, to do something special with their hair. For girls this might be easy, they can braid their hair, make a ponytail or use accessoires. But boys too can style their hair in different shapes, just using gel! In preparation for this lesson kids have to practice drawing with indian ink and a dip pen.

Children have to draw the back of another child. To organize this, they all have to sit in a row around a big table. On this table you put the indian ink bottles. For children who are lefthanded, place some stools besides them to put on their bottle of ink. See schedule.

Give all students a drawing board, drawing sheet and a dip pen. Tell them to draw the back of the classmate in front of him/her. It is important not to draw a contour line of the head, but make this contour out of as many hairs as you can!

This drawing has to be finished in one lesson, because of the fancy hairstyles! When finished, paste the artworks on a black background. Write with silver marker the artist and the name of the person who's hair is drawn.

All drawings are made by children of 10-11 years old

Marvelous Medusa?

You need:

1. black construction paper A3 size
2. tempera paint in blue, green, black and white
3. brushes
4. jars with water
5. paper towels
6. paper towels and newspapers

Medusa is a woman from Greek mythology. She used to be a beautiful woman. She lived in a country where to her sorrow the sun never shone. Medusa begged goddess Athena to be allowed to move to a sunny region. When this was refused by Athena, Medusa humiliated the goddess. Medusa told everywhere that Athena would not let her go, because otherwise no one would pay attention anymore to the beauty of Athena. In another version of the myth Medusa would have made Athena mad because she kissed Poseidon in Athena's temple. The enraged Athena took revenge by changing Medusa's beautiful hair into a nest of snakes. Atrhena also ensured that everyone who looked at Medusa Medusa would freeze immediately . Finally Medusa is killed and decapitated by Perseus, with help from Athena. From Medusa's blood the winged horse Pegasos and a giant are born. After this Medusa's head is offered by Perseus to Athena. Athena put the head on her shield to freeze her enemies.

This myth is the basis for this drawing lesson: draw Medusa's head with snake hair in cold colours. Every child gets a black sheet and four colours tempera paint: blue, green, black and white. After scetching the head (not too many details) and the snakes, the drawing has to be painted in cool colours. Mixing colours is required. Tell the students how to mix the colours: bright colours are created by mixing a few drops of dark paint into light paint, and not the other way.

All artworks are made by children from 10-11 years old

Beat the wall, like Thierry Noir

You need:

1. white drawing paper A4 size
2. markers
3. black markers, thin and thick
4. pictures of the artwork of Noir

Thierry Noir was born in 1958 in Lyon, France. He came to Berlin in January 1982, attracted by the music of David Bowie and Iggy Pop, who lived in West Berlin at this time. From April 1984, Thierry Noir and Christophe Bouchet started to paint the Berlin Wall. He is an artist at the East Side Gallery. The object was not to embellish the wall but to demystify it. As the years went by, the paintings took on phenomenal proportions, which were rapidly recognized by the international arts community. The paintings of Thierry Noir became a symbol of new found freedom after the reunification of Germany and the end of the cold war.

Typical of Noir are bright coloured profiles, reduced to an icon with a big nose, thick lips and saucer-like eyes.

The East Side Gallery (see photo) is a 1.3 km long section of the wall near the center of Berlin and probably the largest open air gallery in the world. Here you'll find the work of Thierry Noir. After looking at pictures of the work of Thierry Noir, children have to get heads in the style of Noir. hoofden tekenen in de stijl van Noir: profile heads looking to the right or left. The sheet has to be filled completely. Choose three colours marker. Outline everything with a thick black marker. Colour the remaining white parts with another colour or fill the spaces with a pattern in thin marker.

Selfportrait in popart style

By Milan, 12 years old

You need:

1. drawing paper A4 size
2. picture of the child
3. watercolour paint
4. brushes
5. wallpaper
6. coloured paper for background
7. scissors and glue
8. black marker
   

   Print from photograph, made at Dumpr

Make portraits of the children. Go to http://www.dumpr.net/ and click on 'photo to scetch'. Upload the pictures and print a drawing for every child.

Show some drawings in the classroom. How do you recognize the student? What are the most important parts of the face? What lines are important? Every student gets his own drawing. The trace the most important lines in their drawing using a fine black marker. Do not trace details, because after this they have to trace with thick markers. This means: don't trace hairs, just the contours of them. Don't forget facial lines around the mound or nose. When tracing is ready, students take their drawing and a new drawing sheet to a window (or use lightboxes if you have these). Keep the drawing against the window with the white sheet one it and trace the drawing with a pencil. Go back to the table and look carefully at your own portrait. Is it you? Are the lines well? Are the eyes correct?

Take a thick black marker and trace the pencil drawing. Paint the portrait with watercolour paint. Choose the colours you like; in popart every colour is possible!

Paint a background or choose a wallpaper background and paste your cut portrait on it. Paste a coloured background behind it for strength.