Art at Hosmer: Arts Around the World: French Impressionist Paintings Inspired by Monet

Friday, March 16, 2018

Arts Around the World: French Impressionist Paintings Inspired by Monet

The third country on our Arts Around the World journey this year is France. We began by learning a few facts about the country, like the capital city of Paris, and we also learned about the French artist, Claude Monet. Claude Monet was born in 1840 in Paris. Monet began the Impressionist art movement.

Impressionism is a style of painting that began in France in the early 1860s when artists started painting pictures outside instead of in their studios. This was called 'en plein air' (which is French for open air). Impressionist artists, like Monet, wanted to capture a moment in time and the light and color of the moment, more than the details of objects.

Claude Monet, Impression, Sunrise (1872)

Monet enjoyed painting the same places over and over, to capture differences in light and color. Because the light conditions kept changing, he had to work very quickly, using quick, gestural brushstrokes of paint.

Claude Monet, Bridge Over a Pond of Waterlilies (1899)

We looked at some examples of Monet's paintings and discussed the differences between a few versions of his garden bridge and waterlilies paintings. We then drew our own version of a bridge, using oil pastels, and waterlilies underneath it.

We just used oil pastel, instead of starting with pencil, to keep things loose and students thought about creating the impression of waterlilies and floating lily pads, rather than drawing each petal in detail.

The following class we added watercolor paint to our oil pastel drawings. The oil pastel bridge and water lilies could still be seen through the watercolor paint which demonstrates resist, an effect students have learned previously. Students also learned about a watercolor technique called wet-on-wet, which involves painting the paper with water first and then dropping or painting with watercolor on top. The watercolor blooms or spreads because the paper is already wet which creates a blurry effect. Students enjoyed experimenting with this technique, and many found its effect "magical"!

Students also experimented with another watercolor technique: using salt sprinkled on top of the wet paint. The salt absorbs the color from the paint, creating a white spot underneath as it dries and making a interesting texture. Students enjoyed combining some of the watercolor techniques they learned about during this project. After our artwork dried, the salt was brushed off and students were excited to see the effects of the salt, as well as the wet-on-wet.

We shared our finished work with each other through a gallery walk, noticing everyone's use of the watercolor techniques and how the paint had dried. We also read a fun book about Monet, by Mike Venezia, which is part of his Getting to Know the World's Greatest Artists series. Below are examples of our Monet inspired garden bridge and waterlilies artworks: