Sunday, December 27, 2015

grid painting

I really like introducing children to grid drawing/painting.

I think it is really important to show them ways to conquer visual challenges when things seem impossible.

So during the holidays, I handed a very big visual challenge to a couple of 10 year old students in my class.  I asked them to create an acrylic portrait painting of Santa Claus on canvas.

The girls divided their canvas and the reference picture into proportional squares.

I asked them to treat each square as an individual painting and not to think about or worry about the adjoining squares.

I even encouraged them to skip around the canvas and paint random squares.


If the project seemed too daunting, I suggested they gain their confidence by finding an "easy" square to paint-like one of the squares that was just red for example.


It was quite interesting to watch their confidence grow as they learned to trust the process of grid painting. Unbeknownst to me, one of the girls was not keen on continuing the painting after the first class but her mother encouraged her to keep going and to just try her best. 

By the end of the second class the young artist announced she didn't want her mother to see what she was doing, as she wanted to give her the painting for Christmas, letting both me and her mother know that her opinion of the project had done a 360 as her confidence bloomed with each square she completed.

10 year old

When completed, each girl had the opportunity to go back over the entire painting and touch up and meld any squares they felt needed work.

10 year old

What breathtaking work they created using the grid system. What a great life lesson in learning nothing is impossible when broken down into simple steps.

And what lovely holiday paintings their families will have to display for many years.  

They were both so proud of their work when finished not only because they thought their paintings looked great, but more importantly because they had worked hard and not given up on something that originally seemed hard.

I am so proud of both of them and what they accomplished.





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