Matisse at MoMA Makes a Great Trip and Project!

A new exhibit of Henri Mattise's work at  New York City's Museum of Modern Art (MoMA) is just the thing to inspire young artists. During the last years of his life, Mattise moved away from painting and created a series of stunning cut-outs, which are now on display. These works of art were made using only white paper, a type of paint called gouache, scissors, and pins or glue. The resulting images are similar in style to many of his paintings, but their effect is more dynamic and three-dimensional, thanks to the layered paper. 

Matisse is a particularly accessible artist for young people. He favored bright colors and simple shapes that lend themselves easily to experimentation. Exquisitely detailed pieces, like oil paintings by da Vinci or Rembrandt, are fun to look at but can be intimidating. Even very young children will enjoy looking at Mattise's colorful paintings and cut-outs, however. As you walk through the exhibit, encourage kids to describe the kinds of emotions they think Matisse may have been feeling as he created the different pieces. Ask them to pick a favorite and to explain why they like it best. Challenge them to consider how certain pieces would feel different if he'd used different colors or shapes. Ask whether they like Matisse and why they think others enjoy Matisse so much.

The exhibit began earlier this month and runs through February 8, 2015. Timed tickets are required for non-members of the MoMA. Visit the exhibit's website for detailed information.

To take the fun one step farther, invite children to make their own cut-outs. Young artists may enjoy watching a short video of Matisse working on a cut-out. Then they can try to replicate one of Matisse's pieces or invent their own. Colored construction paper could be used, but for a more authentic experience begin by painting rectangles of white paper in solid colors. Invite kids to experiment with paint application; visible brushstrokes can add exciting texture to the finished piece. Painted papers should be weighted as they dry so that they don't curl. Once they're dry, kids can cut shapes and arrange them on white paper. Some of Matisse's cut-outs are shaped like plants, animals, and people, while others are simply abstract shapes; kids should experiment with both! Once he was happy with his arrangement, Matisse used either sewing pins or dabs of glue to fasten the shapes in place. If you use glue, be sure not to anchor the shapes down too firmly. Part of the fun of cut-outs is seeing the different layers.

Memory of Oceania - Henri Matisse - created 1952-53

For more information on the technique and on Matisse himself, check out the MoMA's wonderful online resources .

Pitch Painter App Introduces Kids to Musical Composition

Painting and playing music may seem, at best, to be loosely related to each other. They’re both forms of art, of course, but is there really more to it than that? Composer and so-called Godfather of Electronic Music Morton Subotnick thinks there is. Subotnick is a classically trained musician turned rogue. He catapulted into fame with his revolutionary album Silver Apples on the Moon in 1968 (now on CD) and has been pushing barriers, entertaining presidential families, and winning awards ever since. Most recently, he's developed an app that can introduce children to musical composition in a characteristically fresh, innovative way.

Morton Subotnick (source)

Pitch Painter is Subotnick’s latest effort to put electronic music-making tools in the hands of the young. Subotnick says the idea of recording, as opposed to live performance, has always appealed to him. He likes the idea of being like a painter, who gets to look at a piece and perfect it before sharing it, knowing that viewers will see is just what he wanted them to see. With electronic music, Subotnick had that ability. Now, with Pitch Painter, children between the ages of 3 and 5 can have it, too.

Pitch Painter is a simple app that allows children to experiment with sound and musical composition with a few taps of a finger. First, a child chooses from a variety of familiar and exotic musical instruments. Next, the child “paints” on the screen with a finger, perhaps sticking with just one instrument or maybe adding a few more. At any time, she can play back what she’s painted. A long, straight line down the middle of the screen will result in a single, mid-register note held for a long time. Upward swoops will lead to higher-pitched sounds. Single dots will be played as individual notes. Each instrument shows up on the canvas as a different color, so children can layer them, listen to the resulting piece, then go back and make changes.

The app, Subotnick confesses, won’t make symphonies. But it introduces young children to music in the same way that playing with building blocks introduces kids to engineering. Pitch Painter is available through the iTunes store for $3.99.

Art to Support Learning

Students generally relish the chance to create art. They love the opportunity to express themselves and enjoy experimenting with different media. Fitting art into an already full school day, alas, can be a challenge. But according to Mariale Hardiman, co-founder and director of the Neuro-Education Initiative at Johns Hopkins’ School of Education, choosing between art and core instruction may not be necessary; it seems the two can support each other quite well. Her research has found that the use of arts in the classroom does more than make students happy: it can improve their retention of information.

LWT Gunnersbury Triangle

In a simple, elegant experiment, Hardiman compared groups of students who simply learned facts about history with groups who learned history with an art component. For example, students might draw a picture to illustrate historical events, put historical facts into songs, or write creatively about historical information. After learning, both groups of students were tested, and initially there weren't any differences between their scores. But when the students were tested again three months later, the arts group demonstrated much better retention than the control group.

We think incorporating the arts into learning wherever possible is a great idea, and not just because it seems to promote better memory for facts. Adding an art component to classroom work allows artistic kids to shine in a way that they sometimes can’t in a purely academic setting, building self-esteem. And, of course, art encourages children to be creative, flexible thinkers and to experiment with symbolism and abstract concepts.

Want to provide opportunities for your students to pair art with curriculum? Here are some ideas:


Creative Writing








Poetry

Ask students to write a poem about what they’re learning. Use models and get creative. Show kids some limericks and ask them to write their own about a character in a novel. Rewrite one of Shakespeare’s sonnets to become an ode to a plant cell, a planet, or the Constitution.

Letters

Challenge students to take on the role of a historical figure or a fictional character and ask them to write a letter (or an email) to another figure or character. This isn't a new idea, but it can become really fun when kids are given unexpected roles. A student could write a letter to a cloud from the perspective of a plant who is hungry and needs exposure to sunlight so it can use photosynthesis, for example. Students struggling with algebra? Have fun with tricky concepts such as like terms by asking students to write a love letter from the perspective of 2x explaining why s/he adores 5x but has no interest in mixing with 6y.

Short Stories

Creating fictionalized accounts can make academics come alive. Challenge kids to write a story about the experiences of an oxygen molecule who is breathed in, circulated through a body, then breathed out. Ask kids to imagine that they are Louis XIV’s footman or Genghis Khan’s horse. What would they hear and see in these roles?


Visual Art








Comic Strip

Ask students to tell a story (the plot of a novel, the series of events during an important time in history, the transition of water from a solid to a liquid to a gas) frame by frame.

Cause-Effect Panels

For students struggling with causes and effects, illustrating the relationship can be very helpful. Set the stage for cause-effect panels by asking students to fold a sheet of paper in half. On the left side, they can illustrate the cause, and on the right, they can draw the effect or effects. If a student is studying the effect of temperature changes on matter, for example, he can draw a picture of a thermometer with rising mercury on the left, and molecules bouncing into each other with frantic arrows between on the right. Sometimes, students may need to divide the right side of the paper to show several effects. For example, The Stamp Act caused the colonists to both boycott British goods and to form the Sons of Liberty, so a cause-effect panel illustrating that relationship would have two parts to its effect side. This activity can be enriched by assigning a short piece of writing to describe the cause-effect relationship shown, or by asking a student to explain their work orally.

Diagrams

Need to learn about the anatomy of the heart or the difference between Doric, Ionic, and Corinthian columns? Sometimes the best way to commit lots of small details to memory is to draw them. Ask students to draw and label their own diagrams showing the details of these complicated concepts. Color-coding can make diagrams even more valuable; perhaps students could color the pathways of blood into the heart in blue and the pathways out of the heart in red, or shade the columns’ similarities in yellow and their differences in green.


Performance Art








Music

Really talented musicians will love the opportunity to come up with their own songs about academic topics. For students who don’t play music or write songs, challenge them to rewrite songs they know so that they lyrics are about an academic topic they are studying, like the events in a novel, the Bill of Rights, or the order of operations.

Skits

Challenge kids to write and perform short skits that illustrate important events and concepts. Perhaps they could perform a short dialogue between nobles as they discuss the merits and potential risks of presenting King John with the Magna Carta. Have students act out word problems to help them visualize the situations being described. Assign students the roles of different elements and ask them to come up with a skit about what would happen if some of them ran into others at an element party or on a bus; what reactions would occur? What would passers-by notice?

Staged Debates

Comparing and contrasting the ideologies of historical figures, the concepts of different geometric shapes, or the arrangement of plant and animal cells? Give pairs of students opposing roles and ask them to generate some arguments about why their perspective is superior to that of their opponent. Costumes can bring this idea to life!

Icon credits: Itzik Gur (paint, music); Design Contest (pencil).

Building Critical Thinking and Content Knowledge with Art

In a recent article in The Journal of Adolescent and Adult Literacy, author Arlene Lundmark Barry describes the walls of an art museum as “vertically displayed, exploded textbooks.” Indeed, most museums are strangely similar to textbooks: there are images accompanied by captions (though some of the images might be three-dimensional artifacts), and longer pieces of text (found on the wall instead of on the page) to help viewers place the art or artifacts into a context.

As far as most students are concerned, a trip to a museum is unquestionably preferable to reading an assigned textbook or novel. Teachers and families can turn museums into fertile ground for critical thought. Museums are not only fun places to visit, they can inspire students to think deeply across the content areas.

Below are some examples of questions to get students’ minds working across a variety of themes and content areas.

Example Questions

Making Inferences

• How did the artist feel about his subject? How can you tell?

Literature

• What do you think has just happened in this painting? What will happen next?
• What was the artist trying to communicate by exaggerating/downplaying this part of the sculpture?
• Describe the emotional atmosphere/climate/culture/time period associated with this setting. How can you tell? When/where do you think this was created?
• Does this artist’s portrayal of (Juliet, the Lady of Shalott, King Arthur, Saint Peter, etc.) match your mental image of him/her? What’s the same/different? Do you like this portrayal? Why or why not?
• Find a piece of art that reminds you of a theme in a book, story, or poem you’ve read.

Writing

• Imagine you are one of the people in this painting. Write a letter to another person in the painting, or write a diary entry about the event shown .
• Imagine that the city council has proposed painting a mural of this image on a wall as a statement (of anti-violence, in support of education for all, about the importance of natural conservation, etc.). Do you think this image is a good choice? Write an argumentative essay explaining your opinion.
• Write a poem/short story that uses words to convey the message the artist wanted to convey visually with this piece of art.

Science

• This painting shows a doctor treating a patient during the artist’s time. Is this a sound treatment? How does your knowledge of biology and the human body inform your response to this treatment?
• Explain why so many sculptors chose to use marble/bronze. What are the pros and cons of working with this material?

Math

• How is fractal geometry used in this image of waves? Can you find other fractals in the museum, or recall any you have seen in the world elsewhere?
• Explain mathematically why the stone arch in that painting was a better architectural choice than a rectangular opening. Can you think of an even better design?

History

• What does this image tell us about transportation during this era?
• Using what you know about Spain during this period, how might the church and the king have influenced the way the artist painted this picture?
• List some differences between medieval and Renaissance paintings. How did the different ideologies of these periods shape these different presentations?

Photo: John Picken via Flickr Creative Commons