ART START MOOD PAINTING

ART START MOOD PAINTING 1 videocassette... 20 minutes Copyright MCMXCII Rainbow Educational Media 4540 Preslyn Drive Raleigh, NC 27616-3177 Distributed by: United Learning 1560 Sherman Ave., Suite 100 Evanston, IL. 60201 800-323-9084 www.unitedlearning.com www.unitedstreaming.com

TABLE OF CONTENTS Mood Painting Objectives... 1 Required Supplies... 1 Media Activity... 2 Lesson/Project... 3 Instructor Evaluation... 3 Vocabulary... 4 Media Information... 5 Art History... 6 Artist Mentioned In The Video... 7 Extension And Integration Ideas... 9 Script... 11

OBJECTIVES To explore the different effects possible with paint. To gain an understanding of abstract art. To be able to translate a feeling into a visual format. To reinforce each student's viewpoint as valid and as important subject matter. TIME ALLOTMENT Preparation - Cover desks with newspaper 5 min. Video Media Exploration 9 1/2 min. Video Project Explanation 10 min. Set up - Pass out supplies, water into containers, and dispense paint 10 min. Student Media Exploration 5-7 min. Student Project 15-20 min. Cleanup 10 min. TOTAL 65-75 min. If the class watches the video project explanation after they have experimented with the paint exploration, you will have ten minutes in which to collect the wet "experiments". I would wait until the project is explained before passing out clean paper. SUPPLIES PER STUDENT Two sheets of 12" x 18" white construction paper. Paper plate palette with white, red, yellow and blue tempera paint. Cup of water for rinsing brush Paintbrush Sponge Newspaper to cover desk 1

CAUTIONS Ask the students to hold the cup while rinsing their brushes so the water doesn't spill. The rinse water will become colored very quickly. It is not necessary to change it until the consistency changes. The students may ask for help or ask you to do it for them. Discussing the problem and encouraging the students are the most helpful responses. Please do not paint on their papers or alter their work in any way. Pass out the first sheet of paper for the exploration and save the second sheet for the project. MEDIA EXPLORATION AS SEEN ON THE VIDEO Students Are Asked To: Paint an area of color, using any color straight from the pallette. This is the typical tempera consistency or texture. Load the brush with lots of water and paint an area using only the residual color in the brush. This is called a wash and resembles water color paint. Re-paint the first area, using the same color, layering the paint so it is very thick. This is called impasto. Impasto painting is usually done with oil paints because they are thick. Try to paint an area without any visible brushstrokes. Acrylic paints are usually used for this type of color-field painting.

Paint an area as wildly and unevenly as you can - fast and furious. This will create an effect similiar to the spontaneous gestural paintings of the Abstract Expressionist painters. PROJECT This project is to paint a picture of your favorite place by painting only the feeling that this place gives you. What color best describes the feeling? Is it hot or cold? What texture or type of paint best describes it? Is it airy, thin and transparent or rough, thick impasto? Is it smooth or wild? What type of line would best describe the feeling - fast and active or calm and restful? Do not include anything that tells what the place looks like. Use only your feelings about the place. EVALUATION The students are to choose the most appropriate art elements that will convey the feeling their favorite place gives them. No one needs to agree that the feeling is appropriate to the place, only that the student describes the feeling through choice of color, line and texture. I have found that most students are anxious to share their paintings and to let the class guess where the place is. If they are successful in portraying the feelings of their favorite places, they will love their paintings. Paintings can be displayed like banners hung from a cord stretched near the ceiling when wall space is limited. Please make an effort to display all paintings, not just the "best" ones. Any and all student efforts should be encouraged and rewarded and not judged at this point.

VOCABULARY ABSTRACT - In this lesson, abstract means non-representational or non-objective. It is a departure from the natural appearance of something. Students are to be concerned with only the feeling of the subject. COLOR-FIELD - This term generally refers to paintings where the focus is color rather than shape or line. The colorfield painters of the 60's tried eliminating visible brushstrokes to achieve a smooth, hard edged look that did not appear to be man made. This well planned painting was the opposite of the gestural color-field painting of Abstract Expressionism. COOL COLORS - Although there are warm and cool versions of every color, cool colors are generally considered to be blue, green and purple. GROUND - The ground is what you paint (or draw) on. The ground for a fresco is plaster. In Medieval art, the ground was usually a board, now canvas is generally the ground for painting. Our ground for this project is paper. IMPASTO - The application of paint in very thick, often rough, layers. LINE - In this project, the line is the brush stroke which helps determine the action of the painting. Horizontal lines tend to be calm, even, stagnant. Vertical lines have more movement, but are not as dynamic as diagonal lines. OPAQUE - Not reflecting light or allowing light to pass through. A layer of opaque color appears solid, and completely hides what color is underneath it.

SPACE - Space in a painting is the illusion of depth. Renaissance painters created the illusion of "deep space" by showing the background landscape (often viewed through a window) receding into never, never land. In a nonrepresentational piece, space is shown through use of line (type and positioning), color and variation. For instance, space can be defined as calm or agitated by the type and number of lines used. TEXTURE - The texture of a painting is the visual feel of the surface, which is determined by the type of paint and the application. A thin wash will have an airy open fluid feel while a rough impasto seems solid, dense and coarse. TRANSPARENT - An object is transparent if it allows light to pass through it. Transparent paint allows you to see through it to the color or ground underneath it. WARM COLORS - Red, yellow and orange are the colors generally referred to as warm colors. Once again, there are cool versions of these colors just as there are warm versions of green, blue and purple. WASH - A wash refers to a thin layer of paint that is transparent. This technique is employed in water colors and can also be used with acrylic paints. When referring to a thin, transparent layer of color in oil paints, the term used is a glaze. MEDIA INFORMATION TEMPERA - A form of this paint was used by Ancient Greeks. The name tempera comes from the process of tempering powdered pigment with egg yolk and water. It reached a high level of popularity during the Middle Ages

and was the most commonly used technique in Western Art until the Renaissance. Modern tempera, also called poster paint, is known for its flat, velvety surface. WATERCOLOR - This paint consists of finely ground pigments in a water soluble gum (originally gum arabic from the acacia tree). The word watercolor refers to both the paint and the method of painting. It was used by ancient Egyptians as well as the Chinese and Japanese. Watercolors have a thin transparent appearance. OIL PAINTS - During the 16th Century, painters began adding oil to the popular tempera paints, both to increase the variety of effects and to prolong the drying time of the paint. The Van Eycks are credited with perfecting oil painting techniques if not actually discovering them. Glazing, the thin layering of transparent paint was one of the new techniques made possible by adding oil to the paint. During the 19th Century, oil paints were used more directly as opposed to glazing (thin layers). Impasto is the application of very thick paint, an oil painting technique used by Vincent Van Gogh. ART HISTORY /ABSTRACT EXPRESSIONISM The first real American art movement to have impact world wide was Abstract Expressionism. This movement began in the late 1940's in New York. The overall focus of this movement was on the creative process, and the emotional and expressive power of non-objective painting. The Abstract Expressionists believed that art was to be created automatically, spontaneously, and without conscious control.

Because this movement was made up of many different artists working in many different styles, various sub-groups developed. One sub-group of this movement was referred to as action painters, because the hands of the artist were used as a tool to express emotion. Jackson Pollock, one of the best known action painters, dripped paint onto canvasses laid flat on the floor. Other action painters were Willem de Kooning and Franz Kline. A more contemplative sub-group, including Mark Rothko, Clyfford Still, Robert Motherwell and Barnett Newman, relied on color and spatial relationships to express their emotional worlds. ARTISTS MENTIONED IN THE VIDEO Arshile Gorky (1904-1948) "Abstraction allows man to see with his mind what he cannot physically see with his eyes." Arshile Gorky, born in Armenia, came to the United States at age 16 and became a pioneer of the Abstract Expressionist movement. His abstract paintings are considered transitional, because they still contained organic images appearing to have been drawn within the painting. Jackson Pollock (1912-1956) Born in Wyoming, Pollock dropped out of school to go to New York where he enrolled in the Art Student's League. His painting style evolved to the splatter or dripped paintings of 1947-1951. His canvasses were often huge and he

would lay them on the floor and stand on them while painting. His concern with the rhythm of things and continuous action is demonstrated by the lack of a focal point and a beginning or end in his painting. "Painting is self discovery. Every artist paints what he is." Mark Rothko (1903-1970) Born in Russia, Rothko started painting at 22. By the age of 44, he had developed his style of large, floating, soft-edged shapes like rectangles or squares of color. "People who weep before my paintings are having the same emotions I had when I painted them". His paintings are of strong human emotions like tragedy, love, despair, conveyed through the use of vibrant color, not imagery. Robert Mothenvell (1915-1991) "Any art is academic by definition - if you know what the result is going to be before you start." Motherwell was born in Washington and grew up in San Francisco. He received a Doctorate in Philosophy from Harvard after completing his Bachelor and Master degrees at Stanford. Self-taught as an artist and well traveled, he settled in New York in 1940 and became one of the founders of Abstract Expressionism. He continued to change his style throughout the years, working in paint, printmaking, collage and writing a great deal about art. Willem de Kooning (1904 -) De Kooning was born in Holland, came to America when he was 22 and painted portraits and figures for the next 14 years. Although his work was not shown publicly for

another eight years, he was one of the key Abstract Expressionists and exerted great influence on other artists of his time. He went back and forth between abstract and figurative painting during his career and is noted for violent brush strokes and very thick application of paint. Clyfford Still (1904-1980) Clyfford Still started teaching at the California School of Fine Arts in San Francisco in 1946. He was a very private man and did not paint to exhibit his work; he felt that framing of his paintings was intolerable, because a painting should have no real beginning or end. He is best known for his large, often 8" x 10" paintings of dynamic shapes in heavy texture and vibrant colors, often with torn or jagged holes with color coming out from the ground. EXTENSIONS AND INTEGRATION IDEAS Have the students do a second painting of their favorite place, this time using realistic images to show what it looks like. Have the class compare these paintings with the first paintings and decide which they like best and why. Students can illustrate a story with a series of mood paintings or do a mood painting as a background on which to print an original poem. Have the students depict their feelings about an incident through painting. Students can research art from other times and cultures, looking for traits and feelings in the paintings like calmness, serenity, anguish and fear.

How would the class define the time we live in with a mood painting? Fast or slow? Rough or smooth? Discuss illustrations in books being read by the class. How do the artists create a mood? Paint the solar system using warm and cool colors to describe the temperatures of the planets based on their positions relative to the sun. Use paint as an example of a suspension, dye as an example of a solution. FOOD FOR THOUGHT "As soon as I began painting what was in my head, the people around me were shocked." Leonor Fini "The concern of the artist is with the discrepancy between physical fact and psychic effect." Josef Albers "A man paints with his brains, and not with his hands." Michaelangelo "It is only when I lose contact with the painting that the result is a mess. Otherwise there is pure harmony, an easy give and take, and the painting comes out well." Jackson Pollock 10

SCRIPT Open: titles and music. Okay. Today we're going to work on a mood painting. Basically, what we're doing is an abstract piece of art. Okay. Abstract can be really fun. Pablo Picasso, we've talked about him before, he said there is no such thing as abstract art. You must always start with something. Okay. We're going to start with something today. Why don't you set your brush down and close your eyes for a minute? Okay. Close your eyes and imagine that you have been walking. You have been walking for about three or four miles and it's really hot and you're really tired, real thirsty. You're not sure how much further you're going to be able to go. All of a sudden you walk around this corner and there's a pool and it's blue and it's clear and it looks real cool and you just can't wait. You just run over and you dive right in. Okay. What does it feel like? Refreshing. Cool. 11

Cool. Okay. What kind of painting that's behind us would best describe that kind of feeling? The one in the very back. The middle one. The curvy one. The curvy one? Because you're diving in and you're going down under water? I think because it feels refreshing. I'd say that dark-to-light one on that side because, like, you're hot and then it gets cooler You're going down deeper into the water. Yeah. Okay. Let's try another one. Okay. Close your eyes and we'll do one more. This one, you just sat down in this car and it's the front row of a roller-coaster. You're in the front seat. The attendant just puts the little waist bar; clicks it in. You're getting a little bit nervous and it starts to move and you're going up, and you're going up and it's pulling you so you're going back. You're leaning 12

back into the seat and you're going higher and higher. You're getting a little more nervous as you go along. You're getting to the top. You can feel the car start to level out. Seems like you're coming to a stop and all of a sudden you're going forward and you're going down really, really fast. Your hair's blowing. You can't see because the wind's in your eyes. All right. Think about that feeling. Is there a kind of painting up there that would describe how that feels? All the colors. It would feel like all the colors because you're going so fast. Blurred. I say the middle one. And also that drip paint. Because it's just kind of wild and all over the place? Okay. So the type of paint, the way you put the paint down, has a feeling to it. Right? Okay. It doesn't have to be a picture of something to tell you something. All right. Just because you can't see a tree doesn't mean it isn't a feeling or that the painting doesn't have a message. Okay. That's the point of 13

abstraction. There was another artist named Gorky and he said abstraction allowed the mind to see what you can't physically see with your eyes. Okay. So you might not physically be able to see that feeling when you first go down on the roller-coaster but you know what it feels like. Your mind knows what that feels like and an abstract painting can convey that feeling to you. Okay. We're going to start painting today. We're going to come up with some different types of paint and talk about paint. Last time we talked about brushes and the different strokes. Remember to hold on to your water before you rinse your brush. Okay. You don't want any accidents and to have anything spill. Okay. You're all set? All right. Go ahead and start with a color, it doesn't matter what color; and just lay it down the texture that it is here from your pallet. Okay. Just go ahead and put a blotch down. What you're working with is called tempera paint and there's evidence that they used tempera paint back as far as ancient Greece. Ancient Greece; it's very old. It was real popular during the Middle Ages and at that point they mixed it with egg 14

as the binder. It was called egg tempera. All paint is pigment mixed in some sort of solution. Okay. And during the Middle Ages it was mixed with egg. You know how egg gets sticky. Okay. They used that to hold the pigment onto the ground. Your paper, whatever you paint on, is considered a ground. Okay. So this is tempera, just straight here. Now, get your brush really loaded down with water. Okay. Don't get all of the paint out of it. Just get it so it's really dripping wet. Okay. Now, do a splotch with that. This is called a wash. It didn't come out. Okay. Well, you have a little bit so you can still see. This is called a wash. See how you can see through it? That's called transparency. Okay. Water colors are similar to this. Usually you can see through them. They have a lot of techniques that they do with wash. You can also achieve this with oil paints by adding extra oil. That's called a glaze. They did that a lot of times during the Renaissance. There's evidence of water colors back as far as ancient Egypt. And water colors, 15

what they are, is pigment mixed with gum Arabic which is a substance they get from acacia trees We're going to do another one on top of the first one that we did. Okay. Same color and lay it on real thick. Real thick? Real thick. Okay. Real thick. Don't stroke it out very much just really lay it on. Okay. Paint that's real thick like this is called impasto. Okay. Oil paints are very thick. Okay. And we mentioned about how they did glazing with oil paints in the Renaissance. Oil paints came about because painters were using this egg tempera and it dried very quickly. Each time they sat down to paint they would have to mix up a new batch of paints. There were some artists, their last name was Van Eck and they started adding oil to their tempera paints. It made them dry slower. They could paint longer and pretty soon people would just leave out the egg and just mix it in with the oil. So linseed oil and the pigment is what makes up your oil paints. Okay. You can get real thick. Keep building up layers. Okay. If you want to switch colors you can or stay with 16

the same color. We're going to do a new area here. I didn't mix all the blue out and I'm going to add red and see what happens. I want you to try and make it very smooth so you can't see any brush strokes at all. A new area? A new area. A new area. Lay the paint down and try and get it so smooth you can't see any brush strokes so it doesn't even look painted. Does it have to be thick or no? See how thick you'll need it. Okay. Start painting and you'll see how thick you're going to need to put it down. Try and get it as smooth as you can. Like that yellow one back there, right? Yeah. Okay. That yellow is an example of color field painting. Is that what we're doing now? Yeah. You're trying to get as smooth an area as you can. 17

Does that look sort of glazed? Okay. But you can see all the ripples of the paint. Smooth it all out. Okay. That's the idea, Laura. Go ahead and get it as smooth as you can. In the 2Oth century they came up with a new paint called acrylics. And acrylics are very versatile. You can get the effects of water colors, you can get the effects of oils. And acrylics are a pigment that are mixed into a polymer base. They're actually pigment and plastic so they're very durable. Okay. It's hard to get it really smooth isn't it? Uh-huh. Okay. That was one of the points of color field painting that there was no person behind it. It didn't appear to be painted. It was just there. Okay. No brush strokes at all. It's hard. Okay. Yeah, it is hard. That's the reason that color field was in that museum, right? 18

Okay. Now, we're going to do the opposite of trying to make it really smooth. You're going to make it just wild. Okay. Just put it down there, just swish, swish, swish, real fast, furious. Just really get it down there, real wild. Doesn't matter, use what ever color you want. Just loosen up, just go for it. You're getting there. Just real wild. Just keep going. All right. Okay. There was a period of art, and this is actually the first real American art movement. It's called Abstract Expressionism. It took place during the '40s and '50s. There were several different artists involved. They didn't all paint in the same style. Most of the art move ments up until that time everybody was doing essentially the same thing. There were real different styles. They tried to break them into two separate schools. One was called the Action Painters. They were like Jackson Pollock, he did a lot like this drip painting that you saw over here; like where it splattered out. Willem de Kooning did more like this impasto where it's real thick and just 19

like this fast furious stuff. There were other painters that they considered contemplative. They were quiet. They really thought about things more. That would be more like Clyfford Still or Mark Rothko who did just big squares and it was brilliant color. Well, this is more hard edge. That came right after Abstract Expressionism. Okay. The point that all these differ ent styled painters were trying to come across was that they were painting their feelings. They weren't painting nature. They weren't paint ing anything that they saw. They were painting what was inside their heads. Okay. It was their feelings. Okay. And that's what we are going to work on today. All right. So remember the roller-coaster; the feeling as you were just starting to go down? Remember when you dove in the pool? All right. I want you to think about your very favorite place. Okay. Maybe its the beach, maybe it's in the mountains, maybe it's in front of the refrigerator, maybe it's your bed. Now, think about why that's your favorite place. Okay. Why do you 20

like it so much. What does it make you feel like? Maybe it's really fast and furious and it makes you feel really alive and daring or maybe it's really soft and warm and it makes you feel real secure. Okay. Give it some thought for a minute. Think about why it's your very favorite and what it is that you like about that place so much. Okay. There's no right or wrong way to do this. Okay. It's your place and if we put Colleen and Laura on the same roller-coaster their reactions could be very different. Okay. They can have the same experience, be in the same place but their feelings are going to be different. Okay. So there isn't any right or wrong. This is your favorite place; your feeling. Okay. Think about how that place makes you feel. Now think about a color that would best describe that place. Okay. You've heard of warm colors and cool colors. Okay. Warm colors tend to be like yellow and oranges and reds. Cooler colors are considered greens and blues, purples. Okay. That's going to have an effect. Color has some sort of symbolism to it. Okay. Think about the color that would best describe your place. Think about the type of paint like 21

what you've just done here that would best describe the feeling of that place. Okay. Is it going to be a really transparent wash like you could go right through it real easily like if you were on an airplane going through the air and space? Maybe it's real thick and rough. Your place has a lot of texture to it. Maybe like rocks or sand would be thicker. Okay. Maybe it's real smooth. Okay. Think about the type of paint that would best describe it. And think about lines. Okay. Let me show you real quick. A horizontal line tends to be pretty static. It's not a lot of movement. Okay. A vertical line has a little more movement to it but when you start looking at diagonal lines, those have the most. Okay. This seems to have the most action, the most movement. Okay. Remember when we did lines before? A straight line is different than a curve line. Should we do curved lines, too? You are going to do what ever kind of line best describes this place. Can we only use that one or can we use all different kinds of lines? 22

If your place has all different kinds of feelings to it you can use all different kinds of lines. Can we use a lot of different colors? You can use whatever colors best describe your place. If it has a lot of colors to it that's okay. Okay. So you need to think about the texture, the color; the kind of action that's going on. Do you want it really fast and furious or is it real still? Okay. Do you have an idea? Uhhuh. Okay. You're all set. Okay. Let's get you some new paper. Watch out, mines still wet. Okay. Now, remember there's no right or wrong. The point of this is that you're describing your own personal place. Don't put anything - - Can we start? Not just yet. Don't put anything in your painting that's going to describe the place. Okay. If it's at the park don't put in any trees, don't put in 23

any playground equipment. If it's at the beach don't put in waves. Okay, if it's in front of the refrigerator don't put the shelves and the food. Okay. Nothing descriptive. Nothing there that represents something. Not a picture of anything in there. Just lines? Just lines, colors, textures. Okay. You're going to try and describe your place without painting it exactly or representationally. Okay. Does that make sense? Uh-huh. All right. Dive in and give it a try. Remember there's no right or wrong. Just go ahead and go for it. There's an artist named Robert Motherwell and he said all art is academic if you know what the end result is going to be before you start. Okay. Does that mean anything to you? No, not really. Okay. What he's saying is part of art is creation. You want to just come up with something. Let it happen. If you know exactly what it's going to look 24

like before you've started that takes a lot of the fun out of it. Then you're just going through the motions. Okay. So just take the idea of how it feels. The color of the place, the feeling of the place and just paint that. Don't try and picture what the end result is going to be. Just let it happen. Okay. Think about whether it's really calm or if it's real active. Okay. If it's warm or cold, smooth or rough. Yes? At the end are you going to guess what each person's is? Yeah. I think at the end you should all try and guess each other's place. Okay. Think about if your paint should be thick or thin. Okay. Try and fill your whole page. Let the picture cover the whole page. Can I mix my paint on my pallet? Okay. Remember about different brush strokes. Remember about mixing the colors. Okay. Don't think about it too hard. Just let it happen. 25

Okay. I like how you have the color changing as it goes down. It gives you a sense that there's deep and shallow. Okay. Will's is real transparent. It's real clear. Like it's thin; you could get through it easily. Colleen's is warm and Laura's looks like a party. Don't think about it too much. Just go ahead and let it happen. Okay. Look at how Ali and Will are using the same colors but Will's is real thin and Ali's is put on real thick. See how the feeling is real different between these two. They could be the same thing, too. They could be the same thing but you're expressing a different feeling about it. Okay. Cover your whole paper. Make your painting the whole thing. Go upwards more? Yeah. Go ahead, you've got the whole space. Paint it big. See what happens. I'm putting more, like, different layers. 26

Yeah, that's fine. Remember; if there's a part you don't really care for just let it dry and then you can paint over it. I just paint what I feel like. Mine is kind of what it feels like and looks kind of what it feels like. Yeah.That's great. That's what it should be and how it to you can be different to how it feel to anybody That's fine. Okay. It's your very favorite place. Your special place so go ahead and have a real good time. Close: music and credits. 27