Templeton Elementary School Art Literacy
Program
Paul Klee (pronounced “clay”) was born in Switzerland in
1879, and he lived until 1940. He made
artworks in many media, and had a very individual, playful style. Paul Klee had a
natural talent for drawing, and over his life as an artist, he mastered how to
use black and white tones, and also became an expert in color theory, which is how
to combine colors. He usually made small
works of art, and they often show a very fragile quality that some people see
as child-like.
(Show Exhibit 1 page)
Tale a la
Hoffmann, 1921
"In Engelshut" (In the Angel's Care) 1931
Senesio,
1922
Klee’s work is always
considered modern, but people have not been able to fit it neatly into one
certain style or another. He generally
worked on his own, away from other artists of the time, and interpreted new art
trends in his own way. He was inventive in his methods and technique. Klee
worked in many different media, and often combined them into one work. He used
fabrics, cardboard, metal foils, wallpaper, and newsprint, combined with
pastel, watercolor, oil paint, ink and tempera.
Paul Klee was not a terribly good student in school, and liked
to draw in his school books. But he was
always a great reader, and loved art and music. He was a very talented violinist, and he played
violin in an orchestra until his art career got too busy for him to continue. His parents had wanted him to become a
musician, but he got more interested in visual art and by age 16 showed a great
talent for drawing. He went to art
school in Switzerland, then went on to study art in Italy. He had trouble using color, and felt like
painting was too hard for him, so the first part of his art career he had more
success with black and white drawings, etchings, and graphic
illustrations. He came to be known for
his sense of humor, and his playful drawings and paintings. (Show Exhibit 2 and 4 pages.)
Paul Klee liked to do drawings and paintings of fanciful animals,
and here are some of those works.
Bird Garden
The
Friendship
Fish Magic
In 1914 Klee visited North Africa and was very impressed by the
bright light and colors there. It was a
real breakthrough for him as an artist, and he said, “Color has taken
possession of me; no longer do I have to chase after it, I know that it has
hold of me forever... Color and I are one. I am a painter.” After that, Klee began to paint many works
with colored rectangles in them, which art scholars compare to musical
notes. Klee combined his colored
rectangles in harmonious ways, much as a composer creates harmony by arranging
musical notes. (Show Exhibit 3 page.)
May
Picture
Red
/ Green Architecture
Die
Vase, 1938
Insula
Dulcamara, 1938
Paul Klee taught at the Bauhaus, a famous art and design school
in Germany, for ten years.
Today we
will be making watercolor drawings of animals in the style of Paul Klee.
Templeton Elementary
School Art Literacy Program
Paul Klee – Watercolor Drawings of
Animals
Getting
ready
The tools
should be waiting on the Art Lit carts, in the storage closet of the Maker
Space room. You can either reserve the
Maker Space room to use during your lesson, or you can take a cart to the
classroom. (If
you take a cart to a classroom, you need to take an old drying rack with you
too.) Some supplies will need to be taken from the
storage room and added to the cart. These
are the supplies you will need:
These should be on the cart:
Project folder
Black colored pencils
Paint brushes, Water jars, Plastic
palettes
Liquid watercolor paints in squeeze
bottles
Plastic placemats
Bucket with sponge for cleaning up
spills
(If the squeeze bottles of
watercolor get low, they can be refilled with the bottles of paint on the shelf
that is to the left of the storage area door.
BUT THEY NEED TO BE DILUTED! Use 4
parts water to each part watercolor paint.)
This will be on the third cart in the closet, for you to take for your
class:
1 stack of watercolor paper (It’s
good, expensive paper, so don’t waste it, and bring back leftovers.)
Give each kid a placemat, a black
colored pencil, a sheet of watercolor paper, and a paintbrush. Hand out paper towels from the classroom if
possible, one per kid. Fill jars with
water and put them out for every 2-4 kids.
Whatever works. Pre-fill the
palettes with watercolor paint before the lesson, but don’t hand them out yet,
unless you have older students who can handle it. Don’t fill them too high or they’ll spill
easily. They can be shared by at least
two kids. If kids need more of a certain
color while they are working, please give them more.
The
Project
(Things
you might want to say to the kids are in purple.) Try to think of questions to ask the kids as you go
along. Present Paul Klee’s work to the
kids, then show them the samples of our project. Put
Exhibits 2 and 4 on the overhead projector and leave them up for the kids to
see as they work.
Today
we are going to create drawings of animals with pencil and watercolor. We are going to try to think about the style
Paul Klee used to draw his animals. He
often used black outlines, then filled in his backgrounds and characters with
color.
First
thing to do – put your name and your teacher’s name on the back of your paper
in pencil.
Before
you start painting, think about what sort of animals you want to draw, and what
the animals will be doing in the scene.
Where are they? What is around
them? Start by drawing the picture with
black pencil. We’ll use paint to color
and fill in areas after the drawing is done.
Once the paper is wet, the pencils won’t work very well, so try to do
all the pencil before you start the painting.
Remember
to give your characters a background.
Paul Klee often used colored geometric shapes as his background. Think about what you want to do.
When kids
are ready for paint, hand out the palettes of paint. Supervise, clean up spills, and get more
paint as needed.
Give the
kids a 5-minute warning to finish up their pictures.
Afterwards
/ Clean up
Put
paintings into a drying rack. (If dry
paintings are already there, empty the rack into a folder.) Collect the pencils. Collect the brushes and wash them. Dump unused watercolor into the sink and
rinse the palettes clean. Rinse the
water jars. Wipe tables and placemats with the sponge.
Put any
leftover watercolor paper in the box of paper to re-use on the third cart in
the closet.
Thank you! Laura Cox January 2020
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