Gardens and Landscapes

We've been getting in the summer spirit with gardens and landscapes at Sonora!

First and second grade did a cross-curriculum unit on the garden. We mixed some science and literacy into art! 
We went outside and learned how to plant some radish seeds, and all the different parts of a plant. 
We then got to read a story about a little girl that imagines growing all sorts of odd things in her own garden like chocolate bunnies, seashells and jelly beans! 

We imagined what we'd grow in our own gardens and made a garden painting with patterned flowers, and our own imaginative plants. 
Their artworks turned out great!

Fredrick Edwin Church, The Heart of the Andes, 1859 

Student work in progress

Our 3rd, 4th, and 5th graders looked at 19th century landscape artist Fredwick Edwin Church for inspiration for a drawing study. They started by doing a writing exercise about what they saw in the painting, thinking like an artist traveling through new, unexplored territory. They sketched, outlined, then used watercolor crayons to color in the style of the Fauv artists. The Fauv artists didn't want to use the natural colors- instead they used bright, primary colors for their landscapes.

Painting by artist, Derain. Example of Fauvism that students looked at to start adding color

The students really embraced the freedom of color, and their paintings turned out so vibrant and wonderful for it!