Colour My World #5 - Inspired by Matisse

To further into complementary colours, Water group looked at how Henri Matisse used complementary colours. I showed the children the stained glass of Chapelle du Rosaire de Vence. They were immediately drawn to the blue, green and yellow patterns. We studied how Matisse presented nature through these 3 colours: yellow for the sun, green for vegetation and cactus forms, and blue for the sea. Next I showed the children The Parakeet and the Mermaid. They loved the colours because it made the painting danced. Inspired by Matisse's artwork, the children demonstrated their perspective of nature with their own cut-out designs.

Colour My World #4: Colour Magic!

After all the colour mixings, the Water group took a closer look at the colour wheel and learned about complementary colours (colours opposite one another). We read the book Mouse Magic by Ellen Stoll Walsh. In the book there's a Wizard who knows how to make colours jiggle and shake. And just like Kit, the mouse, the children tried to make the colours jump around by placing any two complementary colours together. 

Friday Art: Inspiration from Paul Gaugin

AJ: The sky is blue, the ground is blue
and the rocks are red!

Lucas: I'm painting orange rain.

From the children's idea of what their wonderful would look like, I introduced Paul Gaugin (GO-GAN), a French Post-Impressionist artist from 1848-1903, to them. I explained that just like their use of different colours for things in nature, Gaugin loved using unusual colours in his paintings of everyday things, people, and nature.

Sophie: I have yellow sky and dirt.

Then the children experimented with unusual colours in their landscape painting.