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Choosing artist/picture study for YOUNG children
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This year our kids are 2nd grade, K, pre and baby. I would like to start formally doing artist & picture studies this year. Not being an artist or art-history buff myself, how do I choose 3-6 artists to cover this year, where we can make this an inviting, bright subject. There are so many artists whose life story and works themselves show so much darkness and pain. Of course, I don’t need to shelter my kids from this eventually. But for now, at this age, I wanted age-appropriate, happier pieces (and artists, if possible!)! Thanks for ideas on artist names.
I recommend starting with Benjamin West, an early American artist. There is a great book called Benjamin West and His Cat Gamalkin that your 2nd grader and K’er would enjoy. (Yes, I’ve recommended this book here before, lol!)
Another choice would be Audobon. You should be able to easily find picture book biographies about him at the library.
Thanks for the advice. I was sort of hoping actually to have our art choices reflect the time period (at least vaguely) that we’re covering, which is middle ages this year. I think I could find some benign and even Bible-based paintings of Giotto, Boticello, Michelangelo, Rafael?? Thanks for any more feedback, all.
These aren’t in the time period you’re studying since we haven’t studied the Middle Ages yet, but we thoroughly enjoyed these artists this past year with my 6yo and 4yo:
Norman Rockwell
Edgar Degas
Claude Monet
I tried Michelangelo, but too many of his paintings, even the biblically based ones, had a little more nudity than I was comfortable with–especially with such young children.
Hope that gets you started!
Try typing in the artists that you’re considering into the book finder – that will give you an idea of the living books and if they are age appropriate for your children.
The book Glorious Impossible shows Giotto’s paintings of the life of Christ. That might be a possibility.
You know upon pondering your question more I think that your stated goals may not be compatible with each other. I’m definitely not an expert in art history, but from my limited knowledge (and I will gladly accept correction from those more knowledgeable on the subject) I’m not sure that you’ll find a lot of “bright, happy” pieces if you want to stick with the period you’re covering in history. You’ll get more of the bright inviting pieces that you seek starting with the impressionists – Monet, Renoir, Degas, Cassat – all of them have beautiful paintings that my girls especially enjoy. As for the artist’s lives themselves…. well, I can’t think of any of the top of my head – again even more limited knowledge when it comes to biographies – that led especially moral lives – many of the ones that I can remember reading about had lovers – some married, some not, and of both sexes – so apart from you getting specific suggestions of artists whose life stories are appropriate for such young children, I would suggest that you pick artists whose pictures would be appealing to your children and then use Children’s books ( like Katie and the Impressionists or Linnea in Monet’s Garden) to help them develop a love of art without going into some of the more sordid details of the artist’s personal lives.
Rebekah
I second what Rebekah has said–I think you are trying to do too much at once. Kids don’t need everything perfectly coordinated. I agree that the goals of moral lives, happy pictures, AND historically correlated are going to clash big-time and leave you with not much material. I think you are going to have to make one of these goals your primary one, and then find ways to deal with the imperfections. You are just going to need to choose your pictures carefully. MOST famous painters painted nudes. You can’t rule out painters on that basis. You can certainly choose their non-nude paintings to study, but if you are going to eliminate painters that painted nudes, you are going to be left with nearly nothing. I’m not completely sure what a “happy” picture is, I guess, although I can certainly think of some “unhappy” ones. I never tried to choose on that basis.
If your children honestly are not yet ready for studying a painter, perhaps you’d just like to choose a few paintings you like, regardless of who painted them or what historical period they are from.
I’m going to agree with Rebekah and Bookworm. It would be convenient sometimes to be able to coordinate whatever time period we’re studying with artists, poets, composers, literature, etc. but then we’d be using the Unit Study approach to homeschooling rather than Charlotte Mason. For the most part, I think picture study is meant to familiarize the children with art, regardless of what time period it’s from. We’re about to begin Module 1 (Ancient Egypt), and it would be completely impossible for me to choose composers and artists from that time period because there were none!
Children can make the connection in their mind (especially if you are using a Book of Centuries) that Monet didn’t live during the Middle Ages, and still enjoy his paintings. I will second Rebekah’s book suggestions of Linnea in Monet’s Garden and Katie and the Impressionists. We read both of those last year and enjoyed them tremendously. It was a great way for my children to connect more with Monet’s paintings. Linnea in Monet’s Garden gives some brief biographical information, but it doesn’t go into lifestyle, bad choices, etc. Another book we enjoyed was The Magical Garden of Claude Monet.
Just remember that picture study is supposed to be one of the “fun” subjects! Don’t feel pressured to follow a certain time period or curriculum or even the curriculum guide on this site. You get to choose which artist and which paintings to study. It is great to want to only show your children the “bright and happy” pictures, but I think it’s also good to show them the darker, less happy ones too. That gives them a broad exposure to all different types of art; even individual artists had their happier and less happy paintings. Even Claude Monet, whose paintings are usually bright, colorful, and serene, painted a portrait of his wife on her death bed. The colors are mostly gray and brown, and it’s a very dismal painting. But, it that one picture can tell us exactly how he was feeling at the time of her death, and there’s probably not a book around that has his feelings recorded. That’s what makes art living and interesting.
Of course, you can choose paintings with nudity at your own discretion. For the time being, we have opted out of those paintings. Just thought I’d add that…
Sorry to ramble on. I do hope we are all helping you!
Thanks so much for your honest feedback, everyone! I really appreciate it. Gave/gives me a lot to mull over. Now – one more question . . . where do you all buy nice size prints in order to study a picture over the course of a few weeks? Or, do you just use books of works by the artist, such as the books on the SCM bookfinder? I know Dover publications sells sets of prints, but wondered if you know of other affordable places that may have artists not included on Dover’s site. THAnks again, appreciate you ladies . . .
One thing noone has mentioned so far is the wonderful series of childrens’ art books by Lucy Micklethwait; they are a perfect intro to picture/artist study for younger children. I have the first one, titled A Child’s Book of Art: Great Pictures First Words. I think the next 2 are called Come Look with Me (with 2 diff. subtitles.) Mine has artists/paintings from all time periods, etc, arranged by topics kids are familiar with: “The Family”, “Pets”, “The Seasons”, “A Time to Eat,” etc. All paintings list the title, artist and year. . .skimming thru just now, I do see a handful of Mid-Ages examples that aren’t “dark” or “painful.” (Although I do agree with the others that I probably wouldn’t make hist. period my first criteria.) These book(s) would provide you with a great jumping-off point, from which you and your children could choose some favorite artists to pursue!
I think those books (Come Look with Me) are in the bookfinder under art, but I could be wrong. I ordered 1 or 2 of them from Rainbow Resource to introduce my kids (and myself) to picture study. They also have the Getting to Know the Greatest Artists series by Mike Venezia (sp?), which look promising for young children or beginners like me.
They have Katy and the Impressionists and other books with the same character at Rainbow Resource for $5-6.00. Our library didn’t have any of those and I didn’t want to do ILL for them so I ordered from RR.
HTH. This is our first year (starting tomorrow) with full CM subjects/methods, so needless to say, I’m excited and concerned that I’m not quite as ready as I had hoped by this point. But, I plan to start tomorrow and we’ll work it out as the we get further into our week. We probably have more than enough books/supplies than we need when we get started, we’ll see.
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