Third Grade Miro Drawings

 My third graders had a blast with this project! They usually have a very difficult time working on anything that doesn't look "real", which is why I specifically chose Joan Miro as the artist that we were going to study for this project.

We started out by looking at a video that I had found on YouTube http://youtu.be/Fc-SrCJiArs which showed a wide variety of his artwork, but was fairly short (only about 2 minutes).
Before watching the video, I told them that I wanted them to look for the following things:
1) lines that Miro used in his paintings
2) shapes that he used
3) colors that he used
4) are there any recognizable figures in the paintings

When the video was finished, we brainstormed a list for each of these items.


Then I demonstrated how they could use shapes- circle, squares, triangles, ovals and add very basic lines- straight, wavy, curved, zigzag to create an artwork that looked amazingly similar to that of Joan Miro.

I had them practice in their sketchbooks first (for my 2-5th grade students, I usually spend the 1st day of a project planning out what they are going to do in their sketchbooks).

They had to choose if they wanted their project to be warm or cool (they used crayons in their sketchbooks, but oil pastels would be pulled out for the actual project).

For the next class, I pulled out black construction paper. Here's where I learned my lesson! I had a stack of random black construction paper. I also had the beautiful no-fade black construction paper. The projects that were done on the regular construction paper looked very washed out. I would highly recommend using the no-fade paper. It might be a little more expensive, but the end results are so much better!!!

The students then recreated their sketchbook design onto the black paper, using oil pastels in their chosen color scheme.

I pointed out to them that Miro did not color in every shape that he painted, so they left some sections outlined and colored in others.





For the finishing touch, I gave them a little cup of white tempera paint and a paintbrush and they painted a variety of lines onto their paper.

I would change the size of the paintbrush that I give them next time and give them a smaller brush, but other than that, I was very happy with how these turned out.

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