Curated OER
A Sign of Their Times
Students identify the social climate that created the terms Degenerative Art and Fascist Aesthetic. They also identify how and why certain artists' artwork fell into these categories. Students recognize and discuss the Expressionist...
Curated OER
Lesson: Elizabeth Peyton: Pictures of Royalty: The Imagined
Elizabeth Peyton is an artist who creates images of people (often famous) that she doesn't personally know. These images become part of her imagined community. Learners analyze her work, her community of imagined friends, and then create...
National Portrait Gallery (UK)
Explore Elizabeth I
Keen observation skills are an essential trait for good artists. Discuss the elements of a portrait with your class using terminology such as, full-face, profile, quarter-length, full-length. After that, they can use the included...
Curated OER
About Faces and Fractions
Third graders review concepts of fractions, and one-half. They discuss self portraits and the relationships of eyes, nose and mouth to the whole face. Students create base-line self-portraits. On the second day, 3rd graders observe and...
Curated OER
Patti Smith: Dream of Life
How do artists affect and how are artists affected by the time periods in which they live? Learners examine the life and work of controversial and influential cultural artist Patti Smith as they seek answers to this essential question....
Curated OER
Writing About Art: Comparing Portraits
Students write a composition comparing and contrasting two portraits. In this comparing and contrasting lesson, students will observe two portraits and compare them through their writing. They then will write a letter to the artists...
Curated OER
Gilbert Stuart and Presdidential Portraits
Students read passages about the context of paintings for artist Gilbert Stuart. In this art history lesson, students study paintings by artist Gilbert Stuart and learn about the context of his art. Students then complete a presidential...
Curated OER
Portraits of Courage
Seventh graders define courage and illustrate it in a portrait art medium. In this courage and art instructional activity, 7th graders discuss courage and identify a person who represents its meaning. Students then bring in a visual...
Curated OER
Digital Self Portraits
Pupils use digital cameras and computers to create their own self-portrait. After taking their picture, they download the image and use brush and shape tools, colors and the elements of design to create a distorted portrait of...
Curated OER
Family Portraits
Students view and discuss realistic family portraits and respond to them by creating abstract art work, form and draw imaginative still life, prepare story about their family history or history of family in community, and write...
Curated OER
Visual Arts - Portraits and Paintings
First graders examine portraits and paintings. They create their own self-portrait.
Curated OER
Human Abstraction
Students explore and compare abstraction of human forms in various ancient cultures and by creating self-portraits using geometric shapes. They identify which geometric shapes form the following features: face, nose, arms, torso, legs,...
Curated OER
Creating Realistic Faces
Students explain that, in order to create realistic faces, artists study live models, use mathematics to explain correct proportion, and practice by making sketches. They create a self-portrait using these principles.
Curated OER
Reading Into Rabbit
Eighth graders explore the art pieces found in the Missoula Art Museum. In this lesson, 8th graders select two pieces of art from the coyote section by going to the Missoula Art Museum website, and then create a collage portrait from...
Curated OER
Looking at Portraits: Looking at One's Self
Students examine Charles-Antoine Coypel's Self-Portrait and explain what he shows in this work.
Dick Blick Art Materials
Pop Art Clay Portraits
Create the classic Andy Warhol mass-produced image using clay slabs. Explore the pop art movement using image transfer techniques. This project incorporates art history as well as multiple clay tools. The finished product is an...
Sargent Art
Warhol-like Color Study
The lithographs of pop artist Andy Warhol inspire a lesson that asks young artists to try their hand at creating a study that demonstrates the effect color has on design. After drawing a self-portrait, participants paint their image in...
J. Paul Getty Trust
Expressing Emotions through Art Lesson 1—Everyone Shows They Care
In a instructional activity that explores art and emotions, scholars analyze a piece of art and discuss which emotions it portrays. They go on to reflect on their own emotions and how they are similar to the feelings expressed...
Curated OER
Writing about Art:Comparing Portraits
Young scholars compare and contrast an academic and Impressionist portrait. In this art history lesson, students look at two different styles of painting and write a paragraph as if they are the subject in the painting. They compare and...
Curated OER
So, So Surreal Self-Portraits
Students take virtual trip back in time to 1924 when a Dada manifesto sparked the Surrealist movement in Europe and the United States. They explore about the history of Surrealism and visit online galleries of notable artists of the past...
Curated OER
"ART ZOO 'Blacks in the Westward Movement', 'What Can You Do with a Portrait', and 'Of Beetles, Worms, and Leaves of Grass'"
Students study black history, examine portraits and portrait making and create their own portraits, and investigate their natural environment. This humanities instructional activity provides a text that can be used to teach lessons in...
Curated OER
Portrait Sculptures
Eighth graders study Marisol's art work by comparing ad contrasting several sculptures. They create a 3-D portrait of a person they either know personally, or to portray a social issue. The sculpture be made of a cardboard structure they...
Curated OER
Double Self Portrait
Students meet an artist who overcame learning and physical disabilities and became a successful artist. They use a digital camera to imitate the style of one artist; and explore the connection between the use of technology and art.
Curated OER
Portrait Analysis of Lincoln in Richmond, VA
Students view and analyze a portrait of Abraham Lincoln made during his visit to Richmond, Va. Students determine the historical significance of his visit and create fictional newspaper accounts from various perspectives.