Lesson Overview:

Using James Palmersheim's silver creek's November II as a starting point, students will create their own landscape paintings. Students will learn various techniques to create an effective foreground, middleground, and background. Students will also learn how to portray the illusions of depth and reflection in a painting.

Length of Lesson:

Four 45-minute lessons

Instructional Objectives:

Students will:

• use foreground, middleground, and background techniques.
• learn to emphasize reflection in water bodies, such as a creek.
• learn to paint a landscape.
• learn various painting techniques.

Supplies:

• 12" x 18" white paper—medium to heavy weight.
• Tempera and watercolor paints
• 1" flat brushes for wash; watercolor and detail brushes for other applications
• Pencils
• Water, sink, paper towels
• Clean sponges (optional)

Instructional Plan:

Tips

Basic painting skills, wet wash, and knowledge of color mixing are helpful. Students would benefit from previous experience with the concepts of foreground, middle ground, and background. See Vocabulary handout. It would also help if students had been introduced to basic perspective techniques, such as how to create the illusion of depth in a drawing of a creek.

The Process: Motivational Ideas

State the learning objectives and vocabulary words. Write the words on the board for more emphasis. Ask students if they already know the meanings of the words and ask them to give definitions. Discuss as needed.

Science Connections

The Controlling Watercolor pages from Wet Canvas! give a concise, complete overview of watercolor and of wet-on-dry, wet-on-wet, and other techniques. Teachers may wish to replicate the experiments (on page 2 of the section) and use them to begin a discussion of diffusion, dilution and other related concepts. These are especially important in wash techniques, where thin layers of color are used to create depth. Wet Canvas, a site sponspored by Dick Blick Art Materials also hosts a forum where artists can display their watercolors, click through and find appropriate examples for your class.

The lesson Color Burst from ScienceNetLinks explores paper chromatography using colored markers and coffee filters. While this lesson is intended for a grade 3-5 audience, the instructional plan outlines a method by which students of any age can track color dispersion in various solvents.

The Process: Teaching the Lesson

Show the students an example of a landscape by artist, James Palmersheim—although this is a pastel and not a watercolor, it is a great example of background, middle ground, and foreground. The students will paint a landscape with a creek as the main focal point. After making a light sketch, they will use water-base paints to create the sky and background. Then, using watercolor paints and the wet wash technique, they will fill in the middle ground. With tempera paints, they will add foreground objects and details. Finally, they will incorporate the illusions of reflection and depth. You should demonstrate this process before the students begin work.

Teacher Demonstration

1. Gently fold the paper in half horizontally.

2. Unfold it and press flat.

3. Lightly sketch a landscape with a creek starting at the fold and coming forward, down to the bottom of the page, with parallel lines (sides of the creek) farthest apart at the bottom.

4. Continue to lightly fill in shapes to represent the foreground.

5. With a clean sponge or wide brush, paint a thin wash of clean water across the top half of the page.

6. Load your brush with a sky blue hue and make a graded wash from the top down to just above the fold. Add a little color to your brush and paint in hills if you like.

7. Freshen your brush and make a new line of blue on the fold for the top of the creek. Again, make a graded wash downward staying within the creek lines you sketched.

8. While the paper is still damp, switch to mixed greens of tempera and then paint in general areas of trees just above and down to the fold.

9. Immediately but gently fold the paper again, and press the back to transfer the green of the trees onto the damp creek area below to create a soft reflection on the water.

10. Unfold the paper. At this point, you can let the paint dry and finish the details and other areas later or continue.

11. Remember to make background areas neutral (duller colors) and vague in detail. The foreground shapes should be brighter, larger, and placed at the bottom of the page.

12. Review objectives, vocabulary, process, and clean up.

Process: Painting a Creek in a Landscape with Reflections

1. Pass out paper and pencils. Fold the paper in half, on the horizontal. Unfold and press out.

2. Sketch a landscape with a creek that goes from the fold to the bottom of the paper. Include a few trees on and above the fold line, and other shapes to complete the picture.

3. Pass out paints, water brushes, and paper towels. Moisten watercolor pads.

4. Paint top half of picture with sky blue graded wash. Using same or similar color, wet wash in creek space.

5. Change colors and add trees above creek; fold, press, unfold.

6. Complete the rest of the painting.

7. Clean up and allow painting to dry.

Assessment:

Hold a classroon critique, in which students explain how they followed the objectives. Create a matrix for use during the critique. Did each student successfully use foreground, middle ground, and background techniques to paint a landscape? Was there an emphasis on using tempera paint to create a reflection in the creek?

Extensions:

Enrichment

Study other artists who use water-base paint for reflections. Focus on painting that is transparent or translucent. What "messages" do paintings using this technique send compared to those that are opaque? Are there other art forms that are related to watercolor (i.e., impressionistic music, classical guitar, ballet, etc.)? Combine the landscape painting activity with creative writing.

Variations

To simplify the lesson, omit the tempera and just use watercolor. Alternatively, use thinned acrylic paint and compare the results. Use light-colored, torn tissue paper and collage the landscape and creek on white paper painted with thinned white glue. White still damp, add small lines and details with ink or a fine-line, water-base marker. (Use permanent marker on dry collage if you do not want the lines to "bleed".)

Sources:

Print:

• Language Arts lesson #3 from Frame a Story. Wocester, MA: Davis Publications.
• Quiller, S. and B. Whipple Water Media Techniques. New York: Watson-Guphill, 1983.

Authors:

• Boise St. University/ARTSEDGE
  Washington, DC