Lesson 19 - Still Life on Canvas - Cezanne

Today we looked at the work of Paul Cezanne, (1839). Cezanne loved to paint still life. The French countryside where he grew up was the subject of most of his paintings. He also adored to paint bowls of fruit and used many bold colors in his paintings.

For this exercise the children were encouraged to paint their own version of a still life. Various fruit was brought in (apple, orange, a squash, and a fall leaf), and set up on a chair with a green and blue background.  We talked about the different colors of the fruit and what to paint first. We learned that the background is the easiest portion to paint first, because you can paint the fruit over it when it dries.  The children were encouraged to use the watercolor sponge technique we used in our “resist” lesson, to quickly paint an easy background. Then we dried each canvas by using a hair dryer.  When the canvas had dried, the children were encouraged to draw the fruit freehand if possible. If it was difficult to draw freehand, there were pre-cut stencils in the shape of the different fruit they were able to trace. Next the children were encouraged to paint the fruit using watercolor or watercolor pencils.

Many of the artists concentrated on the color palette much more than the actual fruit shapes, and painted their still life with a decidedly abstract feel.  This was, for many young artists the first time they had the chance to paint on an actual canvas instead of paper. Many of the younger children even tried to “turn over” the canvas and paint on the other side as you would a piece of paper.

The experience of using canvas, which has a rougher surface, varies greatly from using paper, and it changes the way some artists paint their subjects.

Some of the children actually asked for paper, but most had an interesting experience using the canvas. Overall the results were, as always, mostly abstract and as unique as the child painting the canvas.