Paul Cézanne Apple Still Life (Value)

Kindergarten has now moved on to learn about the element of Value. Value is the gradient of a color from dark to light. We first met around one table where a light and an apple was displayed on the table. The students were introduced to value by demonstrating ,with the light and the apple, that when light hits an object it doesn't turn it white but a lighter color of the object and on the opposite side of the apple where there is a shadow is not black but a darker color of the object. The students discussed what they though the reason for the shadow was and they decided that it was because the other side of the apple is blocking the light causing shade. (And they were right!) We also discovered that the drop shadow caused by the apple blocking the light was shown on the opposite side of the light onto the table. We moved the light around the apple and we found that the shadow followed the light. After this demonstration the students were introduced to the artist, Paul Cézanne. We watched a wonderful video on the Metropolitan Museum of Art's webpage called, "Cezanne's Astonishing Apples" which discussed all the things we just learned about during the apple demonstration but it allowed the kids to understand how Cezanne then applied this into his paintings. Paul Cézanne, usually painted still-life's and developed the style of using geometric shapes as the basis for his paintings. He believed that everything in the world was made up of either a sphere, a cone, a cylinder or a cube. He began many of his works with these basic shapes layering thick paint with strong outlines to build form. In our project, students were guided through a drawing of 3 apples on a plate and then a table. They were then given a red craypa and told to color in one of those circles/ apples red. We then added brown on one side for the shaded part and white on top of the red which created pink to the side where the light would be hitting it. We then did a green apple with one side dark green and the other side with white to create a lighter green and a yellow apple which one side in a dark, golden yellow and the other side white. Once the apples were finished, we used black to create the drop shadow onto the plate and table and covered it with a color of their choosing for the plate and table. By mixing black INTO the color is creates a darker version of that color instead of a stark black shadow. The students will finish their pieces by painting the "wallpaper" in any color of their choosing. 

Learning Objectives: Value, Art History, Guided instruction, drawing

ART WORDS:
Value: the scale of a color from light to dark
Shadow: darker version of a color
Highlight: lighter version of a color (where light is illuminated on an object)

you can find the link to the video shown in class here:
http://www.metmuseum.org/metmedia/kids-zone/start-with-art/cezannes-astonishing-apples