Introducing Color

Often when we are exposing children to artistic exploration we begin with color. We start with color because it is the easiest for us to identify and reiterate in every day conversations. Often we find ourselves able to confirm lessons learned about color in daily observations relating to the clothes we wear, the the things we see, and even the food we eat..
When introducing color to children, just like introducing any complex concepts, the key is to do so in small steps with age appropriate activities. You wouldn't try to explain intensity to your 14month old but that doesn't mean you won't be able to explore it.
Before we look at practical applications let's explore those key points relating to color.

Color

Color is an element of art with three properties:

1) Hue, the name of the color, e.g. red, yellow, etc. 

2) Intensity or the purity and strength of the color such as brightness or dullness. 

 

3) value, or the lightness or darkness of the color.

 

The Elements of Art and Design

The elements of art and design are a fabulous way to organize your artistic explorations. While each element is quite extensive it can also be broken down into it's simplest form and explored through a variety of mediums.
A root knowledge of these elements will emerge as you build a library of artistic experiences.
These are not boundaries or guidelines but affirmations of  your discoveries.

• Line
• Shape
• Form
• Color
• Texture

(size, value, and direction are also elements that can be explored through the five listed above)
In subsequent posts we will explore each of these topics in a little more depth before we apply them to practical explorations. 

100 Languages and Artistic Exploration

How it ALL started. 

In 2005, in a small studio in Georgetown Ontario I walked into my first March Break Camp. The studio held nearly 40 children ranging in age from 4-17 who were all seemingly enthusiastic about art. To say that I was slightly overwhelmed would be apt.

at first it felt like hundreds of anxious ears and watching eyes.

My previous years of working the art field had included sculpture fabrication (working in a shop with power tools and loud music), working as a color consultant (mixing paints, matching fabrics and tiles, encouraging expression via home decor), working as a mural artist and sidewalk artist (painting in tight spaces with low light, too much light, or on awkward scaffolding), and working as a graphic designer (in a fancy office dealing with computer monitors, resolutions, proofs, approvals, presses, plates, folders, paper samples, and typography).

Working with children to share my enthusiasm and excitement about all types of art came very naturally to me but for a brief moment, while standing in the sea of excited children, I wondered if they would share in the things that made me excited about art.

It didn't take long before I discovered an educational philosophy that truly married my own ideas about artistic exploration, specifically in the early years of education, and suddenly I was able to 'back up' all of the concepts I knew to be true. Working in private art studios, community centers, Montessori schools, Ontario Early Years Centers, schools, childcare centers, in the home and in my own studio, I built an early arts program based on the foundations of Loris Malaguzzi and his concepts about how children learn.

Please take a moment to reflect upon the 100 Languages Poem before we begin our facilitation of the young Art Explorer.

The child is made of one hundred.
The child has
a hundred languages
a hundred hands
a hundred thoughts
a hundred ways of thinking
of playing, of speaking.

A hundred.

Always a hundred
ways of listening
of marveling, of loving
a hundred joys
for singing and understanding
a hundred worlds
to discover
a hundred worlds
to invent
a hundred worlds
to dream.

The child has
a hundred languages
(and a hundred hundred hundred more)
but they steal ninety-nine.
The school and the culture
separate the head from the body.
They tell the child:
to think without hands
to do without head
to listen and not to speak
to understand without joy
to love and to marvel
only at Easter and at Christmas.

They tell the child:
to discover the world already there
and of the hundred
they steal ninety-nine.

They tell the child:
that work and play
reality and fantasy
science and imagination
sky and earth
reason and dream
are things
that do not belong together.

And thus they tell the child
that the hundred is not there.
The child says:
No way. The hundred is there.
-Loris Malaguzzi