Fifth Grade Art Lesson 21

Looking At "Starry Night" by Vincent Van Gogh Part 1 Copying the Painting

Objective:

The student will become familiar with Van Gogh's painting Starry Night and will copy the painting with acrylic paint.

Materials:

Heavy construction paper, paper plate, thin acrylic brushes, primary colors plus black and white acrylic paint, water, paper towels, a copy of Van Gogh's Starry Night

Procedure:

How many students are already familiar with Vincent Van Gogh's Starry Night. I want us to become familiar with this famous work by examination and replication. Refer to the video for a discussion on Van Gogh's personal life and approach to painting this wonderful work. To begin painting Starry Night set your painter's palette (paper plate) up by pouring small amounts of primary colors and black and white, leaving room to mix colors. Our first goal is to fill in our entire paper with the basic composition and colors that Van Gogh used. Work to fill the entire paper with paint. Reduce the many colors in any given area to one base color. We will fill in details next lesson. Acrylic paint is basically plastic. If you leave a brush out with paint on it, it will ruin the brush. Be sure to leave your brush in water when you're not using it.

Conclusion:

The students have observed Van Gogh's Starry Night. We will complete our work next lesson by incorporating his characteristic short strokes into our painting.

Artwork and Examples used in this lesson

“Starry Night”, by Vincent Van Gogh

Student Artwork

Student Artwork