Renoir Value Umbrellas.

I borrowed this idea from Happy Homeschool Nest and created a powerpoint presentation for use in a sixth grade classroom of thirty students.  Thanks for the great idea!  I read the  book on Renoir by Mike Venezia aloud to the students.  They really seem to love any reference to the childhood of a world-famous artist and the development of his/her interest in art.  Renoir’s drawing with his parents’ fabric chalk was of particular interest to them, though I suspect it might give them some ideas.

As part of my instruction, I made sure to emphasize the aim of the Impressionist movement, which was to capture the “impression” that natural light gives an object or landscape rather than to depict precise forms.  Because Renoir tried to blend these two goals toward the end of his career, I felt a distinction needed to be made.

Since I always attempt to teach an art concept as part of my lessons, we focused on “value” as we studied The Umbrellas by Renoir.  The students then painted a single umbrella, mixing white and black tempera paint with a chosen color to achieve depth and dimension.  See my powerpoint: Renoir Value Umbrellas for details.

Materials: Mixed Media Paper, Tempera paint, pencil, small fine art brushes (flat, I hesitate to give a size because it seems there is so much variation between brands but no more than 1/2 cm in width).

Difficulty: Moderate.  Some students were done in ten minutes, and it wasn’t just the kids who rush through everything.  Others took a full 45 minutes.  The beauty of color-mixing is that it is a skill worth repeating, so have plenty of extra paper and paint on hand for students to try a second (or third) time.