Art AwarenessFirst grade Lesson 1 –Still Life

Artist-Paul Cezanne 1839-1906

Still Life, Drapery, Pitcher and Fruit Bowl 1893-1894 Whitney Museum of American Art New York City

Paul Cezann

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Still life- paintings of objects as he left them in his studio these became some of his best works

Portraits – often of his wife and son although he felt he couldn’t paint people properly

Landscapes- from familiar places

Still Life with an Open Drawer1877-1879

Subjects

Cezanne was born in the south of France the son of a wealthy banker who did not approve of his son being an artist.

Cezanne moved to Paris and his paintings were so rough that none of the art schools would admit him as a student

At first his paintings were dark and heavy and he painted with a palette knife instead of a brush but another artist Pissarro encouraged him to paint out in the sunlight and his paintings came alive.

He was a Post- Impressionist -instead of using flecks of paint like his impressionist friends he used slabs of colors so his pictures appeared solid and he worked so slowly that some of his fruit would rot as he painted

He was a versatile artist who panted many subjects and often the same subject over and over again

He considered shapes to be the basic forms – sphere, cone and cylinder . This realization helped inspire modern art!

The Basket of Apples1895 Art Institute of Chicago

Philospohy He was Roman Catholic and said this about art “when I judge art, I take my painting and put it next to a God-made object like a tree or flower. If it clashes, it is not art.”

“I want to make of impressionism something solid and lasting like the art in museums”

Later Picasso said of Cezanne that he is “the father of us all” and claimed him as his “one and only master!” because his explorations of geometric simplification (seeing all objects as simple shapes) he inspired the development of modern art.

“With an apple I will astonish Paris”

Cezanne

• How do you think he could astonish Paris with an apple?• Think of all the ways you could paint an apple and all the

different shades of colors each apple displays• Today you are going to paint a still life of apples and no two will

be alike• Remember to look for the shapes Cezanne felt were all around

us: cones, sphere and cylinders and use those as the starting point for your Still life

• We will sketch with pencil for about 5 minutes and then you will have 10 min to paint with watercolors

• Remember to use less water for darker shades of red or green and add more water to lighten up the paint…most of all use your creativity and have fun!

Check out this great resource from the Met museum in New York City for more information on Paul Cezanne

http://www.metmuseum.org/metmedia/kids-zone/start-with-art/cezannes-astonishing-apples