National Gallery Kids' Program
Jan. 31st, 2010 04:15 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
entirelysonjaToday we went down to the National Gallery for a kids' program I hoped Erika would enjoy. She got to do it with her friend Molly, who is just barely not-too-old for the program.
It started out with a visit to see Gerhard Richter's "Abstract Painting 780-1", where the kids were guided through several exercises in observing the painting, including looking at it from top to bottom, side to side, wherever their eyes wandered, and through "binoculars" formed by the hands. That last was actually surprisingly effective in helping you to focus on the details! She asked the kids questions about various aspects of the painting, and it was interesting to see what different kids saw in it -- bugs, trees, a house, a pirate ship, etc.
The next stop was a corner of one of the "Small French Paintings" galleries, to hear the Leo Lionni story, "Little Blue and Little Yellow." On its surface, this story is about color mixing, hence its connection to the Richter painting. I thought it was pretty cool that the kids were having storytime surrounded by art; I happened to notice that a self-portrait of Paul Gauguin was right behind me.
Finally, they took the kids to a big open room with lots of brown paper taped down on the floor, and gave them what appeared to be Crayola Color Wonder paper and paints along with some small squeegees, so they could experiment with Richter's technique.
Erika had a good time, and I thought it was a well-done program. We will definitely be trying to get back for the second and third programs in the series - it's amazing that stuff like this is available for free!
It started out with a visit to see Gerhard Richter's "Abstract Painting 780-1", where the kids were guided through several exercises in observing the painting, including looking at it from top to bottom, side to side, wherever their eyes wandered, and through "binoculars" formed by the hands. That last was actually surprisingly effective in helping you to focus on the details! She asked the kids questions about various aspects of the painting, and it was interesting to see what different kids saw in it -- bugs, trees, a house, a pirate ship, etc.
The next stop was a corner of one of the "Small French Paintings" galleries, to hear the Leo Lionni story, "Little Blue and Little Yellow." On its surface, this story is about color mixing, hence its connection to the Richter painting. I thought it was pretty cool that the kids were having storytime surrounded by art; I happened to notice that a self-portrait of Paul Gauguin was right behind me.
Finally, they took the kids to a big open room with lots of brown paper taped down on the floor, and gave them what appeared to be Crayola Color Wonder paper and paints along with some small squeegees, so they could experiment with Richter's technique.
Erika had a good time, and I thought it was a well-done program. We will definitely be trying to get back for the second and third programs in the series - it's amazing that stuff like this is available for free!