Students Will Learn About Austrian Artist Gustav Klimt. They Will Then U
Total Page:16
File Type:pdf, Size:1020Kb
Gustav Klimt 3rd Grade Two 45-minute sessions Purpose: Students will learn about Austrian artist Gustav Klimt. They will then use their knowledge about and inspiration from Klimt’s work to create their own abstract collage. Vocabulary: Gustav Klimt, gold leaf, abstract art, line, shape, form, and color Materials: Biographical information about Klimt (attached), Images of Klimt’s work (at least one per four student group), gold paper (either made by painting gold paint on white paper, or by using gold wrapping paper) cut into equal rectangles (one per student), white and black construction paper, permanent markers (blue, orange, green, purple, red, & yellow). Klimt Bio attached Methods: Begin by looking at Gustav Klimt’s work and reading about his life. At this stage, the kids can work in groups and study one of Klimt’s pieces, answering questions about it: What colors does he use? Are his pieces abstract? Are parts of his pieces abstract? What is the subject matter? The students then draw patterns and shapes that they see. *Next, students work in groups of four. A Klimt piece is placed on the table in front of them and they study its contents. Have them focus on what kinds of shapes they see, what kinds of shapes create patterns, what kinds of lines Klimt uses. *Each student is given a piece of gold paper, which will become the base of their artwork. *Looking at the Klimt work, the students pull out important shapes and patterns to copy in their own paintings. Walk around and discuss these images with the groups and give them assignments such as: You see that he uses black and white triangles, now cut these out and place them on your own page. Now, see his use of green circles: draw these circles in groups and color in your favorite ones. Give students one assignment, then another, working until most of the shapes and colors are used. Therefore, by copying t simple shapes and lines they see in the painting, the students are recreating an abstract piece with Klimt’s important features. Gustav Klimt Gustav Klimt was born in Baumgarten, Austria, near Vienna in 1862, the eldest son of an immigrant gold engraver from Bohemia. He received a scholarship to the School of Applied Arts in Vienna. As a young artist, he was hired to decorate the new public structures and private homes that were built during a construction boom. Klimt, his brother Ernst, and a classmate were hired as decorative muralists and spent the next ten years painting friezes, stairways, curtains, and murals for many public theatres and museums. In the summer of 1892, Klimt’s father died from a stroke and in December his brother Ernst died of heart disease. These events left Klimt gravely shaken and triggered a withdrawal from public life that lasted some five years. During this time, his life and his art became more idiosyncratic. He lived with his mother and two sisters and became obsessive about his privacy, refusing to write letters or commit words to paper. Though he never married, he had numerous affairs with women and is rumored to have fathered fourteen illegitimate children. Klimt became a leader in a progressive art movement called The Secession. Well-funded by a young class of nouveau rich entrepreneurs, the Secession strove to marry art and architecture in a movement of enlightened environmental design. The movement was most successfully demonstrated in the 1902 Beethoven Exhibition, which was a tribute that combined the paintings of Klimt with the interior design of Josef Hoffmann. In 1903 the Wiener Werkstatte organization was founded to develop fabrics, fashions, wallpapers, posters, and greeting cards which are popular to this day. However, many younger artists felt slighted by this new commercial venture, which caused a schism in the membership and led to the eventual end of the Secession. Klimt again retreated to his private life and studio, well-financed by affluent patrons who continued to commission and buy his paintings. Best known for works that infuse gold leaf and metal appliqué into the painted surface, Klimt was also an accomplished landscape painter. In 1918, as he prepared for his daily walk, he was seized by a stroke and died of pneumonia a few weeks later at the age of 56. .