Ms. Kober | Archway Trivium Art: December 2015

When students become discouraged during an assignment, I remind them that all artists started off in their shoes, learning little by little and making errors along the way. We grow from our mistakes and persevere through tasks that we do not necessarily wish to do, but we may realize that we discover something we excel at and become passionate about! It feels good to produce something beautiful that took dedication, patience, and practice. Even if a student doesn't go on to have a career in the arts, learning "visual literacy" will help them throughout various avenues of their lives.

In class, we often discuss different types of art and the importance of art in our world. We have practiced looking at and formally talking about art, especially how to closely observe an artwork using correct vocabulary. We have discussed how artists sometimes create art to make something beautiful, but sometimes they create art to record something exactly how they see it through close observation. We have practiced the steps in an art critique so that students can become familiar with looking at all different types of artwork, and gaining knowledge through visual perception and critical thinking skills.

Students can go on to be able to critique master artworks, but also their own and even their peer's. A critique is an oral or written discussion strategy used to analyze, describe, and interpret works of art. Critiques help students hone in on their persuasive and creative oral and writing, information-gathering, and justification skills. Art criticism can be used outside of the classroom as well, and would be a good opportunity to practice if you and your child visit a museum or art gallery. They can also bring a sketch pad or paper to practice drawing a part of or the whole artwork using close observation as we have done in class. Sketching master studies helps with the visual organization of objects in the picture and being able to translate that understanding onto their own paper.

The four major areas of art criticism are describe, analyze, interpret, and judge. They should focus on each step sequentially using some of the questions below:

Description

Describe the work without using value words such as "beautiful" or "ugly":

What is the written description on the label or in the program about the work?
What is the title and who is the artist?
When and where was the work created?
Describe the elements of the work (i.e., line movement, light, value, space).
Describe the technical qualities of the work (i.e., tools, materials, instruments).
Describe the subject matter. What is it all about? Are there recognizable images?

Analysis

Describe how the work is organized as a complete composition:

How is the work constructed or planned (i.e., movements, lines)?
Identify some of the similarities throughout the work (i.e., repetition of lines, colors, shapes).
Identify some of the points of emphasis in the work (i.e., specific scene, figure).
If the work has subjects or characters, what are the relationships between or among them?

Interpretation

Describe how the work makes you think or feel:

Describe the expressive qualities you find in the work. What expressive language would you use to describe the qualities (i.e., tragic, ugly, funny)?
Does the work remind you of other things you have experienced (i.e., analogy or metaphor)?
How does the work relate to other ideas or events in the world and/or in your other studies?