I previewed two more in the Crystal Productions series Who is the Artist? I
think these are good for introducing kids to works of important artists. A
self portrait and brief biography is given for each artist in the video.
Students learn to recognize artists by their styles and techniques as well
as subjects that dominate their work. The first one was Chagall -Klee -
Magritte. I can see this going with any unit on Fantasy art or Surrealism.
some of my favorites works of these artists are critiqued in the video. The
second one was Benton - Hopper - Wood. Excellent for teaching about the
American Scene. Throughout the programs, viewers are asked to interact with
the paintings as they are presented. If you don't want to listen to the
narrator, you could turn down the volume and let the students tell you why
it is by a certain artists -- the students can point out the clues rather
than the narrator. I think it would be fun to give each child three cards
with the artists' names and have them hold up their card as soon as they
know what artist is being shown. I recommend these for upper elementary and
up (Why not even use them for high school? -- but let the students do most
of the critiquing)
I have Internet resources for each of these artists that I would be happy to
send off list.
