Grades/Level: 	Adult Learners
Subjects: 		Visual Arts, English—Language Arts, ESL
Time Required: 	Single-Class Lesson
Author:		Getty Museum Education Staff

Featured Getty Artworks
Gabriel Bernard de Rieux, Maurice-Quentin de La Tour, about 1739-41
http://www.getty.edu/art/gettyguide/artObjectDetails?artobj=1065 
Celedonio Gallego's House, Llano de San Juan, New Mexico, Alex Harris, Negative June 1985; Print 1994 
http://www.getty.edu/art/gettyguide/artObjectDetails?artobj=134121

Lesson Overview
Students examine the connection between a person's home and his or her personality.

Learning Objectives
- Students will analyze what objects reveal about their owners.
- Students will think about what the objects in their homes might reveal about them.
- Students will use new vocabulary.

MATERIALS
- Image of Gabriel Bernard de Rieux by Maurice-Quentin de La Tour
- Image of Celedonio Gallego's House, Llano de San Juan, New Mexico by Alex Harris
- Looking at Decorative Arts Student Worksheet 6
- Looking at Decorative Arts Student Worksheet 7
- Picture dictionary or realia such as cutouts from mail-order home decor catalogues, newspaper supplements from furniture stores, etc. (optional)

Lesson Steps 
- Explain that we can tell a lot about people by looking at the decorative arts objects that they surround themselves with, a concept that artists have used to capture the personalities of their subjects.

- Display Gabriel Bernard de Rieux.

- Ask students to describe the objects they see in the painting, using the decorative arts vocabulary.

- Ask students to think about the person they see in the painting. Ask them what they can determine about the person simply by "reading" the objects with which he is shown.

- Next, display Celedonio Gallego's House, Llano de San Juan, New Mexico by Alex Harris.

-  Ask students what they can determine about the person who lives in this house by "reading" the objects shown.

Student Worksheets
- To reinforce the vocabulary and teach the classification of objects, use Student Worksheet 6. Distribute the worksheet to students and have them identify the objects in the artwork and classify them according to decorative arts categories (for example, a chair is an object in the furniture category; a vase is an object in the ceramics category, etc.).

- For a more discussion-oriented activity, use Student Worksheet 7. The idea here is to get students to reflect on the decorative arts objects they surround themselves with and to think about the value they place on objects.

Suggested Activities
- Look at other interior views in photographs from the Getty Museum's collection. Ask students what they can determine about the people that inhabit these places simply by reading the objects they see in the rooms. For example, you may wish to use Southhaven, Mississippi by William Eggleston.

- Using a picture dictionary, teach the names of different rooms.

- Using mail-order catalogues, newspaper supplements from furniture stores, etc., have students discuss how different home environments can be created by choosing from a variety of goods.

- Using cutouts from newspapers, magazines, catalogues, etc., have students create collages of their dream home.