Masterpiece: “The Basket of Apples”
Artist: Paul Cezanne
(Pol Say-zahn)
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Concept: Shading Forms
Lesson: Pastel Still-Life
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Objectives:
• To create a still life drawing.
• To experiment with pastels and learn how to use shading to show depth.
Vocabulary: Still Life, Geometric Shape, Form, Color, Light Source, Shading.
Materials: (one per student unless otherwise noted)
• Sharpened sketching pencil and eraser
• 8” x 11” white construction paper
• pastel crayons (or chalk),
• 4 or 5 separate “vignettes” consisting of real or plastic fruit, bowl,
patterned/checked tablecloth or napkin, and jug/vase/bottle (optional)
• 1 can per class of cheap hair spray (aqua net)
• 9x12 colored construction paper for mounting
** Please Note **
Pre-mount artist’s bio to the back of the 9” x 12” construction paper. Cut white
construction paper to 8” x 11”; this will be the paper the students will draw their still
life on.
** Troubleshooting Thoughts **
Arrange fruit and bowl or jug on a cloth. You can group 5 or 6 desks in groups, and make
several arrangements, so that the students can sit around in a circle to draw. Whether
you use pastels or chalk, make sure you spray with hair spray to set. Spray the finished
artwork outside. (An adult should do this before mounting to the 9” x 12” construction
paper.)
Process:
1. Look at and discuss Paul Cezanne’s Still Life Paintings. Notice how he uses
shading to make a simple shape such as a circle look like an apple.
2. Show students how all the forms in the painting can be reduced to simple
geometric shapes – circle, cone, cylinder, oval, square, rectangle, etc.
3. Also discuss where the light source in the painting is. When the source of the
light is known, it will be much easier to see how the shading is done.
4. Hand out 8” x 11” white construction paper and pastels.
5. Have the students sketch the fruit, using geometric shapes. Then have them
color in their shapes with pastels.
6. Color and shading is an important step. First determine where the light is falling
on the fruit. Then add white or yellow in an arc or banana-shape near the upper
edge of the fruit. Then at the opposite edge of the fruit, they can add a dark
color in a banana-shape to show a shadow. Brown, blue, purple or even dark green
can be used as a shadow color. They can blend their colors in the picture by using
their fingers. This will create the illusion of light and shadow on their fruit and
objects.
7. When they are done shading and blending, they may outline the fruit with black
pastel.
When the project is done, have an adult volunteer go outside and spray to set the
artwork. Mount the dry art on a larger piece of colored construction paper. Then the
project will be rea
5th GRADE--PROJECT #3
Artist: Paul Cezanne
Masterpiece: The Basket of Apples
Lesson: Pastel Still-Life/Shading Forms
Project Samples:
Art Masterpiece
Paul Cezanne
(1 8 3 9 – 1 9 0 6 )
This month we looked at the work of the French painter Paul Cezanne. His
work was influenced by the Impressionist painters of the time but his style
of painting came from the use of blocks of color to give form to shapes. He
was an outcast from traditional painting while he lived. Cezanne worked very
slowly; the fruit in his still-lifes often rotted before he had finished painting!
(For this reason he didn’t paint very many portraits). His work slowly evolved
from Impressionism toward Modern, Abstract art. Pablo Picasso, a modern
abstract artist, referred to him as the “father of us all”. Today we made a still-life in colorful pastel, using shapes and
shading in the style of Paul Cezanne.
Art Masterpiece
Paul Cezanne
(1 8 3 9 – 1 9 0 6 )
This month we looked at the work of the French painter Paul Cezanne. His
work was influenced by the Impressionist painters of the time but his style of
painting came from the use of blocks of color to give form to shapes. He was
an outcast from traditional painting while he lived. Cezanne worked very
slowly; the fruit in his still-lifes often rotted before he had finished painting!
(For this reason he didn’t paint very many portraits). His work slowly evolved
from Impressionism toward Modern, Abstract art. Pablo Picasso, a modern
abstract artist, referred to him as the “father of us all”. Today we made a still-life in colorful pastel, using shapes and
shading in the style of Paul Cezanne.
Art Masterpiece
Paul Cezanne
(1 8 3 9 – 1 9 0 6 )
This month we looked at the work of the French painter Paul Cezanne. His
work was influenced by the Impressionist painters of the time but his style
of painting came from the use of blocks of color to give form to shapes. He
was an outcast from traditional painting while he lived. Cezanne worked very
slowly; the fruit in his still-lifes often rotted before he had finished painting!
(For this reason he didn’t paint very many portraits). His work slowly evolved
from Impressionism toward Modern, Abstract art. Pablo Picasso, a modern abstract artist, referred to him as the
“father of us all”. Today we made a still-life in colorful pastel, using shapes and shading in the style of Paul Cezanne.
Paul Cezanne
(1839 – 1906)
Paul Cezanne was born in 1839 in Aix-en-Provence, near the Mediterranean coast in
France. He was the son of a hat dealer who became a very prosperous banker. Cezanne
first studied law but abandoned it in favor of art.
Cezanne was close friends with a man who later became a well known author. They
decided to move to Paris to further their art. They moved to Paris in 1863. Cezanne
became acquainted with the Impressionists. He knew Manet and Pissaro and he
exhibited with them in the first Impressionist show.
Cezanne was largely self-taught. His paintings seemed to draw more criticism than the
others because of the harsh colors he used, and his rough paint surface. He did much
of his art work with a palette knife. He exhibited with the Impressionists one more
time, but never really totally identified with the group.
Cezanne was a different kind of man. He once refused to shake hands with Manet
because he claimed that he, Cezanne, had not washed for days and did not want to dirty
such a great man as Manet.
He married a woman named Hortense Fiquet, and they had a son named Paul. Cezanne’s
father died in 1886 and left him a great deal of money and the family home. He and his
family moved to Aix. Cezanne lived there most of the rest of his life. He devoted
himself principally to certain favorite themes, portraits of his wife, still lifes, and
landscapes of Provence.
He was an extremely slow painter. He is said to have had over 100 sitting for one
portrait before he decided not to finish it.
It was only after the age of fifty that Cezanne won praise for his work. In 1906 he
wrote: “I am old and ill and have sworn to myself to die painting.” In October of 1906
he collapsed after being caught in a storm while painting outdoors, and died a few days
later at the age of 67.
While Cezanne was alive his art dealer divided his paintings into two sizes. He sold them
for $64.00 for the large ones and $26.00 for the small ones. In 1964 a Cezanne
painting sold for 1.4 million. Cezanne is considered the father of modern art, and had a
profound effect on Picasso.