Electronic Field Trips
Comparing Landscapes
Lesson One
Exploring Asian Landscapes
- Grade Level: Middle School, High School
- Subject Area: Art
Brief Description
Students visit an on-line Asian art museum, analyze several landscapes, and
explore the painting techniques.
Objectives
Students will:
- Become familiar with the distinctive aspects of classical Asian landscape paintings.
- Explore painting techniques that are elements of Asian landscape paintings.
Materials and Resources
In developing our lessons and activities, we made some
assumptions about the hardware
and software that would be available in the classroom for teachers who visit the
LETSNet Website. We assume that teachers using our Internet-based lessons or
activities have a computer
(PC or Macintosh) with the necessary hardware components (mouse, keyboard, and
monitor) as well as software (operating system, TCP/IP software, networking or
dial-up
software, e-mail and a World Wide Web client program, preferably Netscape, but
perhaps
Mosaic or Lynx). In the section below, we specify any "special"
hardware
or software
requirements for a lesson or activity (in addition to those described above)
and the level of Internet access required to do the activity.
-
Special hardware requirements: None.
-
Special software requirements: None.
-
Internet access: High-speed (greater than 1 MBPS via network).
-
Classroom resources: Water colors, paper, subjects for landscape paintings,
such as photographs of landscapes.
Activity Description
- Introduce the lesson by outlining to students the plans for the next few class
sessions. Let students know that they will be visiting a site with classical
Asian landscape paintings, that they will be expected to analyze the paintings
according to several criteria, and that they will later be completing a landscape
of their own in a similar style.
- Discuss the list of criteria that students will use to analyze the components
of the landscapes they see. The following are list of possible criteria:
- What is the natural subject matter the painter chose to depict?
- How realistic is the painting-- does it look like something you have
seen in nature?
- How has the artist used color in the picture? What sort of feeling or experience
does this use of color evoke?
- Is the pigment the artist used opaque or transparent? What sort of techniques
do you think might have been used to achieve this effect?
- How has the artist used line in the picture? What sort of feeling or experience
does this use of line evoke?
- How is the illusion of space created in the piece?
- What three words would you use to describe this painting?
- Have students visit the Art in China Website (see Internet Resources below)
and view the first two paintings (by Ming Dynasty artists Chen Chun and Chou Ying).
Have students visit the Web Museum exhibits on Japanese artists Hiroshige and Hokusai (See Internet Resources below).
Students should focus on Hiroshige's paintings Plum Estate and Moon Pine
and Hokusai's The Great Wave Off Kanagawa. Have students read the biographies
of Hokusai and Hiroshige.
Students should
respond to the questions listed above and record their observations for later
use.
- Assemble the class for a whole group discussion of students' observations. Conclude
the discussion by highlighting the distinctive elements of Asian landscapes and
summarizing students ideas on techniques that might be used to achieve such effects.
Ask students to try to link information they learned from the biographical sketches
to the artists' work.
- Students create water color landscapes in the style of the classical Asian
landscapes they viewed.
Internet Resources
- The Art of China
[http://pasture.ecn.purdue.edu/~agenhtml/agenmc/china/art.html]
This site has resources on a variety of Chinese art forms,
including paintings, pottery, and calligraphy.
- Works by Ando Hiroshige at
the Web Museum
[http://peace.wit.com/wm/paint/auth/hiroshige/]
This site includes both pictures by Hiroshige, a Japanese artist who worked
during the early to mid-1800s, and a brief biography and discussion of his work.
- Works by Katsushika Hokusai
at the Web Museum
[http://peace.wit.com/wm/paint/auth/hokusai/]
This site provides both pictures by Hokusai, a Japanese artist who worked during the mid-1800s, and a brief
biography and discussion of his work.
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