artisticsara-blog

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SESSION 5

Let’s print!

In the last lesson of Art class module, we started from the “Arnolfini portrait” of Jan Van Eyck to analyse printing techniques. It deals with a practice based on ink, which is the main element we used to create our printing postcard!

To make it as costumized as possible, I wanted to combine two elements that characterize me in this specific period of my life: sunflowers and bicycle.

I chose to print sunflowers both because it’s my favourite flower and because I have a sunny personality and I like following positive and optimistic vibes in my daily life, as this flower inspires me.

Thinking about my current Erasmus experience in Gent, the first symbol that came up to my mind was a bike. It represents the main transport with which students move in this city and I have become very attached to mine.  

It is absolutely true that, in Gent, “a student without a bike is like a pub without beer”!

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SESSION 4

Starting from the story of “Nello & Patrasche – A dog in Flanders”, we discovered the Belgian comicbooks’ world!  

The engaging plots, the colourful drawings, the strange characters, the superheroes and the funny speech and thought bubbles are appealing elements not only for children but also for adults.  

A valuable example of that it’s “Nello & Patrasche” story, which has become a real tradition both in Japan, the original country of this comic, and in Belgium, the country in which the comic is set. According to it, in Antwerp, a big statue of the two protagonists of the story (Nello & Patrasche) and their graves have been built in the square in front of the cathedral of the city, where the story takes place: nowdays, lots of Japanese people want to visit Antwerp just to admire these peculiar monuments!

Being inspired by the main characteristics of the Belgian comicbooks, we tried to become cartoonists creating our first comic!  

As you can see in the photos above, we followed an efficient didactical method, based on team-working, sharing and creativity. Split in groups, we received a blank sheet. At the beginning, we were asked to create six comic windows and to draw different kinds of landscapes (mountains, seaside, rural environments, etc.) only in three of those windows. After that, we shifted our sheet to the group on our right side, while we were receiving another sheet from the group of our left side. This changing among groups was used for all the following steps, which were adding speech and thought bubbles, drawing the shape of a superhero and writing down all the sentences and dialogues.

Eventually, each group managed to contribute to the creation of all the comics!

I consider this practice very active, funny, engaging and educational for children in preschool and in primary school. Through it, they can develop both their creativity and their social skills, such as co-operating, sharing, team-working and negotiating, in a playful and positive context, in which they learn while they have fun!

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SESSION 3 (3/3)

During the visit at The Museum of Fine Arts in Gent (MSK Gent), I discovered an efficient didactical technique that I want to bring with me in my professional future as teacher.  

It’s very important that, both in preschool and in primary school, children start building the aesthetic sense of beauty looking at artworks, such as paintings, statues, etchings, artistic compositions, etc. To develop interest and curiosity in pupils about art, teachers should provide them a broad variety of stimulating and playful activities in which children don’t just stand in front of an artwork, but they experience it actively. It deals with the concept of learning by doing, thanks to that pupils can increase their memory, attention and concentration levels. This way, they also can enjoy art and can develop their creativity, imagination and innovative thinking.

The photos above show some of the playful didactical activities which we did during the museum visit and which can be a valuable example of art’s didactics with children in preschool and primary school.

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SESSION 3 (2/3)

After a period of austerity during the Second World War and alterations in the mid-20th century, MSK (one of the oldest museums in Belgium) recently underwent a complete and drastic renovation. The collection, which ranges from Jeroen Bosch and Rubens all the way to Magritte, has never presented more effectively and includes a huge variety of paintings, drawings, etchings and tapestries, which date from the medieval period through to the 20th century.

An auditorium, library, children’s workshop and cafè/restaurant make MSK a contemporary and multifunctional complex where you can spend many happy hours surrounded by beauty.

(It continues in the next post..)

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SESSION 3 (1/3)

The strenght of the Museum of Fine Arts (MSK) lies in the diversity of its collection. This was particularly striking when Gent was under French rule at the end of the 18th century and many of the city’s art treasures were confiscated. Some of them are still in the Louvre to this day. However, Gent did not lose heart. The city gradually acquired a comprehensive art collection and spent years searching the right location to showcase it. This building at Citadelpark, designed by the architect Van Rysselberghe, is an art temple with a fantastic spacious feel and plenty of natural light, and proved to be the perfect solution. 

(It continues in the next post..)

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SESSION 2

Creativity and imagination: these are the main elements that I used to develop this artistic creation.

“The fairy sisters” story derives from the painting which comes up at the end of the video: it calls “Idyl in Spring” and it was created in 1905 by the Scottish artist Edward Atkinson Hornel. The main characters of the painting are two young girls who are chilling surrounded by flowers. The combination between the Scottish origin of the painting and the natural and floral environment that is showed led me to create a story set in the Scottish Isle of Skye and based on nature and magical elements. I was inspired also by some Scottish legends, coming from the Isle of Skye and characterized by fairies, because I’ve always considered Scotland as a place full of magical, mysterious and interesting elements.

Thinking about the process of the story’s creation as well as about the story behind the painting analyzed in classroom, “Old Lady with Masks” by James Ensor (1889), I learnt an efficient method that I would like to use in my future job as teacher: when we show an artwork to children, we should try to tell them an appealing and interesting story connected to it, in order to make children more engaged and motivated in learning process.  

So, I hope that this fictional story could appeal to you and could lead you to develop your interest in learning more about it.

Enjoy the video!

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SESSION 1

What an unexpected encounter! Last 13th of February, during my Art class lesson, I chanced upon the “Speaking Bird”, one of the main characters of the writer Vittorio Imbriani’s legend from Florence in 1887.  

As we can see in the photos, the bird had his feathers completely messy, because he had lost his way to come back to Florence and he had turned up in Gent! He was very frightened by this new Flemish city, so I tried to make him relax kissing him, as one of the photos shows. When he was finally quiet, he explained me his amazing story.

He comes from the castle of a king who, in the past, lived in Florence. This rich king married a poor Florentine woman who gave birth to three children. Unfortunately, while the king was at war, his sisters, who were envious toward the woman, kidnapped the three infants and abandoned them in a basket on the Arno river in Florence. Then, they substituted the three kids with a monkey, a dog and a tiger, telling the king that his wife had gave birth to three animals instead of three humans. Believing in that, the king imprisoned the woman and he fell into depression.

Many years later, the three sons became youngsters and they lived in the house of a Florentine boatman, who found them as newborns and raised them. In their garden, there was a bird which loved singing and speaking.

One day, the king was walking accidentally in the street of that house, when he suddenly saw the three guys who were playing together in the garden: he felt as if something deep connected him to them. Following this feeling, he decided to know these three youngsters and finally he invited them to his castle for dinner. They accepted and one of the three guys took with him the speaking and singing bird, which he was very attached to. During the dinner, the king asked to the bird to say something and so, suddenly, that magical bird started telling the story of the three youngsters and their mother, unmasking the king’s guilty sisters in front of him. 

And... guess what? That charming bird was exactly the bird that I met in Gent!

Thanks to him, the terrible sisters were imprisoned and eventually the big family, made up by the three sons, the king and his wife, reunited.

After listening to his amazing story, I helped the bird to find his own way to come back to Florence and fortunately he managed to get it.