Van Gogh Starry Nights in Arizona

Vincent Van Gogh 1853-1890 Dutch painter. He is best known for his post-Impressionist work. His most famous works include several studies of sunflowers and A Starry Night (1889)

In first grade they study the planets and solar system in January, so this is a great project to do for it. I changed it a bit to make the foreground silhouette an arizona one.

They will be doing a wax resist, the oil pastels repel the watercolor when you paint over them.

Give the PDF on Van Gogh. Van Gogh Starry Night

Materials needed:

12x18 white watercolor paper

Oil pastels- lightest colors show up best

Paintbrushes-maybe 3/4-1" wide.

Watercolors. Dark blue, --Hobby Lobby sells magic liquid water color,One or two bottles are good for a whole classroom (@3$ each)

12x18 black construction paper-precut the black paper on a long diagonal so that each child will have half a black sheet of paper for their silhouette.



Talk about what they would see in the Arizona skies. The moon, stars and planets.
Have them Start by taking white or yellow pastels and drawing the moon and stars. Have them press hard and color the dots/circles/crescent completely in. Then they take the pastels and draw the radiant lines around the stars, moon and planets ( if they drew them) they continue this process until the page is filled with the lines and swirls. Referencing van goghs starry night. At this age, it is important to demonstrate , perhaps on the board. Some of the kids will try to color in or scribble or color the background, impress upon them that it will look the best by pressing hard and drawing slowly. The white shows up later when the watercolor is applied.

The next step is to brush the dark blue watercolor thinly all over the paper. The pastels will resist the watercolor. If someone puts too much watercolor on and it is pooling, don't blot with paper towels, the pattern will show up on it. Just let it drip onto a paper towel if it's too much, generally the excess just dries fine.
As the painting is drying, the kids will take their half black paper and free cut the top edge into a Arizona landscape. Make sure they only cut the curved edge, not the bottom edge. When they are done, glue-stick the silhouette to the background for them, and make sure their names are on the back.

Don't forget to take photos for artsonia!,