Last week, I ended my unit on Impressionism with one of my classes.  This class was a short 5 week class so I didn’t have plenty of time to go over all the little tidbits associated with the art movement. Despite this, I believe that my students built on top of their current painting skills by adding the painting techniques used by the Impressionists.  I emphasized the use of visible brush strokes and the mixing of complementary colours to create dark “shadow” colours.  The Impressionists avoided the use of pure black paint so this was a good way to mix their own dark colours from the palette they are currently working with.  The requirements for this project were to find a picture that consisted of at least 3 colours.  They were to do a colour analysis on the image they want to paint  and do an undersketch on their good painting.  Prior to this, they had practice on a worksheet I handed out for t hem to do.  This worksheet required them to use various brushstrokes including pointillism.  They also had to practice highlighting and darkening areas with the use of creating tints and shades to their colours.  With all this practice, I believe I’ve equipped them with the proper skills and knowledge to create /mimic their own Impressionist style painting.  The results were fabulous.  I couldn’t be more happier.  The students all did very well and their use of colours, highlighting, and shadowing were well done.  During the final critique/presentation, about half of them admitted that they were happy with their painting.  Half of the class also felt that they had “learned useful techniques” they could carry on into the future.  Although the class was fairly quiet, I could feel that they were satisfied with their work.   Here are some examples.