Lesson At A Glance

Here’s a brief overview of the complete lesson. It’s also on your prep page in the Ready, Set, Go! section (below the lesson).

Colored buttons jump to each section in the full lesson plan below.

15 Minutes – Finish Dream Painting or sketch face

35 Min – Paint flesh tone color journal

2 Min – Organize Supplies

15 Min – PDF about face color zones

 5 min – Set up for painting acrylics

30 min – Paint facial details from reference

2 min – Everyone helps

Use this button to jump down to the preparation section.

SCROLL & TEACH

LESSONPLAN

Each section is a different color. Read over once and then you can SCROLL & TEACH using any device you like. It’s designed to work well with your phone.

All materials are suggestions and may be modified as you see fit. We have tried many items, and these seem to allow the most versatility for the cost.

Brushes should be nylon for springiness and durability. Round brushes are the most versatile.

Paint pigment list:

• Napthol or Pyrrol Red
• Hansa or Light Yellow
• Pthalo Green (blue shade)
• Cyan or Cerulean Blue
• Ultramarine Blue
• Dioxazine Purple
• Magenta
• Burnt Umber
• Raw Sienna
• Titanium White (professional grade only)

Explain some options.

Students may want to finish working on the dream painting from last week. If so, they can go ahead and set up for that if your schedule has room. Otherwise, move to the warm up, sketching faces.

Make several rough sketches as shown on the example.

Using the example, create as many rough sketches from the reference as you can. Use any or all of these 3 materials:

• Ebony pencil
• Charcoal
• Oil pastels – black or color

Use this button to jump down to the preparation section.

 Provide Color Journal page

One page 25-color PDF journal for flesh tones. Grades 3-5 only do 16 colors. Divide young student’s palettes into 4 or 5 sections using a sharpie. Show demo for students who are new or need a refresher. (all young students!)

Divide the palette with sharpie

It really helps students keep their paint organized if you divide the palette into 4 or 5 sections, especially with the young students. Since they mix into the same blob of paint for each row, writing “Row 1”, “Row 2”, etc. on the sections, prevents accidentally using the wrong paint or starting a new blob in the middle of a row.

It also helps to keep the mixes from spreading out into giant blobs that take up most of the palette.

Demo if needed

If you’re new to ArtSquish…

Here’s our demo for how to use and create our special color journals. These are not just a series of formulas since that would quickly become the only colors a student would use. Instead, the journal is designed to mimic the way artists actually mix colors, changing the color several times with the addition of new pigments to take the color to a new direction. The resulting colors are all useful and show artists how other pigments AFFECT colors.

Color Journal Painting

Tap the 4 arrows icon to enlarge the video to full screen.

Review the demo video and demonstrate to your students, or you can simply display the video on a larger screen for them to watch.

Pinterest Gallery – John Singer Sargent

Tap the icon to the left to open our special Pinboard showing examples of artwork to display to your class. See our Article for making Pinterest work on larger displays. You can also use a laptop or large tablet and gather everyone around like you’re using a book.

Show Sargent work & read bio

“An artist painting a picture should have at his side a man with a club to hit him over the head when the picture is finished.” 

John Singer Sargent

Many people consider John Singer Sargent one of the greatest portraitists of all time. He not only had great skill with color, light, and painting techniques, he was a master at capturing the spirit and personality of the people he painted. All through his life, however, he had a love/hate relationship with portraiture, and eventually gave it up to pursue other techniques and subject matter. Over his lifetime, he had at least 7 major styles, but all of them were based on realism and impressionism. Late in life, when these went out of popularity, he was considered behind the times.

Portraits are very difficult to do, and to drive home that point, he once stated, “every time I paint a portrait I lose a friend”.

An American who lived most of his life in Europe, he was trained in Italy and France. When he showed an early portrait of his instructor at a Paris art show, it was considered by some to be better than his master’s work, and one critic said it was “uncanny” that he was at the beginning of his career yet had no more to learn!

He moved to London and made that his home for most of his life, though he travelled extensively, many times to the U.S. and other places for commissioned work. Sargent painted portraits of famous people most often, but sometimes would draw and paint the world around him. He was a profound watercolorist too. In his lifetime, he produced thousands of paintings and even more drawings. His work can be found in museums all over the world, but most of them are in America.

Don’t worry!

Color journals are easy to finish later. The purpose is mainly to practice mixing and to learn what pigments do to others when they’re mixed. Any amount of progress is great. Finishing up color journals is a great filler activity for students on other days.

Use this button to jump down to the preparation section.

Clean for the session…

If this is the end of your first session, clean up completely by skipping down to a full cleanup shown in the final step. If continuing on today, just wash brushes out in the water tubs, and tidy up work space. Save any paint by piling it up in small blobs with a palette knife. Teacher can spray with water mist too, so it won’t dry out.

Use this button to jump down to the preparation section.

Painting Skin Shades (tap any image to open viewer)

Display the slideshow and discuss.

Look at the handout and discuss the color areas on the face. Go over the “Face the Facts” section and observe the similarities of skin tones. Each of the 3 examples come from paintings by different old masters. The top one is from a very light skinned portrait, and the bottom two both come from a portrait of a black man.

End by comparing the information in the row of examples at the bottom. Each area is isolated and surrounded by the basic color of the area shown.

Use this button to jump down to the preparation section.

Provide printout(s) and decide which image to use.

It always helps to begin where you want to, and to have your own choices. Allow the students to practice starting with either one of the references. It’s ok to spend the whole time on one, or get to do both. You can even paint both of these at the same time, allowing paint layers to dry as you switch back and forth.

If doing the first print of the face parts, draw guidelines first. Use a canvas pencil to make some simple guidelines.

Paint the practices right in the canvas pad, or on paper in their watercolor or sketch pad. This is just a practice, so anything works. The sketch paper will wrinkle up with the wet paint, so do not add water or use a wet brush.

Students should draw a frame, or box, that matches the proportions of the sample they’re copying. Drawing should be done with canvas pencil or if on paper, a regular pencil.

Use this button to jump down to the preparation section.

Explain two techniques needed for this practice.

1. Dark-to-light – Students should begin with the dark shadows first. If you paint the shadow shapes just a bit larger, then the lighter layers can cover up the edges for a good effect. Add medium dark colors next. Then medium, light medium, and finally add the lightest colors last.
2. Don’t add water – Use smaller amounts of paint on the brush, and don’t add water. This creates a fast-drying paint technique, and layers can be added easily from dark, to medium, to light.

Everyone gets started painting

Encourage your students to not worry too much and just have fun practicing creating the different colors and lights and shadows. Remind them that you can’t waste your time as an artist, you can only learn if you’re working. Even if you make something you don’t keep. This is just an exercise.

Use this button to jump down to the preparation section.

Students clean up their work area.

• Wash hands
• Super-wash brushes if used
• Put art supplies away
• Wipe tables & toss trash
• Remove any smocks (last)
• Check for items on floors and tables

Try to get photos of your student’s artwork. Find a good spot for quick lighting without highlights or shadows from your hands and device. Ideally in-between two strong lights on each side

Practice the demo if needed.

Print all of your PDFs from the lesson plan and cut any references apart as needed.

STUDENT’S

MATERIALS

• 14 x 17” Sketch pad
• 4B pencils
• Erasers
• Markers
• Oil pastels
• Blender sticks (stumps)
• Ebony Pencil
• Charcoal
• Paint
• Brushes

Week 32: Acrylic Portrait

An underpainting in bright orange helps students create an easy portrait using acrylics and their newly learned skin tone color journals.

Week 33: Fun & Freaky Game Day

Students get a fun break while learning and practicing at the same time. Games are played for mixing colors, drawing, and observation.