Thursday, March 20, 2014

Sculptor Studies: Alexander Calder

I believe Alexander Calder has been Xander's favorite artist/sculptor we have studied so far! He was really fascinated with his mobiles and circus characters.

We read a brief biography online (HERE) and looked up some of his most famous works.

We watched a video of his famous mobile at the National Gallery of Art. . . youtube has a bunch of Calder videos!

Then we watched some videos of his circus which Xander found hilarious. (as with everything else, I suggest viewing the video first to decide if it's appropriate for little eyes. There were a couple scenes I skipped when sharing it with my son)

I also found this awesome video showing how to make a mobile from cardboard. I must confess, this has been MY favorite project so far!

 

First, we made a simple level using push pins as instructed in the video
 

Next I let my son draw the shapes on cardboard as instructed by the video and I cut them out using an exacto knife. Then I used paper clips to link the shapes together. 


After linking all the shapes, we decided to paint our mobile. 

 
 
Our finished project. . .



 
This was a really fun piece that was pretty easy to make and ended up looking really nice! We used oil paint, but you may want to use something a bit less messy. However, I think oil is Xander's favorite medium just because of said messiness!  Haha, such a boy ;)

You can see other ideas for KONOS on my Pinterest boards!

2 comments:

  1. I love how your finished mobile came out! So pretty!! We loved learning about Alexander Calder. He was one that I never heard about when I was in school, so I loved learning about it him alongside my girls.

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    1. Thank you! I really enjoyed learning more about him too! Just another perk for us homeschool mamas :)

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