Thanks Piet Mondrian

This weeks work was inspired by the Dutch painter Piet Mondrain. I have to say sometimes I just don't know what art projects will work well with those with Alzheimer's or for the elderly for that matter. Sometimes you think you have a great project and it just flops. Well this project was a winner. I was shocked at how everyone settled in and just really focused on the project.

Here's where I got the idea for the project, Piet Mondrain for Kids. They do a great job explaining how it works. I would recommend getting some of Piet's work that is similar to what you'll be creating to show your participants. Having a little bit of history on this gentleman is great too. You'll find info at his website here.

I first made a sample myself to show the groups. Then I premade all of them by just adding a couple of lines of tape on each page of card stock. Each one was a little different, I had them pick one that spoke to them. Then I would ask them where they would like to put the next line of tape. Once they felt there was enough lines, I gave them red, yellow, blue and black paint to use.

What I love about my groups is I try to give them a few rules to go by and they usually break all of them. I LOVE THIS. While I tried to have them stick to squares and rectangles there were many triangles and other wild shapes. They'd mix their paint to come up with other colors and THAT'S what I love about the creative process.

At the end of the class I like to ask each person to talk a little about their work. I try to see if they can come up with a title and any other thoughts or feelings they have about their work. 

Love Week

I've been pondering what to have the peeps create for the week of Valentines. So I decided to head to my favorite site in the whole wide world...Pinterist of course, and start to do a little search. Came across the Useyourcoloredpencils blog and loved the art project that resembles the work of Robert Indiana's Love Sculpture. I like when I can show the peeps that what they are doing is inspired from a well known artist. Much like the painting with scissors project we did a few weeks ago that was inspired by Henri Matisse.

My cat Mike checking out the project. He approves!!

I've found that with elder classes, they actually do quite well when we do a drawing step-by-step. I'll use a white board and walk through each line with them. I like outlining the words in a black crayon and or oil pastel. It creates a nice resist technique so when you paint in the spaces, the paint is easily kept in the right spots.

I recommend bringing in pictures of Mr. Indiana's Love sculpture to show the class. It's also a great conversation piece to see if it triggers any memories in my early Alzheimer's groups. 

I took an 8 1/2 by 11 piece of paper,  folded it so it makes a squire and cut off the excess. Then I folded the paper in half both horizontally and vertically so I had four boxes the same size. This makes it easier to create each letter in it's own box. You could first use a pencil to draw in your letters, and then go over it with a dark oil pastel and or crayon. Then get out the paints, course you could use any type of medium really. I just like the watercolors with the oil pastels due to the resist technique that is created.

Just an FYI...I created these two Love pics very quickly. I didn't even use card stock, which I would recommend, or even watercolor paper. I tried a few different approaches with colors.