While learning about pop artist Roy Lichtenstein my students explored his use of primary coloured dots. The students had a choice of
Crying Girl (1964) and
Girl with Hair Ribbon printouts to create their artworks. Surprisingly, it was pretty even in which image the kids picked. I showed the kids an example I had created, looking at it from far away and close up, while discussing how spacing the dots closer together works to creates areas of shadow, and more solid looking colours, while spacing the dots farther apart creates highlights. The kids used tempera paint with q-tips and toothpicks to create their dots.
We spent about 30-40 mins on these, but the younger students lost focus more quickly than the older ones while initially creating their artworks. I thought that they would be completely done with it, but to my surprise during free art sessions they asked to continue working on them. With this in mind I would suggest doing this artwork in short bursts, as an activity for those who finish other projects early.
Below I've included a close up and far away image of each artwork to give a sense of how their appearance changes from each viewpoint.
This artist did a great job in spacing dots to create highlights in the hair and on the lips.
This artist had fairly even spacing throughout, but nonetheless, I like the resulting 'sunburn' effect.
The use of different sized dots on the lips and face in this image creates a very cool effect when viewed from far away.
