Class Listing: We’ll take a trip around the world together and students will learn basic sketching, perspective, and watercolor techniques while drawing such landmarks as the Taj Mahal, Eiffel Tower, and a watercolor postcard of the Golden Gate Bridge. Lessons will be guided drawing and beginning watercolor techniques of famous structures in simple landscapes.
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World Landmarks was great fun as I traveled around the world with 12 talented young artists. Our first stop was India and the Taj Mahal. We learned a lot about the famous structure such as it took over 1,000 elephants to help bring the materials to the site to build it and it is thought to be haunted by the Empress Mumtaz Mahal, whom it was built for.
When we were ready to sketch the structure, we simplified it down to it’s most basic shapes, and sketched them several times with pencil in our sketchbooks before we were comfortable to do a final sketch on watercolor paper. The long and somewhat complex shape of the windows proved to be most challenging for students to sketch but the most fun to draw and, once the shadows were put in, it gave the structure a lot of dimension.
When we were ready to paint the Taj Mahal, we took into consideration the idea that the famous building takes on different coloring at different times of the day, from a pinkish hue in the morning hours, to a milky white hue late in the day, and finally a golden glow at night when it is lit by the moon. Legend says that the changing colors of the Taj Mahal resembles the changing moods of the Empress. Students decided what time of day they wanted their Taj Mahal to portray and used the appropriate paint colors to represent it.
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Next, we traveled to Paris, France, to tackle the most iconic manmade structure in the world, the Eiffel Tower. We learned some basic fun facts about the tower, such as that it is over 1,ooo feet high and was built as the entrance to the 1889 World’s Fair, but BY FAR the students favorite facts were, 1) that the Eiffel Tower can grow up to 6 inches in the summer because of the expansion of its steel. 2) There is a restaurant on the middle level of the tower that anyone can eat at! We even saw a photo of the city of Paris taken from the Jules Verne Restaurant, and we all decided we would like to eat there some day…
To sketch the Eiffel Tower we, again, simplified the structure to it’s most basic shapes. I kept the Eiffel Tower as a drawing lesson since it is a very complex subject and really not that interesting for a young artist to paint. After two sketches in our sketchbooks, we did our final drawing on a long, tall piece of drawing card stock and we used color pencils to put in our horizon line, as well as a few finishing details.
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| A dazzling array of Eiffel Towers! |
The final drawings were then mounted on matte board and young artists were able to sign their works of art with their “artist’s signature”, which we talked about and practiced during our first class.
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Our final stop on our trip around the world was, of course, HOME! Where students were really excited to learn our last World Landmark subject was The Golden Gate Bridge. We all shared LOTS of stories of walking across, driving across, and visiting the bridge with family and friends.
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| A lovely Golden Gate Bridge postcard |
Since this World Landmark was so close to home for us, I decided it would be fun to paint the Bridge onto a watercolor postcard, so young artists could send the card to a special person if they wish.
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| The Golden Gate Bridge with blue skies! |
When we began our sketches in our sketchbooks, we started with a brief but important lesson on perspective, because we wanted to try and portray the Bridge fading back into the scene on our card. Students then decided what time of day they wanted to portray in their painting and we had a lesson on watercolor washes for a sky.
The results were fabulous!
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