The last weekend of March was a cold and a dark one. Spending a lazy weekend at home is not my kind of relaxation. I decided to haul a couple of my cousins visiting our family for a quick trip to the Jane Voorhees Zimmerli Art Museum at Rutgers University (about 15 minutes from our home). It is a fairly good museum by New Jersey standards and we were fortunate to run into works by the Indian artist Natvar Bhavsar who was having a retrospective there. His work was characterized by very large abstract forms and shapes thickly overlaid by oil, encaustic and sand. My cousins were very excited on seeing the abstract art although they could not make much of it.. We also visited a hall that exhibited abstract American artwork (1960s – 1980s) and also imbibed some brilliant Soviet non-Conformist art of the 1970s. By the way, the Soviet art representation at this museum is outstanding…
They asked me a lot of questions on what each of the paintings meant and how we could read meanings into diffuse forms on the canvas. I am not so sure if I gave them proper perspectives, but from their faces they seemed a little confused. After about three hours at the museum, we headed back home all charged up on artwork and abstractions… They then decided that they were going to create a quick piece of artwork if I were to lend them a canvas to work on… (considering their original plans on watching a Spiderman movie that night, I thought the museum visit really set their creative juices flowing).
I told them the ground rules were that I would not participate in the painting process, but would offer suggestions and oil paints whenever needed. I told them to open their minds, forget what they learned at school and just express their thoughts on the canvas (easy words to say – I still cannot seem to practice it). They initially asked for color pencils and wax crayons and then proceeded to fill the canvas with words and phrases that they were taught at school with smaller pictures dotting the periphery and the centers of the canvas a la Basquiat style. I then handed them dabs of oil paints mixed with linseed and proceeded to give them disposable brushes with which to apply the oil at spots they felt would highlight aspects of what they had drawn into the background.
Title: Undecided; Artist: Aswin, Anusha and Hari; Material: Color pencils, wax crayons and oil on canvas; Size: 4 feet wide X 3 feet high (Click here for a higher resolution image.)
What they had created is pictured above. Of course the artwork was helped by bits of finishing touches added on by my three year old son (who had proceeded to hijack one corner of the canvas entirely to himself – the dark splotches at the top right corner was his handiwork). At the end of the exercise they felt elated, forgot about Spiderman and wanted to work on another canvas right away. It was about 10:30pm and I told them that it was late for bed and we could work on another one the next time they visited our home. I was very excited to see the activity and the energy that my cousins displayed on developing the artwork.
The next day, I remember feeling a little alarmed that I might have demolished some of the careful teachings in artwork that their teachers were imparting at school beginning with forms like drawing a house, sunrise and animals. In retrospect, I am not so sure if I did the right thing in exposing them to abstract art at so young an age but they sure had fun doing so. I would be very much interested in your thoughts…
My cousin’s names were Aswin and Anusha. He was 9 and she was 8. My son Hari will turn 3 in a couple of months.
I can see no flaw in your approach; indeed, I must congratulate you.
When you said “cousins,” I at first thought you meant some who who were peers in age. All during my reading, I was imagining this. I was delighted and surprised at the end to find out they were kids.
Well done. I think people do best when given freedom of choice with no peer pressure. Their excitement and interest in non-objective art sounds delightfully sincere; this is unlike many adults who wish to appear hip.
Even if my conscience told me that this approach might be the right thing, it is always good to hear feedback. Thank you, Rex.
I wanted the reader to appreciate the artwork before finding out the ages – hence the reason for putting their ages at the end (plus it is a good punch line ;-).
I think children have a lot of potential locked in them – it is just a matter of coaxing it out of them, the right way… I hope to have another ‘free form painting’ session at our home in the coming weeks… Lets see how that goes.
Sunil,
Great story! I think it is amazing you guys stayed at the museum for 3 hours, given their ages! I can’t see how exposing kids to ANY art could be a bad thing. Why limit them at that age? Why limit ourselves at any age? I also think working on something with someone else can be exhilerating, at any age.
Leslie,
Yes it was a little difficult to shepard the children along – but I think we managed admirably. I chose this museum expressly because it is a quiet place devoid of crowds on weekends (given the fact that it is a University Museum and the students have other things to do)…
I love the picture. It is happy not grim like some adult abstract art. A happy face in the middle and so much movement all around it.
Your cousins painted in blue. Not your color. Did you have a lot of blue leftover or was it their own choice?
I’m inspired with what you offered your cousins….a whole new world and way of communicating!! Stirring some curiosity and creativity without judgement or direction!!!
Sunil,
What a delight. What’s even more delightful is that most children the ages of your cousins are bent on “realism” and find themselves hideously frustrated that they can’t achieve it on first try. What you’ve done is showed them that art and color are a delight; later they can decide to work at the representational if they wish. Or they can simply continue to revel in the materials that make color and shape and line.
Well Done!
Birgit,
I am glad you noticed the smiley.
No – it was not a question of leftover blue – but the blue I gave them was cobalt and the brilliancy of the blue masked the little red and yellow that they had originally put on the canvas. I did not want to disturb them as they went about it – otherwise I would have told them not to overlay the yellows with the cobalt blue… And I am glad I did not jump in.
Ginger,
I am glad you enjoyed it!!
June,
You make a good point about ‘being bent on depicting realism’. Yes, I find that in children’s work and them getting all bent out of shape when the drawing does not seem to conform reality (which it does not need to)…