One Day Elementary Art Lesson | First Grade Still Life Painting, Cezanne

I just had to share this tonight.  It couldn't wait.  First grade has been learning about still lifes as part of our curriculum this year, and today I completed my first round of Cezanne apple still lifes.

I was SO pleased with how these turned out!  It only took one class period, which is always nice, and the kids really enjoyed making them.  We reviewed what a still life is [because we just completed a Van Gogh sunflower still life], and looked at a few of Cezanne's apple paintings.  I will write out the steps below [although I feel that it's pretty self explanatory].

 Step 1: Draw three or four circles. [so easy]  I used black pastels, but black crayons would be alright.

Step 2: I told the kids to draw a "u" with a little line on it to create the stems.

Step 3: Draw the plate [or bowl] around the apples.  It doesn't need to be perfect!

Step 4: Design your table cloth.  This is where they can really have fun with it and make it their own.

Step 5:  I had the students paint only one side of each apple either red or green. [I used tempera cakes.]
Step 6: Add yellow to all of the apples and go back and add more red or green [or orange].  Mixing colors on the paper is fine!
Step 7: Finish the rest of the painting.  I encouraged them to paint the plate only 1 color so that the apples stood out more. But they could paint the table cloth any way they wanted.
Step 8:  This is the hardest part, but I think it makes a huge difference.  [Carefully] Go back over your black pastel marks.  They will have to be careful because the paper will probably still be wet in places.  We JUST painted and used pastels on top for our last project, so my kids were really good about taking their time with the pastels.

That's it!  I am really trying to get my kids to remember that a still life is THINGS, portraits are PEOPLE, and sea/city/landscapes are PLACES.  We will be moving right along to those other subjects soon.  Let me know if you'd like to see more step-by-step examples!