Autumn Equinox: The Colour of the Night
Painting Shadows
Honestly, I only picked it up because it's based on a painting by my favourite artist, Gauguin.
It fit beautifully into our theme of 'Balance' and highlighted characters representing night/day, relating to today's Mabon (Autumn Equinox) celebrations of equal daylight and night.
The book tells a tale about a village of people who have coloured shadows. Their lives are full of light.
They are cheerful and never allow negativity.
A young boy feels conflicted about always being happy and is shunned for his negative thoughts and feelings. His life is represented by nighttime and darkness.
The book teaches about range of emotions and balance.
We set out some animals and traced their shadows.
We noted how shadows are longer than the shapes, particularly in the afternoon light, as the sun is headed into the Western horizon.
I then asked for them to paint shadow drawings in a rainbow of colours to represent various feelings.
Since we were already delving into Artist Study, I brought out a book of Gauguins work and asked Ms.O to pick her favourite piece. She found a landscape painting and used it as inspiration for watercolour work.
