1st Grade
"Drawing with Scissors" like Henri Matisse
Henri Matisse was a French painter who also invented a new art form called collage. He liked to draw, paint, do printmaking and sculpt, but he was known primarily as a painter. He was most known for his brightly colored paintings that used a lot of form and decorative patterns. He was one of the original "Fauve" artists. In French, Fauve means wild beast. People weren't used to seeing paintings with so many bright and wild colors. In his later years, right before he died, he developed a new form of art that hadn't been done before. He called it "painting with scissors," or "paper cut outs." Because he was ill and had to be in bed at all times, he had others paint papers for him that he would then cut and make collages with.
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December 31, 1869 – November 3, 1954
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Matisse was first famous as a painter. He did some crazy paintings that people weren't used to seeing at the time. He used wild and bright colors for things. People weren't sure of this, and they called him a "Fauve" painter because of it. Fauve means "wild beast" in French. We look at this painting today and we think, wow... this is really neat. But, back then, it was very strange and new.
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Later on in his career, Matisse became sick from intestinal cancer. He had surgery and ended up with complications from the surgery. This ultimately put him in a wheelchair, and then was bed ridden. During this time, he was unable to paint like he liked to. So, he then started exploring other mediums. He figured out how to paint papers to make what we now know as construction paper. He then cut shapes out of these papers. He liked to call this "Drawing with Scissors." He worked hard at balancing shapes on the paper, playing with the colors to see what looked best next to what. And, he loved cutting organic shapes for his "cut paper" artwork. We now call this a form of collage. But, he was the first to do this kind of work.
Here is some of his collage artwork:
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Another artist that was inspired by Matisse:
Your Challenge: "Paint with Scissors" and make a Matisse collage. Have fun making your own "paper garden" to play in.
Try to make shapes that are symmetrical on both sides like I showed you how to do. Try to make "organic" shapes that when someone looks at it, they don't know what it is. Try overlapping some shapes as you glue them onto your background. You could even weave some of them together. Matisse would tell you to "arrange and rearrange" your paper cut outs until it makes you happy.
Remember, when you cut something that is symmetrical, you want it to have the same shape and "balance" on both sides. That's how Matisse would tell you to do it. Keep this in mind as you start to glue your pieces down onto your paper as well. "Balance" them... make them have the same "weight" on both sides.