Chicken Crossing the Road

Elements of Art

Line: the flat path of a dot through space used by artists to control the viewer’s eye movement; a long narrow mark or stroke made on or in a surface; a thin mark made by a pencil, pen, or brush. Lines can be horizontal, vertical, or diagonal; straight or curved; thick or thin.
Shape: a two-dimensional (flat) area enclosed by a line. Real space contains three dimensions: height, width and depth. An illusion of depth can be created in two-dimensional art formats, using certain techniques.

Principles of Design

Movement: using the elements of art to move the viewer's eye around and within the image. In this lesson, movement is created by the illusion of space.

Additional Vocabulary

Background, Middle Ground & Foreground: The areas in a picture that take up space. Objects that are closest are situated in the foreground, farthest from the horizon line/vanishing point. While objects that are farthest are situated closer to the horizon line/vanishing point.
Horizon Line: A horizontal line where the land (or sea) ’meets’ the sky. It is the farthest spot we can see.
One-Point Perspective: A drawing method that creates the illusion of depth on a 2-dimensional surface using diagonal lines that converge to ta vanishing point on the horizon line. 
Overlapping: A technique to create depth in a 2-dimensional image. When shapes overlap, the partially obscured one appears to recede (get farther away). Proportion: The relationship between parts to a whole or to each other, in terms of size or amount. In this lesson it creates depth when it shrinks shapes that are closer to the horizon line (i.e. ‘farther away’).
Vanishing Point: Where parallel lines (lines that are equidistant) appear to meet on the horizon line.

Materials & Supplies

Context (History and/or Artists)

Before the 1300’s, art was rich and beautiful but made no attempt to create the illusion of depth and space. During the 1300’s, Italian painters explored these ideas using altered lines and shading to create depth, but it was perfected by later Italian artist during the Renaissance. Leonardo Davinci, Michelangelo, Raphael, Botticelli, Donatello and Titian represented artistic pinnacles and were so imitated that the theory of perspective took hold throughout the art world. 

Advanced Preparation

• Prepare a short slide show of photos of Italian masterpieces by the above artists that demonstrate simple one-point perspective with a clear vanishing point and receding vertical objects such as trees of buildings.

Tips & Tricks

• Show the video (3.54 minutes), “Easy 1 Point Perspective” pointing out the same rules being used to draw a single building or the 7-minute video “Lesson 5B: One Point Perspective Cityscape.” This can be stopped at the 5-minute mark if needed.

• It helps to use long (18 inch) clear rulers, if available.
• Depending on how detailed the students are with their drawing, you may need to allow 1.5 hours to include time to paint with the watercolor paints.
• The first pencil lines should be drawn very lightly so that can be fully erased, by your students.
• Remind students to erase upper pencil lines of “X” so they don’t have sharpie lines running through their sky, trees or buildings.
• Horizontal and vertical lines will be ‘true’ if the edge of the ruler is lined up with the edge of the paper before drawing the line.

Discussion Points

Using the slide show look for repeated examples of depth: 
 - Things appear to get smaller as they go back in space.
 - Normally parallel lines intended to move from the foreground to back ground become diagonal as they converge at the vanishing point on a horizon line.
 - Horizontal & vertical lines not receding stay the same but if repeated closer to the horizon they get smaller.

Reflection Point (Assessment of Learning Objectives)

Students will:

• Identify areas of perspective examples using vocabulary words above, during class discussion.
• Observe & practice the theory of one-point perspective drawing.
• Draw a landscape using one-point perspective.
• Paint the drawing using watercolors.

Instructions for Lesson

1. Demonstrating under a document camera or on a white board, lightly draw an ‘x’ from the top left corner to bottom right corner and from top right corner to bottom left corner using the ruler. (Unless this is done in advance.)
2. Make the vanishing point dot where the lines intersect. Draw a horizon line from edge to edge through the vanishing point. Have students do this.
3. When most of them have completed this step, have them stop & watch you.
4. Draw the sidewalk lines to follow the diagonals radiating from the vanishing point with additional lines touching the bottom edge slightly inside the first set. Use horizontal lines to separate pavement. Use vertical broken lines drawn from the vanishing point to the bottom of the paper. Have students do this.
5.  Draw a large tree in the foreground on the left side. Draw a slightly smaller one ‘behind’ it. The tops of the trees should meet the diagonal line running from the top left corner to the vanishing point and the trunks should be parallel to the edge of the paper (a common mistake on this step is for students to draw trees that angle out toward the edge of the paper). Have students do this.
6. Draw (lightly) the side of a building in the middle ground on the right side. This should be a rectangle with vertical & horizontal sides. (flat) Add a couple of windows.
7. Draw one more building’s side, leaving room between for the foreshortened walls to be added later. Each ‘side’ will get progressively smaller as it ‘nears’ the vanishing point and should follow the diagonal line running from the tope right corner. Have students do this.
8. Line up the ruler from the vanishing point to the bottom left corner of the farthest ‘side’, draw a short diagonal at the top and the bottom of the receding wall & connect them with a vertical line. Repeat with the other ‘sides’. Have students do this.
9. Students may add their chicken and other details about why it is crossing the road on or near the road, paying attention to its size in relationship to its placement in either foreground, middle ground or background. 
10. Using a permanent marker, demonstrate going over a few lines. Point out that the ruler MUST be used again, with it moved slightly over to allow for the thicker marker point. No freehand straight lines or it will look messy. Have students do this.
11.  Have students erase any pencil lines.
12. Paint with watercolor. Alternatively, students could draw in pencil, color with watercolor pencils and then “activate” them with water and a brush if time allows.

References & Attributions

Lesson written by Cynthia Moring and Juliette Ripley-Dunkleberger. Videos referenced: Easy 1 Point Perspective and Lesson 5B: One Point Perspective Cityscape.

Notes for Educators

21st Century Thinking Skills
Reflecting, Observing, Making Connections, Visualizing, Sequencing, determining main idea, Finding Evidence, Determining Point of View, Analyzing.

WA State Learning Standards
(VA:Cr2.1.4) a. Explore and invent art-making techniques and approaches. This happens when learning the drawing technique of one-point perspective. 
(VA:Cr3.1.4) a. Revise artwork in progress on the basis of insights gained through peer discussion. This happens as students correct their work. 
(VA:Re7.1.4) a. Compare responses to a work of art before and after working in similar media. This happens as students learn to identify the rules of one-point perspective drawing. 
(VA:Re9.1.4) a. Apply one set of criteria to evaluate more than one work of art. This happens when evaluating accuracy of using this technique. 
(VA:Cn11.1.4) a. Through observation, infer information about time, place, and culture in which a work of art was created. This happens when observing works of art used as examples of one-point perspective.

Arts Integration Opportunities
Math: understanding spatial relationships and distance. This lesson is great to use mathematics, fractions, division, measuring and computation. To find the vanishing point (in the middle of the paper), have the students measure and divide. They can use computation and study angles in a number of ways in this lesson.

Please note:  These lesson plans are intended for non-profit use only. Use of these plans for commercial purposes should give attribution to the Issaquah Schools Foundation and be accompanied by a nominal donation at www.isfdn.org/donate. Thank you.

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