Art Instruction Books with DVD and Blu-Ray ~ A New TOS Review!!

We have used other series from ARTistic Pursuits, Inc., so we were very excited to hear we'd be reviewing Artists that Shaped the Italian Renaissance from their brand new series ARTistic Pursuits Art Instruction Book with DVD and Blu-Ray. We thought this would be a great art curriculum and would go best with our Renaissance studies in history.

This brand new series has 6 volumes for K - 3, which are hardback editions, and 2 more on the way (8 total). We had actually just come from a homeschool convention in March where my art loving daughter and her father went to a seminar taught by Ariel Holcomb, who is also the video host on the DVD and Blu-Ray. As soon as we played the first video lesson for lesson 1. There are 18 lessons and 6 video lesson components for Volume 4, as well as a page on materials needed for this volume and simple teaching methods. Even though my daughter is older then 3rd grade, she joined her brother (who is a 3rd grader) with the lessons.

Because we have had art in our curriculum over the years I chose to not start with the first volume. And I was hoping to match their art up with what my high schooler was working on since some of the artists they are/will learn about in this volume were the same. Those artists include Cimabue, Giotto, Limbourg, da Vinci, Michelangelo, and Sofonisba, to name a few. Each lesson starts off with some reading, usually a little story about the artist or the times, followed by an art piece for your student(s) to study. Once they have studied the piece, you can ask them some of the critical thinking and observation questions. These aren't there to have a "right" answer, but helps your child look more intently on each piece they are studying. You will also find the objectives for each of the 18 lessons at the back of the book.

There are some key difference in the way that ARTistic Pursuits, Inc., approaches teaching art then other curriculums. One is that for older children they can read the materials and teach themselves independently. With the K - 3 age range, even if you have no clue about art yourself, all you have to do is read these lessons, provide your child with the necessary supplies, and let them create THEIR art. You will learn about art right next to your child. You could even join in, it's really that simple. They also include art history, helping children use their own interests and ideas to create their own art pieces that relate back to the artist they are learning about. They learn to grow their observation skills, critical thinking skills, and they learn how to draw on their own with their own quirks. This is how an artist is born. They also created the video lessons to be short enough to hold the students attention and learn the use of the materials, but not so long they are just sitting all day in front of the TV. Brenda Ellis, the author of this series, does say watching the video multiple times will allow them to see additional techniques they may have missed the first time through the lesson.

Blu-Ray intro screen

Ariel is dressed up at the beginning of each video lesson.

Clear pictures of how to lay out your space from a video lesson.

There were a few materials that we didn't have on hand (we do a LOT of art) so I went out to get some supplies to be sure we had them on hand as they came up in the lessons. I chose to go to a local store and get the items listed. There is an option to purchase the supplies you will need for each book so you are sure you have the right materials. I still have a few items I will need to gather, but that's not for a while so I chose to wait on those (like spackling paste and a putty knife) until we are closer to that project.

Dipping water into the Prang watercolor set.

I really enjoyed that the 'teaching time' was short ... just about 10 minutes. That allowed my children to get started quickly and keep their enthusiasm about the art project up. The very first lesson was a little bit of a struggle for both my children mainly because they have never really drawn themselves ... and drawing people is just hard. My job after we watched the video was to remind them of some of the steps they learned (which were repeated at the end of the video lesson.) like making sure you pulled your brush once you had painted your outlines; how to add more color; swishing your paintbrush in the water to clean and making sure to drag your brush to remove excess water. There were also tips given like waiting for a few minutes until the paint is dry before moving to the next color so the watercolors don't bleed into each other. I will now hear my son saying thins like swish, swish, swish, when he uses watercolors for other art projects.

Review of steps.

Sketching his 'gesture' painting.

 This 4th volume, Artists that Shaped the Italian Renaissance, starts in the 13th century and goes through the 16th century and shows just how art was changed during this fascinating time period. Lesson 1 begins with how to do watercolor. Other lessons will cover things like scratch art, frescos, and oil pastels. The lessons also explain concepts like foreground, background, foreshortening, and texture to name a few. During the video lessons Ariel repeats the main objectives that Brenda is teaching to help with learning those skills. This is particularly helpful for younger artists because repetition helps with retention of the steps.

"Gold leaf" is in the middle. 

Both of my kids enjoyed the 2nd lesson where they added "gold leaf" to their painting. We used gold origami paper, which was one of the materials listed in the front of the book. My daughter wanted to skip ahead to making the fresco panels in lessons 11 & 12, but I told her that we should try not to jump ahead to far. So she settled on doing a calendar page to mimic the Book of Hours that the Limbourgh brothers created for the Duke of Berry. We also looked for a more recent picture of the Louvre by the Seine River to find similarities and differences as the lesson suggested.

Working on the top for her calendar page.

My son has tried to do the first few lessons on his own a second time. I told him since he was not happy with his end results that he could try them again and just to go slow. He tends to move fast through everything, but while painting I saw that he was using Brenda's techniques like pulling the brush in one direction, swishing to get the paint off, and dragging to let the excess water drop back in your can. In these pictures he is trying to perfect his figures making a gesture (bent knees or arms or a tilted head).

Sketching self portraits.

Gold leaf lesson.

They are really excited about the new techniques and language they are learning about art. I really appreciate that both the text and videos are written in a clear and precise way so as not to be daunting to us non-artists. I even plan to join in on some of the lessons that are coming up like the watercolor wash, line resists, and collagraph. I know we will be checking out some other books in this new art curriculum series - ARTistic Pursuits Art Instruction Books with DVD and Blu-Ray. You can learn more about some of the books that our crew reviewed (Art for Children, Building a Visual Vocabulary; Art of the Ancients; and Art of the Middle Ages) in this series by clicking the link below. You can also find ARTistic Pursuits, Inc., on Facebook and Twitter.