Art Awareness First Grade Lesson 4 – George Seurat Dec 2, March 29, 1891

Pointillism- using tiny dots of different colors next to each other to create a picture. The eye mixes the colors instead of the painter mixing them. George grew up in Paris and his family was wealthy which allowed him to focus on his art He attended the School of Fine Arts in Paris He also served in the military George’s parents helped him set up a studio not far from their home Unlike many poor artist he didn’t need to sell his art to survive He started painting with tiny dots instead of mixing colors and we call this pointillism He felt that his way of painting would make the colors appear more brilliant to the viewer

His first major painting was Bathers at Asnieres. It was a large painting of people relaxing near the water as Asneires. He was proud of it and entered it at the Salon a French art exhibition but it was rejected. He didn’t give up and entered it into the Society of Independent Artists and presented his art at their exhibition

The Circus This was sadly his final painting because he died at a young age of 31 from what was likely meningitis. His paintings work a lot like computer monitors work today. His dots were like the pixels on a computer screen.

Let’s practice with Pointillism using Q-tips to create tiny dots of color to make a painting.