Activity:
Painting Watercolor Landscapes
Grandma Moses was a celebrated American folk artist who created many paintings of life around her – including landscapes! Your child can learn more about aspects of a landscape along with more about Grandma Moses through this watercolor activity!
Click to find similar content by grade or subject.
What You Need:
- Sheet of white paper
- Watercolor paints
- Paintbrush
What You Do:
- Help your child learn more about Grandma Moses and her interesting story by conducting research online or at your local library. Grandma Moses was an interesting woman that didn’t start painting until her 60s!
- Many of Grandma Moses’ works depicted rural scenes and often showed holiday celebrations and family gatherings. Invite your child to pick a season to use as inspiration for her painting.
- Now she can think about layout of her painting. Most of Grandma Moses’ paintings were landscapes, showcasing a foreground, middle ground and background. The foreground is the parts of the landscape closest to the viewer, middle ground are the items in the middle, and the background is what’s farthest from the viewer.
- Invite your child to use a pencil and ruler to lightly sketch where she would like each part of her landscape to be located.
- Now your child can start painting her landscape, including houses, nature, people, or animals – whatever she’d like! While she’s working, she can look at her favorite Grandma Moses painting as inspiration!
- When she’s finished, your child’s finished landscape painting can proudly be displayed somewhere in your home!
Did you know: Grandma Moses started out selling her paintings out of a local store for $3 to $5 each! And, Grandma Moses lived to be 101 years old!
