Kandinsky Circles with 1st Grade

1st Grade recently saw the painting Several Circles by Wassily Kandinsky. We had a wonderful aesthetics discussion on why Kandinsky would choose to make a picture that wasn't really of something (nonobjective art). Some of the students really got it, with suppositions like "maybe he just wanted it to be about the colors." Other students suggested that he might have run out of ideas of things to draw, or maybe the circle was his favorite shape.

After our discussion of Kandinsky's work, the students traced some round objects I had in the classroom to make their own nonobjective circle artwork. We used crayons to color the circles, and then watercolors later to add a background and complete a few of the circles however they wanted. This was a really fun project because the students had complete freedom of color and composition. Also, I didn't have to hear "I can't draw that!" or "I'm not very good at making that," once, since it's just circles, and the only way to make perfect circles no matter how good of an artist you are is to trace something or to use a compass.