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In grades 7 and 8 students continue to build on their skills with perspective and exploration of the principles of design.
Students continue to build critical thinking skills through learning about various historical periods, styles and cultures.
A key theme in both grade 7 and 8 is the analysis of how art reflects the artist.
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| Untitled, 1984 |
Jean-Michel
Basquiat
Jean-Michel Basquiat was born on December 22, 1960 in Brooklyn, New York and died August 12 1988 in New York. His father, Gerard Basquiat was born in Port-au-Prince, Haiti and his mother,
Matilde was born in Brooklyn of Puerto Rican parents. As a youth living on the streets Basquiat began spray painting cryptic
aphorisms on subway trains and around lower Manhattan. He
lived with friends and began selling hand painted postcards and T-shirts. In June of 1980, Basquiat's art was publicly exhibited
for the first time in a show sponsored by Colab (Collaborative Projects Incorporated). In 1981, Jean-Michel Basquiat catapulted
from being an unknown nineteen year-old graffiti writer to becoming one of the most successful, controversial, glamorous artists
in the world. By 1984, many of Basquiat's friends had become quite concerned about his excessive drug use, often finding him
unkempt and in a state of paranoia. Basquiat's paranoia was also fueled by the very real threat of people stealing work from
his apartment and of art dealers taking unfinished work from his studio. In 1986, Basquiat travelled to Africa for the first
time and his work was shown in Abidjan, Ivory
Coast. In November, a large exhibition of more than sixty paintings and drawings opened at
the Kestner-Gesellschaft in Hannover; at twenty-five Basquiat was the youngest artist ever
given an exhibition there. Upon return to North America Basquiat died as the result of a heroin overdose on August 12 1988
the age of 27.
Other work by Basquait...
Basquiat's work illustrates the influence of an individuals culture and lifestyle in relationship to a specific time
in history. Students at this age, will be able to identify with the artist personal struggles and be able to recognize
perhaps thier own styles within the graffeti culture that Basquait's work examplifes. In addition students can learn
to confront the contemporary concerns of fine art in terms of learning about conceptualism (the concept as a creative process,
the final art piece a product rather than purpose).
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| Early Moses, 1983 |
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Other Artists to Look at...
Frida Kahlo
Frida Kahlo, real name Magdalena Carmen Frida Kahlo y Calderón was born in Mexico City
on July 6, 1907 and died in 1954. During her short life she had many accomplishments. She was a surrealist artist who expressed
her feelings and thoughts through her paintings. Her father was a photographer of Hungarian Jewish descent and her mother
was Spanish and Native American. Her life was to be a long series of physical traumas, and the first of these came early when
at the age of six she was stricken with polio, which left her with a limp. In 1922 she entered the Preparatoria (National Preparatory School), the most prestigious educational
institution in Mexico, which had only
just begun to admit girls. She was one of only thirty-five girls out of two thousand students.
Early in her career as an artist Kahlo met famed murealist Diego Rivera in 1928 that she later married and divorced.
The two found that they had much in common, not least from a political point of view, since both were communist militants.
In July 1954, she made her last public appearance, when she participated in a Communist demonstration against the overthrow
of the left-wing Guatemalan president Jacobo Arbenz.
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| Self-Portrait with Monkey. 1938 |
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| The Execution of the Third of May, 1808 |
Francisco
Jose Goya
Francisco
Goya, born March 30, 1746 in Fuendetodos, Spain is considered the 18th
Century's foremost painter and etcher of Spanish culture. Goya’s work is known for his realistic scenes of battles,
bullfights and human corruption. The artist lived during a time of upheaval in Spain
that included war with France, the Inquisition,
the rule of Napolean’s brother, Joseph, as the King of Spain and, finally, the reign of the Spanish King Ferdinand VII.
Goya's deafness as a result of an illness in 1793 was central to understanding Goya's work, which frequently depicts human
misery in a satiric and sometimes nightmarish fashion. After 1824 he lived in self-imposed exile in Bordeaux until his death, reportedly because of political differences with Ferdinand. Over
his long career he created hundreds of paintings, etchings, and lithographs.
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Enter supporting content here
This site is built in accordance with the expectations outlined in The Ontario Curriculum. The objective is to serve as a
resource for students and teachers to confront the integration of art history into arts education program
 
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