How We Created Our Own Van Gogh Immersive Experience
Vincent Van Gogh is one of the most well-known artists across the globe. In honor of his legacy, we created our own sort of Van Gogh immersive experience, which we lovingly called the Van Gogh Vault for our Spring Arts Festival. We transformed our gym into an art gallery that exhibited paintings created by all 600 students in our school, each one inspired by a work by Vincent van Gogh.
A Learning Experience to Make the Schoolhouse Rock
We wanted attendees of our Van Gogh Vault, aka the Van Gogh immersive experience, and our students to know more about the artist. So, most of the art exhibit was inspired by Van Gogh’s lesser-known works.
Vincent Van Gogh’s Sunflowers for 2nd Grade
I selected a unique piece for each grade level. Our second graders created Van Gogh’s The Garden with Sunflower painting. This lesser known, vertical painting has dark colors and is dissimilar to the rest of his Sunflower paintings.
To recreate this painting, we folded a piece of a long tagboard paper vertically and cut it in half. The kids created a sunflower at the top. The bottom of the tagboard had a long stem with lots of leaves, making this an excellent opportunity to incorporate shapes into the kids’ learning.
Kids in all grade levels used a painting technique I call “making dash marks.” Using the same unwashed brush, kids painted dash marks in multiple colors, resulting in a beautiful blend of colors that resembles Van Gogh’s work.
The Garden with Sunflower by Vincent Van Gogh was the inspiration for the 2nd Grade artwork.
Van Gogh’s Irises for 3rd Grade
The third graders created Irises. I got the idea for this project from another online art education company, but I put my spin on it. I went very deep into teaching about the colors and the sense of depth created in this painting, focusing on the foreground, middle ground, and the background.
The irises in this painting are in varying shades of purple. So, it was an ideal piece to teach color theory to the third graders. I wanted them to understand that dipping from one color to another will produce different shades of the same color or a new color. The students thought the overarching colors shown in the painting were magic.
3rd graders were inspired by Van Gogh’s Irises while 5th graders used his Wheatfield with Crows as inspiration.
For our Van Gogh Vault, fourth graders were inspired by Vincent Van Gogh's well-loved Starry Night.
Starry Night by Vincent Van Gogh for 4th Grade
The fourth graders did Starry Night. My fourth graders that year were exceptional at working with mixed media. So, I thought recreating this piece as a collage would be an excellent way to showcase that talent. This project also helped kids who struggled with mixed media improve those skills.
To create the collage, we painted shapes onto construction paper. We then cut the shapes out. However, painting in a straight line and curling it into a spiral took a lot of concentration and practice for the kids. We made A LOT of messy mats! After painting the background, the kids collaged and glued the rest of the pieces to it.
Our fourth graders were inspired by Vincent Van Gogh's Starry Night.
5th graders were inspired to paint by Vincent Van Gogh's Wheatfield with Crows for our Van Gogh Vault Arts Festival. This was our own version of a Van Gogh immersive experience.
Wheatfield with Crows by Van Gogh for 5th Graders
The fifth graders recreated Wheatfield with Crows. Fifth graders usually start showing interest in ‘edgier,’ out-of-the-box things. This bleak and eerie painting appealed to them, and the crows in the background sealed the deal.
I also knew this would be the perfect painting for my students to work on the horizon line because it’s a vital part of drawing. A horizon line is needed whether you're drawing a scene, landscape, or table setting.
We painted on black construction paper, which gave the painting an eerie sense. We used blue and gray to paint the sky and yellow and orange for the wheat field. The black paper showed through these colors and gave the painting a haunted feeling.
Final Thoughts: Better Than Artwork Bulletin Boards
The Van Gogh Vault was an excellent opportunity to display student work (even better than the artwork bulletin boards) and teach attendees about the artist. It was a truly remarkable experience to walk into our gym and see 600 different versions of Van Gogh's work created by our kids.
This project included studio processes, historical context, and community engagement. Those pieces could have been an art project but involving the community made it special, and I don't think any of those 600 kids will ever forget it. I certainly will not
More Van Gogh Art Resources
FREE Van Gogh Matching Game
This interactive matching game is a delightful way for students to engage with van Gogh's art while honing their observation and memory skills.
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