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National Museum of Women in the Arts

Abstraction from Different Angles

Alma Woodsey Thomas, <em>Orion</em>, 1973; Acrylic on canvas, 59 3/4 x 54 in.; National Museum of Women in the Arts, Gift of Wallace and Wilhelmina Holladay; © Estate of Alma Thomas (Courtesy of the Hart Family)/Artists Rights Society (ARS), New York; Photo by Lee Stalsworth
Collection-Focused Lesson
Grade Level
9 to 12
Subject Area
Visual Art Writing

Overview

Students will describe, analyze, and interpret three abstract artworks from NMWA’s collection to gain an understanding of the ways artists develop visual voices to express ideas and emotions abstractly. Each student will select one of the three artworks and create an original work inspired by it.

Instructional Objectives

Visual Arts

Students will:

  • Understand and engage in the process of art criticism: describing, analyzing, interpreting, and evaluating.
  • Draw parallels between the creative processes of professional artists and their own.
  • Be able to name three abstract artists and identify characteristics of their work.
  • Visually express inspiration and personal voice within a single work of art.

Writing

Students will:

  • Understand and engage in the process of art criticism: describing, analyzing, interpreting, and evaluating.
  • Understand that an artist must be able to clearly articulate her/his ideas in writing throughout the creative process, from initial proposal to final reflection.
  • Engage in reflective practice and critiques through writing.

Instructional Plan

Observe

The teacher will present an introduction to abstraction and abstract art, including biographies of Georgia Mills Jessup (1926 to 2016), Alma Woodsey Thomas (1891 to 1978), and Mildred Thompson (1936 to 2003), three women artists featured in NMWA’s collection. Students will take notes in their sketchbooks and create visual journal pages for the three artists.

For the following activities, break up into three groups to divide up the featured artworks, Jessup’s Rainy Night, Downtown (1969), Thomas’s Orion (1973), and Thompson’s Magnetic Fields (1990), among students.

Georgia Mills Jessup
Washington, DC-native Georgia Mills Jessup demonstrated diverse talent as a painter, sculptor, ceramicist, muralist, and collage artist.
A black-and-white photograph of an adult woman with long dark hair in a braid. She wears a plaid shirt, jacket, large belt and hoop earrings. Her hand is touching her braid. She stands next to a painting which depicts an abstract street scene.
Alma Woodsey Thomas
Alma Woodsey Thomas developed her signature style of large, abstract paintings filled with dense, irregular patterns of bright colors in her 70s.
A black-and-white photograph of an older adult woman wearing a dress with square patterns resembling a quilt. She smiles, surrounded by her paintings, holding one herself. The paintings feature different colored, thick, similarly shaped brushstrokes that create vertical stripes.
Mildred Thompson
Mildred Thompson was an abstract artist who worked across a range of mediums.
Close-up black and white photo of a woman with a medium-dark skin tone looking directly into the camera. Resting her head on a table, she crosses her left arm in front of her mouth, reaching her right hand up to her hair. She wears a dark blouse, open at the cuffs, gold hoop earrings.

Describe

Heavy black lines along with circles and ovals rendered in hot hues of orange and yellow evoke urban architecture and the glare of streetlights in an abstract painting. Two shadowy figures occupy the lower right, and legible signs include “Translux,” “St. H NW,” and “Casino.”
Georgia Mills Jessup, Rainy Night, Downtown, 1967; Oil on Canvas, 44 x 48 in.; National Museum of Women in the Arts, Gift of Savanna M. Clark; © Marsha E. Jessup, Rose A. Powhatan, Juaquin F. Jessup, and Miklos A. Jessup

Imagine you are writing a postcard about this artwork to someone who can’t see it. In 200 words or fewer, describe in detail what you see. Use the Word Bank provided and your past knowledge of art terms to write about the artwork, but don’t mention artist’s name or artwork title. Consider answering the following questions in your postcard:

  • What do you see?
  • What do you think about what you see?
  • What do you wonder?

Students will pair up to share their writing and will be asked to guess which artwork their classmate described.

Analyze

Painting features vertical tile-shaped brushstrokes in various shades of red separated by horizontal white lines. Creating a rhythmic and mosaic-like pattern that resembles stitching, the white lines create stair steps in the lower right corner, separating as they move towards the center.
Alma Woodsey Thomas, Orion, 1973; Acrylic on canvas, 59 3/4 x 54 in.; National Museum of Women in the Arts, Gift of Wallace and Wilhelmina Holladay; © Estate of Alma Thomas (Courtesy of the Hart Family)/Artists Rights Society (ARS), New York; Photo by Lee Stalsworth

Analyze the artwork for aesthetic/formal concerns. Identify principles of design and elements of art. Using your knowledge of color theory, analyze the artist’s use of color. Consider composition and analyze concerns like arrangement, overlapping, cropping, and balance. Students will share writing in discussion.

Interpret

Mildred Thompson, Magnetic Fields (detail), 1990; Oil on canvas, 62 x 48 in.; National Museum of Women in the Arts, Gift of the Georgia Committee of NMWA in honor of the thirtieth anniversary of the Georgia Committee and the National Museum of Women in the Arts; © The Mildred Thompson Estate; Courtesy of Galerie Lelong & Co., New York; Photo by Christopher Burke

What clues does the artist provide, visual or verbal (e.g., title), that this work was inspired by the world around her? What might be the subject of this work and what story is the artist telling us about it? When asked, be able to offer evidence, from the artwork and about the artist, to substantiate your inferences. Students will share writing in discussion.

Create: Abstract Artwork

Supplies:

  • Sketchbook
  • Pen
  • Pencil
  • Paper
  • Self-selected art-making materials

Activity

  1. Write a proposal for your art project that is inspired by one of the three artists introduced in this lesson by answering the following prompts: Identify the artist and title of the artwork that has inspired you. What about this artist inspired you? What will your artwork be about? Write a brief description of the theme/concept/big idea that is the basis of your art. Thinking of the artist who inspires you, describe your work method. What materials will you use? What techniques will you employ? Given the opportunity, what two questions would you ask the artist who inspires you?
    What research will you do to inspire your artwork? What planning will you do to ensure that your artwork is successful and creative?
  2. Once your proposal is approved, planning begins. Jessup, Thompson, and Thomas planned their compositions carefully before putting paint to canvas. Adopting this process, use your sketchbook to plan your composition and your color palette. Include thumbnail sketches, color mixing experiments, and detail sketches.
  3. Create your final work of art and present it for group critique.

Reflect

Describe what you gained from the experience of working in another artist’s style. Using the Word Bank provided and your past knowledge of art terms, describe, analyze, and interpret a classmate’s completed artwork.

Word Bank

Balance

Asymmetrical, Radial, Symmetrical

Contrast

Expressive, Hue, Intensity, Intermediate/Tertiary, Monochromatic, Neutral, Primary, Realistic/Local, Recede, Secondary, Shades, Spectrum, Tints, Warm

Line

Broken, Continuous, Contour, Crosshatching, Curved, Descriptive, Diagonal, Expressive, Gestural, Hatching, Horizontal, Implied, Outline, Parallel, Perpendicular,, Stippling, Straight, Thick, Thin, Vertical

Color

Advance, Analogous, Complementary, Cool

Pattern

Density

Shape

Geometric, Organic, Negative, Positive

Space

Cropping, Depth, Flat, Framing

Texture

Actual, Implied, Negative, Overlapping, Positive, Light, Range, Shading

Credits

Faylinda Kodis, high school art teacher, H-B Woodlawn Secondary Program, Arlington, Virginia, in collaboration with Adrienne L. Gayoso, senior educator, NMWA, in conjunction with the exhibition Magnetic Fields: Expanding American Abstraction, 1960s to Today (October 13, 2017, to January 21, 2018).