EYFS (ENG), KS1 (ENG), FD (NI), KS1 (NI), CfE EY (SCO), CfE L1 (SCO), PS1 (WAL)
Trompe l'oeil, Post‐Impressionism, Genre painting, Visual literacy
Early Years Foundation Stage
Expressive arts and design
- Safely use and explore a variety of materials, tools and techniques, experimenting with colour, design, texture, form and function
- Share their creations, explaining the process they have used
Key Stage 1
Art and design
- Evaluate and analyse creative works using the language of art, craft and design
- Know about great artists, craft makers and designers, and understand the historical and cultural development of their art forms
- Produce creative work, exploring their ideas and recording their experiences
- Become proficient in drawing, painting, sculpture and other art, craft and design techniques
Art and design
Foundation Stage:
- Look at and respond to a piece of work by artists, designers, illustrators or craft workers
- Investigate and talk about colours, lines, shapes, textures and patterns
- Talk about their own and other pupils’ work and how the work was made
- Observe and respond to things seen and unseen, handled, remembered and imagined
Key stage 1:
- Enjoy and appreciate the work of artists, designers and craft workers from their own and other cultures
- Look at and talk about resource material to stimulate their own ideas
- Explore visual elements of colour, tone, line, shape, form, space, texture and pattern to express ideas
- Talk about their own and others’ work and how it was made, use observations to identify difficulties and suggest modifications
- Investigate and respond to direct sensory experience, including visual, verbal, spatial and tactile dimensions, memory and imaginatio
Art and design
CfE early level:
- I can create a range of visual information through observing and recording from my experiences across the curriculum (EXA 0-04a)
- Inspired by a range of stimuli, I can express and communicate my ideas, thoughts and feelings through activities within art and design (EXA 0-05a)
- I can respond to the work of artists and designers by discussing my thoughts and feelings. I can give and accept constructive comment on my own and others’ work (EXA 0-07a)
CfE level 1:
- I can create and present work using the visual elements of line, shape, form, colour, tone, pattern and texture (EXA 1-03a)
- I can create a range of visual information through observing and recording from my experiences across the curriculum (EXA 1-04a)
- Inspired by a range of stimuli, I can express and communicate my ideas, thoughts and feelings through activities within art and design (EXA 1-05a)
- can respond to the work of artists and designers by discussing my thoughts and feelings. I can give and accept constructive comment on my own and others’ work (EXA 1-07a)
Expressive Arts
Exploring the expressive arts is essential to developing artistic skills and knowledge and it enables learners to become curious and creative individuals.
Progression step 1:
- I can explore and experiment with a variety of creative techniques, materials, processes, resources, tools and technologies
- I can ask questions to discover how creative work is made
- I am beginning to explore ideas, feelings and moods in a variety of creative work
Responding and reflecting, both as artist and audience, is a fundamental part of learning in the expressive arts.
Progression step 1:
- I can listen to and respond to views about my own creative work and that of others
- I am beginning to compare my creative work to the creative work of others
- I am beginning to talk about my moods and emotions and use these to impact upon my creative work
This is one of the lessons in The Superpower of Looking on scenes of everyday life. It focuses on Interior, painted by William Gillies in 1938. This resource has been written to support learning for early primary and early years children.
Explore this painting with students in key stage/level 2 and 3.
To teach this lesson, download the teachers' notes on a separate device or print them off. Have this webpage open on your screen or whiteboard and use the prompts in the teachers' notes to guide children through the lesson.
Scenes of everyday life are known by art historians as 'genre' paintings. They usually focus on ordinary and unidentifiable people doing normal, everyday things. This is the opposite of what art historians call 'history' paintings where the artist shows a specific scene from history or myth.
Interior (1938)
William Gillies (1898–1973)
Medium: oil on canvas
Dimensions: H 127 x W 173.5 cm
William George Gillies is one of Scotland's best-known twentieth-century artists. He taught at Edinburgh College of Art where he inspired generations of young painters.
Gillies took inspiration from Post-Impressionism and European modern art to develop a uniquely expressive painting style. In Interior, he brings landscape, still life and portraiture together for this scene painted in his family home. The painting was made two years after the death of Gillies' sister Emma, whom he was close to, and reflects his family, their identities and relationships in the context of this loss.
Gillies places himself in the centre of the composition, between his mother and his sister Janet. He has presented Janet some 20 years younger than she would have been at the time Interior was painted. A small red squirrel, a ceramic made by Emma, can be seen behind his mother's head to the left.
At first, it looks as if Gillies is standing in a narrow space between two rooms, but in fact, he has painted a reflection of himself in a tall, narrow mirror. If you look closely, you will see that he has treated the reflected space behind him in the mirror differently from the space in the rest of the painting. He uses the mirror to explore the idea of visual illusion. By placing a reflection of himself painting the picture we are looking at, he makes the artist and the act of creation a part of the painting itself.
Open a full-screen version of the zoomable image in a new window.
Ask children to describe the artwork, encouraging them to simply say what they can see.
You can start by showing the whole image, and then use the zoom feature to explore details of the painting. Or you might like to start by using the zoom feature to show a detail from the image, and then zoom out to see more.
Encourage children to look carefully – this is their superpower! It's best to not give too much background information about the artwork at this stage, so children can develop their own ideas and opinions.
An audio description of the painting is available. It is accompanied by a full written transcript which can also be used to describe the painting.
Now when looking at the painting, ask more specific ('nudge') questions:
Now we can start to explore the 'elements' of the painting. For this artwork, you may like to focus on the following areas from The Superpower of Looking Kit:
Ask children to evidence their points:
Helpful responses to the questions below can be found in the teachers' notes. You may also like to introduce knowledge from the contextual background for teachers at this point.
See our Everyone learning activities below for practical activities to support children's understanding of composition, colour, and materials and techniques.
You can find out more about The Superpower of Looking SEND/ASD/ALN/ASN approach on our Everyone learning page.
Now it's time to explore the artwork in different ways. This list of sensory activities encourages children to apply their learning and can suit a variety of learning needs.
Make
Experience
Communicate
Use talk and observation to identify children's thoughts, ideas and learning from the lesson.
Congratulations!
You have now completed this lesson resource on The Superpower of Looking.
There are more resources below which have been written for early primary and early years children. You may also like to explore the rest of The Superpower of Looking resources which can be adapted for use with younger children.
