Clay Slab Printing

Kasimir Malevich

Kasimir Malevich was a Russian painter and pioneer of geometric abstract art. He was the oldest of 14 children although only nine survived into adulthood. Malevich grew up in a rural area and knew nothing of culture or Art. He was fascinated with aerial photography and said that this is what led him into abstract painting, looking at images from a completely different viewpoint.

Look at a variety of Malevich’s paintings and show the children the variety of shapes that appear in some of them. Many of the shapes are repeated and some are repeated at different angles throughout the painting.

Gustav Klimt

Despite living in poverty during his early life Klimt won a scholarship to the Vienna School of Arts and Crafts where he trained as an architectural painter. Klimt’s early work was mainly painting murals and ceilings in large public buildings.

Klimt used a lot of patterns in his work, sometimes to decorate clothing and also to decorate the background in some of his paintings. You may want to be selective about which paintings you choose as Klimt often included a degree of nudity in his work - you need to decide what is appropriate for your children.

Look at several Klimt paintings with the children and get them to identify the patterns which appear in many of them. See if they can draw these patterns on paper as preparation for their clay slab printing.

Graham Tjupurrula

Graham Tjupurrula is a contemporary Aboriginal artist who was born in 1975. He uses a very restricted range of colours because he is influenced by some old Pintupi artists who depicted the traditional Aboriginal stories.

Take a look at some of Tjupurrula’s paintings and encourage the children to try drawing similar patterns in preparation for clay slab printing.