These ‘Giuseppe Arcimboldo' KS1 Art lessons for children in Year 1 and Year 2 will have your class looking at portraits in a whole new light. They will explore a variety of Arcimboldo’s paintings and find out what different natural materials he used to create his portraits. Your class will have a go at creating portraits to represent different things, including a portrait made up of their interests.

With lesson plans, slides, activity ideas, differentiated worksheets and lots more, these KS1 ‘Giuseppe Arcimboldo' lessons provide everything you need to teach this exciting module.

Who was Arcimboldo?

In the first lesson of this six lesson scheme of work, your class will be introduced to the work of Giuseppe Arcimboldo. They will look at portraits he painted in a traditional style and find out where he lived. They will either continue their research during the lesson or create a self-portrait in using water colours. At the end of the lesson they will be introduced to Arcimboldo’s more famous style of painting through looking at Rudolf II as Vertumnus.

This downloadable Art lesson comes with lesson plans, slideshow presentations and printable teaching resources.

The Four Seasons

Your class will explore Arcimboldo’s portraits of the four seasons in this lesson. They will look at the four portraits and try to work out which season is represented in each one. During the activity section of the lesson your class will either draw representations of the seasons or work practically rearranging natural resources to represent them. In the plenary they will begin to think about items they would chose to represent different events.

This downloadable Art lesson comes with lesson plans, slideshow presentations and printable teaching resources.

The Four Elements

Now that your class are familiar with the work of Arcimboldo, they will focus on the portraits of the four elements. They will try to work out which element is represented in each portrait and talk about why specific items might represent an element. Your class will then either draw or collage their own version of water, air, fire or earth.

This downloadable lesson comes with lesson plans, slideshow presentations and printable teaching resources.

Flora Flowers

In the fourth lesson of this scheme of work your class will look in detail at the painting Flora. They will explore Arcimboldo’s use of flowers in this portrait before looking at real flowers and using them in their own portraits.

This downloadable lesson comes with lesson plans, slideshow presentations and printable teaching resources.

Animals

During this lesson your class will explore Arcimboldo’s use of animals in a variety of his portraits. They will be encouraged to think carefully about which animals they decide to include in their own animal portraits.

This downloadable lesson comes with lesson plans, slideshow presentations and printable teaching resources.

Portraits

In the final lesson of this series your class will explore Arcimboldo’s portraits of The Juror and The Librarian. They will be encouraged to think about what the items in the portraits says about the subjects before creating their own self-portrait made up of items that are important to them. They will be challenged to think about what their self-portrait says about them as a person.

This downloadable lesson comes with lesson plans, slideshow presentations and printable teaching resources.