Sign up to receive a handout with nine fun art appreciation activities for all ages. These games and challenges will help you connect with artworks and practice key art appreciation skills like attention to detail, comparison, and visual description in the process. I hope you'll have as much fun trying them as I had dreaming them up!
Tag: enjoy art
Prehistoric Art as a Fundamental Element of Humanity
Discoveries of artworks created up to 45,000 years ago prove that expressing and deriving meaning from visual images is an ancient and fundamental part of being human.
How Viewing Art is Good for Your Mental Health
Studies suggest that looking at art can be good for mental health. It can increase happiness, decrease stress and anxiety, and improve cognitive skills. Art can also help us be mindful and connect us to the past.
A New, Visual Approach to Art Appreciation
Check out my new online course, Art Appreciation for Beginners. Find out what I'm excited about its visually-based approach, and not only for beginners.
Introducing Online Courses with The Art Museum Insider
This just in: You can now take online courses about art at my new Teachable school, The Art Museum Insider! A short course about museum visits is already available, and more are coming soon.
How To Teach Children About Art History
I wasn't a big art lover as a child, but there's no reason other kids won't be. Here are my ideas for how to introduce children to art history.
Connect with Art During Worldwide Shutdown
DailyArt Magazine is currently publishing a series of articles recommending ways of connecting to art from home. Here are my contributions to this project, which I'm really proud to be part of.
Seeing Old Art With Modern Eyes
While discussing the difficult questions art restoration poses concerning artworks' original states, noted Leonardo da Vinci scholar Martin Kemp made a great observation about the tricky nature of the "original". It seems obvious when I see it written in front of me, but I can't say I had considered it much before.
Highlights at the Wadsworth Athenaeum
The Wadsworth Athenaeum, in Hartford, CT, is one of America's oldest art museums. It was founded by Daniel Wadsworth in 1842. However, it has been expanded several times since them. The museum has a little bit of everything, from paintings to porcelain, ancient Egyptian to contemporary European. It's a very pleasant place to spend an afternoon.
Beginner-Friendly Art Styles – Suggestions for New Museum Visitors
For those of you new to the art-viewing, museum-going experience, do you feel unsure what to see first? If so, I can make a few suggestions. I've come up with three areas that I think are particularly accessible and enjoyable to new viewers. You'll find them in most major museums, and they also happen to be among my favorites.
A Scholarly Skater 