Fantasy Cityscapes

Lesson Title: Fantasy Cityscape
Big Idea: Dreams 

In this lesson, students learned how they could use line to manipulate a surface. Students took a look at the amazing achievements artists have made in creating the illusion of depth on a 2-d flat surface. They were exposed to a variety of images of chalk street artists who create the illusion of space on a flat road like so: 

Then, students learned one-point perspective. Students created a city-scape in one-point perspective worm's eye view.

Next, students learned about two-point perspective. They designed three boxes in two-point perspective.

Finally,  students used their knowledge of perspective to design a Fantasy Cityscape in their choice of one-point OR two-point perspective. Students learned all about Surrealism and how it represents the subconscious, using dreamlike imagery that isn't supposed to make sense. 

Students completed a Cityscape plan in which they designed their own city. They answered questions like where will your city be located? What will be the theme of your city? How can you make your city dreamlike (surrealistic)? 

Students were to add at least one building that was surrealistic such as a building made out of their favorite food item OR perhaps favorite sport such as a soccer ball or basketball building. 

Finally, students learned about the Warm Colors and Cool Colors and they were to color their city using mostly their choice of a Warm Color Scheme or Cool Color Scheme. 



To help students better understand how ART can be used to represent the subconscious, how art can represent our dreams, and how art doesn't always have to make sense- Students participated in Surrealistic art making activities such as an Exquisite Corpse and a Decalcomania. 


An Exquisite Corpse is a surrealist technique in which a group of students create a figure one part at a time. The first student begins with the head, then passes it to the next student without revealing what their drawing looks like. The complete drawing is not exposed until the final person draws the last part of the body, the feet. In the end, a figure that resembles surrealism is created in that it is dismembered and represents an image that is not meant to make sense.  The importance of the exquisite corpse is that it is a collaborative work of art and it suggests that each of its authors has something unconscious in common.

 Here are some of my students Exquisite Corpses~ (coming soon)

“Decalcomania” was a techique was used by Surrealists to create impromptu paintings controlled largely by chance. Much like a Rorschach Ink-Blot test, they would search for hidden imagery and develop it into a finished painting.

Here are some of my students Decalcomania's~ (coming soon)   


Finished Cityscapes~