Amongst all the television, video games and online entertainment available to kids today, can children actually enjoy art? While showing her popular painting “Hanging With Friends” at the Celebration art show in West Michigan, Dixie Olin found that they can not only enjoy art, but it can elicit thoughts and insights far beyond what one might expect from elementary school students.
Olin’s painting depicts five leather jackets hanging together on a picket fence. When Olin came to pick up her piece from the show, a teacher from a local Christian school approached her and explained that Olin’s piece had been her class of nine-year-old boys’ favorite painting. It may not surprise anyone that a group of boys would prefer a painting of motorcycle jackets, but what is astonishing is the boys’ explanations of why they preferred it. They said that the strong grid of the fence against the softness of the jackets made it a strong composition, that the selection of the colors created an atmosphere of spring, and that the points of the picket fence with the jackets hanging on them created tension. The boys explained that the painting was about loyalty to friends and country and about sticking together when times are tough and knowing you are part of something bigger than yourself.
Despite the constant barrage of technologically enhanced modes of entertainment, inspired works of art like Dixie Olin’s “Hanging With Friends” can provide an exciting, creative, and cultural learning experience for even young children.
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