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In Part 5 of ‘The sound of art’, the students will experience the pioneering music of Anton Webern through his ‘First Bagatelle’. They will then explore connections to the paintings of Wasily Kandinsky and John Coburn.
This part is the first step to identifying the links between graphic notation as a visual art and a way of recording music in symbolic form. It explores shape and symbol in both music and visual arts. Use this footage to explore some of the important factors linking shapes and symbols in music and art.
Part 5 – shapes and symbols in music and art
Duration 1:33Video transcript – Part 5 – shapes and symbols in music and art
Creative Arts K-6 outcomes
Creative Arts K-6 outcomes
Part 3 addresses these outcomes from the Creative Arts K-6 Syllabus (NESA)
© NSW Education Standards Authority for and on behalf of the Crown in right of the State of New South Wales, 2006.Stage 2
Making
Making
VAS2.1 Represents the qualities of experiences and things that are interesting or beautiful* by choosing among aspects of subject matter.
VAS2.2 Uses the forms to suggest the qualities of subject matter.
Appreciating
Appreciating
VAS2.3 Acknowledges that artists make artworks for different reasons and that various interpretations are possible.
VAS2.4 Identifies connections between subject matter in artworks and what they refer to, and appreciates the use of particular techniques.
Organising sound
Organising sound
MUS2.2 Improvises musical phrases, organises sounds and explains reasons for choices.
MUS2.3 Uses commonly understood symbols to represent own work.
Listening
Listening
MUS2.4 Identifies the use of musical concepts and musical symbols in a range of repertoire.
* ‘Beautiful’ within this outcome does not simply mean ‘pretty’ but rather something that excites and arouses awe, wonder, fascination and delight.
Stage 3
Making
Making
VAS3.1 Investigates subject matter in an attempt to represent likenesses of things in the world.
VAS3.2 Makes artworks for different audiences assembling materials in a variety of ways.
Appreciating
Appreciating
VAS3.3 Acknowledges that audiences respond in different ways to artworks and that there are different opinions about the value of artworks.
VAS3.4 Communicates about the ways in which subject matter is represented in artworks.
Organising sound
Organising sound
MUS3.2 Improvises, experiments, selects, combines and orders sound using musical concepts.
MUS3.3 Notates and discusses own work and the work of others.
Listening
Listening
MUS3.4 Identifies the use of musical concepts and symbols in a range of musical styles.
Teaching and learning intentions
Teaching and learning intentions
Students will:
Students will:
Identify the unusual pitch and harmony techniques of composer Anton Webern.
Identify the painters Wasily Kandinsky and John Coburn and their works.
Learn how abstract shapes can be imagined as music and vice versa.
Define the following words: mute, pizzicato, ponticello, tremolo and harmonics as they effect instrumental timbre.
Teachers will:
Teachers will:
Explore the use of shape and symbolism in music and visual arts through Kandinsky and Coburn’s works.
Examine the use of shape and symbolism in graphic notation, artworks and musical performance through examples
Explore graphic notation and art
Use this footage to support learning of music and graphic notation or symbols through shapes and symbols in music and art.
Assessment suggestions include:
Assessment suggestions include:
Explores shapes and symbols in own artworks and those of artists.
Identifies aspects of musical concepts that are changed through a variety of instrumental types and techniques.
Uses symbols as a way of depicting musical concepts including developing ways of depicting changes in these concepts such as showing higher or lower pitches, or changes of dynamics.
Explores artistic techniques such as colour and value combined with shape, form, line and symbol as expression in artworks.
Explores artistic techniques such as colour and value combined with shape, form, line and symbol as the basis of scores that can be interpreted through musical expression of concepts.
Music and art activities
Music and art activities
Webern uses some special techniques for the string instruments in order to attain certain sound effects to create ‘shapes’ in the music. Use Webern’s composition to:
Discuss the following string techniques prior to listening to the ‘First Bagatelle’ from ‘Six Bagatelles, Op.9’:
mute: a device that dampens the vibrations on an instrument, resulting in a softer sound
pizzicato: plucking the string with a finger instead of the bow
tremolo: moving the bow back and forth on the string as fast as possible, making a trembling sound
ponticello: to play on the bridge, which makes an eerie, squeaky sound
harmonics: a whispery sound created by putting your fingers on the left hand on the string with a light pressure.
Anton Webern: Six Bagatelles for String Quartet, Op. 9 (1911-13)
Duration: 4:12Listen to at least 30 seconds of the ‘First Bagatelle’ from ‘Six Bagatelles, Op.9’ by Anton Webern (1883-1945). Discuss the possible string techniques used. Play again and ask the students to close their eyes and try to imagine the shapes or gesture in the air.
Listen again to the first of the ‘Six Bagatelles’. Encourage the students to imagine or physically create the shapes in the music. Ask them if they see each shape having any particular colour or texture.
Watch the following short live school performance of the ‘First Bagatelle’. This activity is known as the ‘Webern Shape Game’. What is the relationship between what the performers are doing in the video and the audio track?
Discuss how Webern packs a lot of ideas and emotions into very few notes. The little gestures the performers do are essentially very condensed forms of complex feelings.
Organise the students into groups of between 3 and 6. Each group stands in a circle facing each other. It should be a tight circle with a little room between each student to move their arms. Play the ‘Webern Shape Game’ where the students turn physical shapes (created with their hands in the air) into sounds. Use a variety of percussion instruments, environmental sounds, body percussion or vocal sounds to represent the shapes made. Delivery can be flexible with this game. One student may be the leader or ‘conductor’ creating shapes for the others to imitate through sound individually or as a group. Alternatively, the students might take it in turns to be the leader. Discuss as a class your rules for the game.
WEBERN GAME
Duration: 5:02Wassily Kandinsky
Wassily Kandinsky
Russian painter Wassily Kandinsky (1866- 1944) is considered one of the first abstract painters. This means that he painted shapes and lines and colour, rather than realistic pictures. He loved music (he played the piano and cello as a child) and felt a strong connection between painting and listening. He felt that he could ‘see’ music and ‘hear’ colour.
Look at some of Kandinsky’s paintings. Isolate and point to different shapes. Ask the students to imagine or perform how different shapes might sound.
Ask for any volunteers to sing or perform the ‘sound effects’ of the painting. Try singing or adding sound effects to the shapes in the paintings. Is it possible to turn the paintings into music?
John Coburn
John Coburn
Australian artist John Coburn was also very interested in shapes. His 1973 commissioned tapestries of ‘Curtain of the Sun’ and ‘Curtain of the Moon’ hang in the Sydney Opera House. These tapestries are among Australia’s most significant large-scale artworks.
Explore similar techniques in Coburn’s other artworks including some from the Art Gallery of NSW.
Using the inspiration of Webern’s music and the artwork of Kandinsky or Coburn, consider ways in which the shapes within the music can be reflected in artworks. This is an example of a Kandinsky style painting by musician and artist Sharon Roffman titled, ‘A Painting of Webern’s First Bagatelle’.
Webern Bagatelle painting
Duration: 0:50Allow the students’ time to explore materials, shapes and the space within their artworks.
Resources: paper of any size, pens or pencils, coloured pencils, markers or crayons.
Choose a bagatelle and draw or paint it using inspiration from the styles of Kandinsky or Coburn by drawing its shapes. Play about 5 seconds at a time, repeating as many times as necessary for the students to draw what they hear.
Encourage the students to think about how they want to lay out the page. Do they want to show the passage of time from left to right, up or down, in a circle, or at all?
Listen to whether the musical shapes rise in pitch or get lower in pitch. How can this difference be shown in the shapes?
Listen to how the musical shapes connect to one another, make sure the shapes that the students draw, reflect these connections. Is there space between the shapes? Consider whether the musical gestures can also be drawn as lines or zigzags or just blobs of colour.
After sketching out the shapes in pencil, play the music again and ask the students to think about which colours they hear.
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