Let’s LINE Dance!! – Visual Art in Motion

In addition to creating fabulous visual art projects, at Hands Create Fine Arts Studio we also use other disciplines from which to enhance our lessons and draw inspiration and ideas, such as music and DANCING! With the Wee, Beginner, and Small Hands artists, we do A LOT of music and movement during our art making. One of our faves is LINE dancing!

Step #1 Create a dance move to represent each type of line. Each student can take a turn to create a move or you can work together as a class. One of our favorite moves is the “sprinkler” for the dashed line. Put one hand behind your head and stretch out the other in front of you, but slightly to the side. Then move your arm in short movements across the front like one of those rotating sprinklers until you go all the way across your body and then swing your arm back to the starting place and water the lawn again!

Variety of Lines: WAVY, STRAIGHT, ZIG ZAG, HUMPY, CURVED, SQUIGGLY, SCRATCHY, DASHED, DOTTED, SQUARE, SPIRAL

WHAT CAN WE MOVE? Your hands, arms, feet, head, fingers, hips, knees, toes, etc!

HOW CAN WE MOVE? We have 3 different levels of space or planes in which we can move our bodies- Low near the floor, the area in the Middle of our bodies, or High above our heads. For example, can you dance your elbows LOW to the ground in a curved line fashion? How HIGH can you make your fingers move in a zigzag pattern? Bend your knees to make some MIDDLE movements with your hips squiggling!

WHERE CAN WE MOVE? Each person must remain in their own “bubble” when they dance. Otherwise you might pop your bubble, or even worse your friend’s! Our own personal imaginary bubble, where we can dance without touching a friend or furniture in the art studio, helps us to dance safely and maintain self-control.

STEP #2 Review all the dance moves without music to be sure everyone can remember each one.

STEP #3 Play a fun song like “Happy” by Pharrell Williams and get your body moving! I like to point to a line on a large poster of the variety of lines, which tells the kids which move to dance next. Sometimes when learning about PATTERN and RHYTHM in art, we might make up a dance using a line pattern (AB, ABBA, ABC, etc.) with the moves. For example- wavy line, wavy line, curved, curved, curved, STOMP and REPEAT 3X!

STEP #4 It’s a LINE DANCE DISCO! Buy some flashing rings, turn off the lights, and have a dance party! It’s so fun!

STEP #5 Use all of the lines you have learned to create a masterpiece like we do at Hands Create Fine Arts Studio. We like to decorate our bowls that hold fruit in our multimedia lesson based on Paul Cezanne’s still-life paintings. Come and join us! Sign up for a classes today.