After a brief presentation of Marcelle Cahn's background ( key dates, places of residence), the children discovered a reproduction of ''Femme et Voilier'', 1926 (2)) and commented on it (simplifying, finding geometric forms and disproportions,talking about figurative painting...).
The pedagogical objective of this workshop is an understanding of how one can move- concretely and thereby in practice- from figurative painting to radically abstract painting such as that of Marcelle Cahn.
The children then discover the artist's works which are currently on display in the museum.Together we stop in front of the ''Nu de dos''* (1917),the oldest work. Afterwards there is a rapid analysis of the abstract works in the display (forms, colours, lines). Finally I propose that the children make a sketch of the ''Nu de dos'' beginning by a process of simplification.
The sketch then becomes the starting point for the composition of an abstract work on a larger scale (50 cm X 70 cm) with three constraints :
The children went to work turning the human figure into geometric forms and dismembering it. They had no choice but to do this if they wanted their final result to really be abstract !
I carried out three workshops with a total of 36 participants. The instructions were perfectly well understood regardless of age and the results were very creative. No doubt Marcelle would have really appreciated them !
Stéphane Lentz
Head of Public Relations
MAMCS
(1) MAMCS- The Strasbourg Museum of Modern and Contemporary Art
(2) Femme et Voilier – Woman and Sailboat
* Nu de dos – Nude, backview
