5th Grade: Wayne Thiebaud Tints and Shades

American artist Wayne Thiebaudis,  famous for his realistic still-lifes, was our inspiration for our project. He has a well known series of paintings featuring life-like cakes and desserts that seem to welcome the viewer to reach out an grab a slice.

As a group we learned how to draw a cake with a slice missing, then we discussed how light would effect the appearance of the frosting.  We learned that closer to the light source the frosting will appear lighter (tint) in color and further away the frosting will appear darker (shade). Oil-pastels allowed us to mix white or darker colors with our 'start/true color' to achieve our tints and shades.

We layered lights and dark colors to create the illusion of shadows and the reflection of light. They look good enough to eat!