Introducing children to art - Soutine

I'm very interested in art. As well as studying at GCSE and A-Level, I've visited lots of famous art galleries across the world. If I'm nearby in London I always try to pop into the National Gallery, sometimes just to visit Van Gogh's Sunflowers and Rousseau's Tiger, but my favourite art gallery is probably the Musee d'Orsay in Paris.

So I've been inspired by Red Ted Art to begin introducing Harry to some of the great artists, having seen some wonderful projects linked up previously.

I didn't really know where to begin, so I decided to let Harry choose and took out my collection of arty postcards. It's quite a varied collection, some were bought because I like them, some to remind me of paintings that I've seen in galleries on holiday, and some are not necessarily to my taste but were bought to be used in various school projects. My absolute favourites adorn my desk at work, so if I want to work on those I'll have to bring them home!

We looked through them and I asked Harry to pick out the ones that he liked, and then from those to choose the one he liked best. Harry's favourite colour is green, so it was no surprise when he selected an image that is mostly green - Chaim Soutine - Paysage.

I decided that because of Harry's age (he's 3) then probably the simpler the better, so I took out the poster paints and some thick brushes. I showed him how to put plenty of paint onto the brush, and to make big, sweeping strokes. He helped me to pick out paint in all the colours from the original painting.

When it was dry I took out my oil pastels and encouraged him to add some details. He made lots of little spirals to try and copy the shapes of the leaves in the trees, and also some bigger yellow shapes for the houses.

It might not look very much like the original, but we had a lot of fun looking more closely at a painting. I really enjoyed looking through my postcards with Harry and seeing what caught his eye, so I will definitely be doing that again soon!