This 3D Art Museum project is ALWAYS a favorite with my students! They get to become museum designers and curators as they create their very own 3D art museum using 1-point perspective. What makes this lesson so much fun is that students aren’t just practicing perspective drawing; they are also designing a space to showcase artwork and sculptures. Here’s why students love it and how I teach it.
What Students Learn
The goal of this lesson is for students to understand and apply the basics of 1-point perspective while creating the illusion of a realistic 3D space. Students will learn about the three categories of art: realistic, abstract, and non-objective, as well as sculpture in the round. They will explore how artwork can be displayed in a museum and use their knowledge of art styles to plan their own gallery. Along the way, students will build drawing skills, learn new art vocabulary, and discover how artists use perspective to create the illusion of depth.
Why Students Love It
I think students LOVE this project because they have so much creative freedom! They get to design their own museum, choose the artwork they want to display, and make their gallery reflect their personal interests. They can choose a color scheme, their favorite genre of art, feature their original character (OC) or incorporate their favorite subject matter. It is exciting to see students recreating famous masterpieces alongside their own original artwork. Every finished museum looks different and it is one of those projects where students are genuinely excited to share their work and see what their classmates have created.
How I Teach It
We begin by reviewing 1-point perspective including the horizon line, vanishing point, and orthogonal lines. Students then sketch some ideas of which artworks and sculptures they want to include in their museum. Students can create their own masterpieces or recreate well-known works of art to display in their art museum.
Next, students use a template to create the 3D room, or you can draw your own template. Students begin by connecting all four points to draw a rectangle for the back wall. An “X” is used to find the center of the wall and create a vanishing point. Then orthogonal lines are used to connect to the vanishing point and the side wall to create the top and bottom of the paintings. A thin rectangle is drawn to show the side of the painting. Once paintings have been added to all 3 walls (the painting on the back wall is drawn as a rectangle) lines are added to the ceiling. I demonstrate how to first use dots to equally space the lines and then connect to the vanishing point to draw the orthogonal lines.
Before drawing the flooring, a rectangle is drawn for the base of the sculpture. The top 2 corners are connected to the vanishing point and a horizontal line is added to create a 3D rectangular prism. Lastly, the lines for the flooring are added around the sculpture base. After the room is drawn, my students use markers and colored pencils to draw the artwork and give color to the flooring. I suggest leaving the walls white to give emphasis to the artwork. Once the drawing is finished, we cut and fold the thin triangles on the template to actually create a 3D box to create the illusion of our 3D art museum. Finally, I incorporate a little art museum etiquette so students learn how to respectfully visit and enjoy artwork in a real museum.
If you are looking for a lesson that teaches perspective while incorporating art history, creative thinking, and student choice, this one is definitely worth adding to your art curriculum.
Happy Creating! – Trista
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