A primary student draws a painting in Beijing Photo: Courtesy of Gui Shen

 
Art class for primary students ends in Beijing

Before the start of primary school in September in Beijing, a charity art class brought a different summer to children.

Teenagers during the holidays are faced with a large number of activities to choose from exhibitions to sports. 

But many children want a holiday where they can show their creativity. Therefore, professional aesthetic education institutions and the government joined forces to present a project of art feast full of cultural connotations to these children, the 2023 Colorful Dream Art Class.

Until the end of August, teachers specially designed a set of special courses for chil-dren, covering traditional Chinese painting, seal cutting to promote Chinese art and aesthetics, as well as oil painting creation that compares and draws on international styles. 

"Our goal is to focus on aesthetic education and use beauty to infiltrate the hearts of these children by broadening their horizons and improving their hands-on abilities, and therefore to boost their self-confidence," said the person in charge of the pro-ject.

"This activity inspired their children's interest in art, and gave them confident in painting," said one parent.

Sun Jiayi, a student who participated in the activity, said: "This activity is particularly meaningful. The teacher's course design is to lead us to start new creations and get in touch with things that have never been tried before."

"This is the result we want. We firmly believe that this summer art class can help these children establish a confident outlook on life," concluded the head of the project team.



Course on 'Salvator Mundi' of Da Vinci 

On Saturday, Paragon Book Gallery will invite Martin Kemp, emeritus professor of art history at the University of Oxford, to give an online lecture based on his more than half a century of research on Leonardo da Vinci, starting from the collection, identification and restoration of Salvator Mundi, bringing an authoritative and professional in-depth interpretation of the true appearance of the painting.

On November 15, 2017, the painting Salvator Mundi was sold at Christie's auction house in New York, becoming the "most expensive painting in history" in one fell swoop. 

The painting was once identified as a replica painted by Leonardo da Vinci's apprentice. When it entered the market in 1958, it changed hands for only 45 pounds ($56). With the completion of a series of research and restoration work on the work, scholars from all over the world are actively involved in the investigation of the authenticity of the painting. 

Kemp was an important participant in the discussion.

Did Leonardo da Vinci create Salvator Mundi? And was the Salvator Mundi auctioned by Christie's an authentic work by Leonardo da Vinci?

This course embodies the essence of the Kemp's half-century of painstaking study of Leonardo da Vinci. He will lead the audience to understand Leonardo's way of thinking, methods of observing nature, and interpret the mysteries contained in his works. 

This course is divided into six lessons and nineteen sections, covering a large number of complex manuscripts and outstanding paintings by Leonardo da Vinci that have been handed down to this day. 

The highlight is not only the master's fantastic ideas, but also his scientific thinking that surpassed his contemporaries, such as anatomy and perspective, and his outstanding contributions to science and geometric principles.