Key Stage 2 art and design · Great artists, architects and designers

KS2 great artists in history: a guide for parents

In Key Stage 2, children are taught about great artists, architects and designers in history. The aim is that they know about great artists, craft makers and designers, and understand how their art forms have developed over time and across cultures. The curriculum doesn’t name a single artist, so your child’s school decides who to study, and the real skill being built is looking closely, asking questions and putting a work of art in its time and place.

Great artists in history, explained

It helps to know what is required and what is a choice. The national curriculum says only that pupils should be taught about great artists, architects and designers in history. It gives no list of names, no dates and no set order. Schools choose, often to fit another subject (portraits when studying the Tudors, mosaics alongside the Romans) or to go with a skill the class is practising, such as landscape, printmaking or working in clay. So your child may study Monet and Hokusai while a friend at another school studies Frida Kahlo and a local sculptor. Both are meeting the curriculum.

The phrase “historical and cultural development” is the heart of the topic. It means that an artist belongs to a particular time and place, and that art forms change for reasons. Painters in the later nineteenth century could work outdoors partly because paint had started to be sold in portable metal tubes. Printmakers in Japan worked in teams, with one person drawing, another carving the wood blocks and another printing, so that many copies could be made and sold at prices ordinary people could afford. Children are encouraged to ask “when was this made, where, and why does it look like this?” as well as “do I like it?”

In class the pattern is usually look, talk, then make. Children study one work closely and describe what they can see before anyone tells them what it means. A teacher might ask, “What did the artist choose to put in the middle? Which colours are warm and which are cool? How do you think this was made?” Then pupils try a technique they have noticed, such as short broken brushstrokes or bold outlines, in their own work. This is learning from an artist rather than copying one, and much of it is recorded in a sketchbook with notes about what they tried.

The curriculum’s own wording includes craft makers as well as painters, so you may hear about potters, weavers, stained-glass makers, stone carvers and sculptors. Many schools also try to show a spread: work from different countries and centuries, women as well as men, and living artists as well as famous names from the past. Not every school will manage all of that, but it is a good question to ask. There is no test in this area. Teachers listen for a child who can name a few artists, say roughly when and where they worked, and give a reason, from the artwork itself, for an opinion.

Words your child will hear

Artist: A person who makes original work such as paintings, drawings, prints or sculpture.
Craft maker: Someone skilled at making things by hand, such as a potter, weaver, glassmaker or woodcarver.
Movement: A group of artists working in a similar way at the same time, such as the Impressionists in nineteenth-century France.
Medium: The material an artwork is made with, such as oil paint, watercolour, clay or woodblock print.
Portrait: An artwork that shows a person, or sometimes an animal.
Landscape: An artwork showing a view of the land, such as countryside, hills or a town; also the name for a page turned the wide way.
Still life: An artwork showing objects that don’t move, such as fruit, flowers or a jug on a table.

What the National Curriculum says

The programme of study for Key Stage 2 says:

Pupils should be taught about great artists, architects and designers in history
Aim: pupils know about great artists, craft makers and designers, and understand the historical and cultural development of their art forms.

Objectives from the National Curriculum in England, © Crown copyright, used under the Open Government Licence v3.0.

Try it: finding out about one artist

Your child is asked to find out about the Japanese artist Hokusai and his print known as The Great Wave. How might they go about it?

Look before reading. Describe only what you can see: a huge curling wave with foamy fingertips, three long boats full of rowers, and a small, snow-topped mountain far behind. The colours are mostly deep blue and cream.
Find the basic facts. Katsushika Hokusai lived in Japan from 1760 to 1849. The print was made around 1831 and belongs to a series of views of Mount Fuji, which is the small mountain in the picture.
Ask how it was made. It is a woodblock print. Hokusai drew the design, skilled craftspeople carved it into wooden blocks, and printers made many copies. That is why ordinary people could afford to buy prints, and why the artist, the carvers and the printers all deserve a mention.
Think about time and place. The print shows ordinary working people at sea in a country where Mount Fuji was famous and loved. Later in the nineteenth century, Japanese prints reached Europe and interested some European painters.
Make something of your own. Choose one idea to try rather than copying the picture: perhaps the curling wave shapes, or the bold dark outlines. Use it in a seascape of your own and write a sentence in the sketchbook about what you borrowed.

A good model answer might be: “Hokusai was a Japanese artist who lived from 1760 to 1849. His print The Great Wave, made around 1831, shows a giant wave and small boats with Mount Fuji in the distance. It was printed from carved wooden blocks, so many copies could be sold. I borrowed his curling wave shapes in my own sea picture.”

Common mistakes and how to help

“Great artists are the ones who paint things that look real”

Children often judge art by how much it looks like a photograph, because that is what they are praised for in their own drawing. So a bold, flat or distorted style can seem like a mistake.

What helps: Ask what the artist might be trying to show instead: movement, mood, pattern or a feeling. Look at one realistic and one very different picture and talk about what each does well.

Thinking all great artists were European men who lived long ago

The names that appear in many books and on many classroom walls are a narrow selection, so children assume that is the whole story. Craft makers and artists from other countries are often left out.

What helps: Look out for artists from different places, women artists, potters and weavers, and artists who are alive today. A local gallery or church can show work by people from your own area.

Believing that copying an artist is the same as learning from them

Copying feels safe because there is a clear right answer. Children then produce something that looks like the original but haven’t made any decisions of their own.

What helps: Ask one question: “What is one thing this artist did that you could try in your own picture?” Borrowing a technique, a colour idea or a way of arranging shapes is learning; tracing the whole thing isn’t.

“I don’t like it, so it isn’t good art”

Children, like adults, react straight away. Without practice they can’t explain a reaction, so “boring” or “weird” ends the conversation.

What helps: Accept the reaction, then ask for evidence: “What in the picture makes you feel that?” A reason such as “the dark colours make it feel lonely” is worth more than a verdict.

How to help at home

Look for five minutes. Choose one picture, from a library book, a postcard or a gallery visit, and look at it together without talking for a minute. Then take turns saying what you notice, starting with simple things and moving on to what you think the artist wanted you to feel.
Visit a gallery, museum or church. Many galleries and museums are free, and local churches and town halls often hold carvings, stained glass or paintings. Let your child pick one favourite and one they dislike, and explain why for each.
Borrow one idea, not the whole picture. After looking at an artist’s work, make a drawing or painting that uses one thing you noticed, such as thick outlines or only warm colours. Write a short note beside it saying what you borrowed.
Build a family timeline. Draw a long line along a roll of old wallpaper or taped-together sheets and add artists and craft makers as you meet them, with a small picture and rough dates. Over a term it makes the shape of history much easier to see.
Spot craft makers around you. Look at a pot, a rug, a quilt or a carved chair at home or in a shop and ask who might have made it, from what, and how long it took. Handmade objects count as art and design too.

Builds on

Key Stage 1: Artists, craft makers and designers
Key Stage 1: Comparing artists’ work

Leads on to

Key Stage 3: Ancient and classical art
Key Stage 3: Medieval to Renaissance art
Key Stage 3: Baroque to Impressionism
Key Stage 3: Modern and contemporary art