Little van Gogh

This month our library is offering a series of four art classes for three- to five-year-olds, and Gracie had her first art class last week. When I took Gracie to the class I noticed that the teacher had a copy of van Gogh's painting, Starry Night. After class, I asked Gracie if they looked at any paintings by famous artists. She told me that they looked at a landscape by Vincent van Gogh (she hesitated on his last name) and that he didn't paint the sky straight. A minute or two later she commented that the sky is straight in our world, not whirly, so I asked her why she thought van Gogh painted the sky "whirly." Gracie said, "He painted the sky in cursive!" (We had talked about cursive handwriting earlier in the week, and I guess she was impressed by the loops in cursive writing. I thought it was a cute observation!)