Resources for Monet to Matisse: Defying Tradition

This education resource supports teachers and students to engage deeply with Monet to Matisse through close looking, inquiry and contextual understanding. It encourages learners to explore how artists responded to a period of rapid social, cultural and technological change, and to consider the evolving nature of modern art practice.

Below you will find resources to use while in the Gallery as well as detailed pages on fundamental themes in the exhibition; landscape, the figure, still life and abstraction. This thematic approach is linked to the themes you will encounter in the exhibition and are topic staples for classrooms everywhere.

Within each themed page you will discover teaching strategy suggestions, making and responding activities linked to the Australian Curriculum, connections to AGSA's collection, flowcharts, demonstrations and links to relevant videos and talks. Each theme will also feature 3-4 artists from either the Toledo Museum of Art or AGSA's permanent collection.

Monet to Matisse presents a century of innovation and experimentation in art through the collection of Toledo Museum of Art, an internationally respected art museum located in Toledo, Ohio. The selection of fifty-seven paintings illustrates the complexity and diversity of art from the mid-nineteenth to mid-twentieth centuries and traverses an array of artistic movements, from early Impressionism to Abstract Impressionism.

Art is often shaped by the circumstances in which it was made. The hundred- year period highlighted in this exhibition was marked by profound cultural and social change, driven by rapid scientific and technological advances alongside two world wars which reshaped global relationships. Artists engaged with these transformations through their work, developing new ways to interpret and communicate the complexities of a changing modern world.

Monet to Matisse is complemented by a selection of works from the Art Gallery of South Australia’s collection, primarily on paper. These works extend our understanding of the artists represented in the Toledo collection, offering additional perspectives on their materials, processes and lived experiences, and deepening insight into the contexts in which they created.

For more detailed information on the curatorial approach to the exhibition we recommend purchasing a copy of Monet to Matisse Defying Tradition Catalogue from the Gallery Store.

To support meaningful engagement in the Gallery, the resources below promote flexible, student‑centred approaches. These include self-guided strategies such as our Chatterbox and Curiosity Question cards. Emphasis is placed on slowing down and prioritising sustained looking rather than completing structured worksheets.

AGSA’s Top Tip for responding to Monet to Matisse: Move away from mimicking the masters

We want to encourage children to be artists, to think critically and creatively, and to avoid replicating what has already been made. Our resources highlight specific themes and corresponding artists. There may even be artists which straddle multiple themes.

We will suggest ways students can respond to an artist’s work (the concept or idea) without creating a copy of the artist’s work.

For example, when Monet painted his water lilies series, he wanted to capture nature’s beauty, observing the changing light and textures of a scene. Instead of children copying Monet’s water lilies, they could create a drawing or painting that captures the beauty of a place that is special to them.

For more ideas and suggestions see the artists featured in the themes below.