photo by [email protected] My visit to the Netherlands, a.k.a. Holland, is influencing the current projects at Blue Church Art. Windmills have been a part of Dutch culture since the 13th century. Many of the old windmills used their wind power to grind corn and grain, or to saw wood. Others performed the important task of draining water from Holland's marshy land to make it usable for farming. In the 1800s there were about 9,000 working windmills in the country. Today more than 1200 of these historic buildings survive. I saw lots of these great old windmills in my travels around the country.
My K-3 students created beautiful Dutch windmills using watercolor and crayons. They added unique touches to their drawings, including American style mailboxes, a bearded sun, pink and purple rainbows, and rainbow colored sails (the windmill's turning "arms" that catch the wind). There are even windmills with snow covered mountains in the background- something you'd never see in Holland!
Click on an image to enlarge it.
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An old Dutch windmill is a complicated machine, and it's also a very complicated subject to draw. My students worked hard to create their wonderful windmill masterpieces, and they had a lot of fun in the process.
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