Activity Title: What Can We Learn From Portraits?

Grade Level: 4-8th

Activity Overview:
Image has always been important to people in power. In this activity we will develop a list of questions from which criteria will be developed for analyzing portraits of Abraham Lincoln. We will also use the Basic Guide to Portrait Analysis used by Art Historians from the National Endowment for the Humanities to compare questions in analyzing portraiture.

Goal of the Activity:
Create our own criteria for analyzing portraits, or using an already developed analysis worksheet determine what we can learn and know about Abraham Lincoln from these visual representations.

Exhibition: Portraits Abraham Lincoln’s Cooper Union Portrait, Campaign Buttons from 1860

Learning Objectives:
• Cite at least three purposes a portrait can serve.
• List criteria for analyzing the image a portrait projects.
• Analyze a portrait of Abraham Lincoln based on the criteria established.
• Relate biographical research to the portrait.

Investigative Questions:
What is a portrait?
Why do artists paint portraits?
What differences in portraits do we observe?
What image of the individual do portraits convey?
What we know from a portrait about the individual?

Primary Sources Learning Practices:
Write questions that can be selected to develop a list of criteria to analyze portraits
Create a list of criteria to use for an analysis of Abraham Lincoln’s portraits
Use the Portrait Analysis Workshop from the National Endowment for Humanities

Assessment:
Students bring in pictures of themselves dressed casually or formally-have the other students analyze the portrait and determine if the portrait represented the image the student wanted to project.