Jasper Johns: Monochromatic Numerals

• Jasper Johns was an Abstract Expressionist, but unlike his contemporary Jackson Pollock he believed painters still needed to have some kind of subject matter to give form to their work. To avoid allowing the subject matter to steal the spotlight from the painter's expressionistic style, he chose neutral, "boring" subjects like maps and numerals.
• Students learned about Monochromatic painting: using different values of a single color. They used a syringe to add increments of white and black to bottles of a base color to create tints and shades.
• We talked about the way the subject becomes partially obscured in the painting and compared this to camouflage in animals. Students were challenged to make their numbers hide without totally disappearing.