Try This Scandinavian Art Style

This summer I taught a few of my usual clay art projects, like pinch pots and animal sculptures, to kids at one of my summer art camps. To guide their creativity, we looked at Duodji art from the Sámi people.

Sámi people are Scandinavian indigenous people from the northern parts of Norway, Finland, Sweden, and parts of Russia. This map shows the specific areas inhabited by the Sámi.

By Designer/Cartographer: Johanna Roto. Original map: Nordregio. Data sources: Sámi language law (Situation as 2014): FI – Saamen kielilaki 1086/2003; NO – Forskrift om forvaltningsområdet for samisk språk FOR-2012-10-12-964; SE – Lag om nationella minoriteter och minoritetsspråk (SFS 2009:724)., Attribution, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=104066060

Duodji is the type of art created by the Sámi people. They used Duodji to create items that were both functional and beautiful. This type of art was culturally significant, expressive of the Sámi artistic style, and served various purposes for the Sámi.

This is a great time to talk to kids about function versus form in art. Functional art means it has a purpose like a mug or blanket. Form, in terms of art, means the way an art item looks, like an animal sculpture that is just that - an animal sculpture. The animal sculpture has no other purpose other than to look beautiful.

A pinch pot is beautiful and it serves a purpose - form and function together. We make pinch pots all the time in art. In every grade I have ever taught, kindergarten through 12th grade, we always make pinch pots. It is a great basic building technique for clay hand-building. It encourages fine motor skills in younger students and it inspires creativity based in structure for older students. For this exploration of Sámi art and culture, we made basic pinch pots and carved Duodji patterns into the outside of our pots. Kids can practice their pattern ideas in sketchbooks before they begin carving.

For our second Duodji clay project, we made clay animals. For this, we started with a pinch pot body and then added limbs, heads, and other details using the slip and score method. The clay animal sculptures helped us to explore the form side of Duodji art. We also carved Duodji patterns and designs into the outside of our animals. We used traditional Duodji colors, red, blue, yellow, and green, to paint our projects. As a side note, we were using air dry clay for this project since we didn't have time to properly use and fire kiln fire clay.

This project gave us a great opportunity to learn about a new part of the world, a new culture, and a new type of art. It was new for me too! As an interesting aside, check out this article about how Sámi culture was properly used in two animated films - Frozen 2 and Klaus. This would be great to share with kids as you begin working on this project. It also opens up the conversation about proper use of culture in art versus appropriation.

I hope you'll enjoy learning about this culture as much as I did!

Olu Gittu!