PICTUREBOOKS AND CITIES: A COLLABORATIVE CREATION BETWEEN ARCHITECTURE AND PRIMARY SCHOOL STUDENTS

Abstract

Picture books have an indisputable value in teaching of language and literature and the plastic arts as an object of artistic creation. Due to the synergetic structure between text and image, picture books enable the acquisition of skills linked to both fields as well as generating inherently creative abilities. More and more often, the main setting for picture books is a city, as it is the living space for today’s children; it also becomes an instrument for appropriating the urban space from the imaginary. After an introductory theoretical framework, this article focuses on analysing the transformations of the city through its representation in picture books in order to subsequently investigate the educational value of their use in a classroom, and the different ways of approaching them in the teaching/learning processes. This article concludes by presenting a collaborative proposal for the creation of a picture book on cities between students from the Clermont-Ferrand School of Architecture (France) and students of a primary school, within the framework of a Master’s subject aiming at raising awareness of architecture.