We think Landseer was an incredibly persistent and resilient person. Despite personal set back he was dedicated to making art, especially painting animals.

Landseer started painting deer in the 1830s and explored similar themes for the next three decades.  He studied domestic and farm animals and more exotic creatures, and in 1815 first exhibited paintings at the Royal Academy of Arts. He was encouraged to study animal anatomy by one of his tutors. His drawings show his desire to fully understand the anatomy and movement of animals. 

Landseer became an accomplished, wealthy painter but in 1840 he suffered a severe nervous breakdown. There were probably a number causes, including the stress he experienced because of the pressure to finish paintings, the death of his mother, and disappointments in his private life. Landseer did gradually recover, but the experience impacted on his career.  He had a reputation for taking a long time over his paintings sometimes leaving them unfinished.

• Ask pupils to create a mind-map of words they think are ‘encouraging’.  These could be words they would like to hear if they were struggling to achieve something.
• In small groups ask them to create a banner using the words.  Ask them to consider how they could make it bright, bold and eye catching.
• Now ask the groups to hang their banner in a place that they think someone else might see it who needs some encouragement, i.e. the playground, the library etc

• Use Monarch of the Glen as a starting image.  Ask the class to list adjectives to describe the stag.
• Now show them 2 other animals (e.g. sheep / snake).  Ask what these animals represent and what characteristics we assume they have, compared to a stag.
• Ask each pupil to write down adjectives to describe themselves and their own key strengths.
• Now each pupil must decide on a different animal or body part of an animal to represent each strength, for example, the wings of a bird could represent energy, the body of an ox represents strength.
• Now ask them to create a new animal that contains different body parts to represent their whole self.
• Give the new animal a name.  
• Create an exhibition and labels saying why they chose the combination of body parts.

• Landseer drew and painted animals over and over again. In small groups ask pupils to share any interests and hobbies they have.
• Now ask pupils to map out where these interests come from.  Who introduced them to it? What is it about the activity they love?
• Swap skills: what can they teach each other?
• Ask pupils to work together to curate an exhibition that shares their interests. They should have as much control over the exhibition as possible.
• Ask pupils what they learned from each other and how it felt trying something new that was perhaps difficult or needs practise or what they found a challenge.