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How You Feel – Class 7 Arts Chapter 17 Notes & NCERT PDF

Class 7ArtsChapter 17NCERT book: Kriti - Arts Class 7

Notes and a simple summary of Chapter 17 of the NCERT Class 7 Arts book, with the official chapter PDF, flashcards, an MCQ quiz and an AI tutor for your doubts.

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Chapter 17: How You Feel (Visual Arts)

Introduction

This chapter is about the human body and facial expressions. You discover hidden ratios and proportions in the face, learn to draw emotions, travel back in time to a great rock-cut sculpture at Mahabalipuram, make a clay relief of a face, and question the stereotypes about bodies that we see in popular culture.

Key Ideas

Expressions and navarasa

You have met the navarasa (nine emotions) in theatre and dance. In Activity 17.1: Act and Guess, teams enact prompts — being hugged by family, meeting an animal suddenly, being laughed at, discovering something new — while others guess from body movement and facial expression.

Proportions of the human head

  • What makes a baby's face look different from an adult's? Proportion.
  • Use the same guidelines to draw the head from different angles, and notice how proportions change as a person grows.
  • You can use your index finger, or the length of your nose, to measure other parts — ears, eyes, forehead.
  • Two useful discoveries:

    • - The space between the two eyes is about one eye's width.

    - The ears sit between the level of the eyebrows and the tip of the nose.

  • Math in Art: write facial proportions as fractions or ratios with your maths teacher's help.

    • Drawing facial expressions

    Watch how the eyes, eyebrows, mouth and jawline change for a funny, sad, laughing or worried face. Draw four or five faces with correct proportions, then change these features to create expressions — and your own emojis.

    Descent of Ganga at Mahabalipuram

  • Imagine a time machine taking you to a massive rock-cut sculpture at Mahabalipuram, Tamil Nadu. Sculptors call it the 'Descent of Ganga'; others tell the story of 'Arjuna's Penance'.
  • The river seems to flow down the cleft between two boulders, with all life gathering around it. Some figures are clear; others look unfinished.
  • Figures you can find: Kinnaras (half-human, half-bird/animal), Gandharvas (celestial singers, musicians or dancers), Yakshas (shown as dwarves), a sage sitting near the shrine, and Sage Bhagirath, also identified as Arjuna.
  • The sculptures at Mahabalipuram have eroded over time, so many facial expressions are no longer clear — you reimagine them.
    • A relief is a sculpture which stays connected to its base. Its back is usually flat or not sculpted.

    Making a clay relief (key steps)

  • Soak dry natural clay for a day; knead it and remove stones and impurities.
  • Get the right consistency — too much water makes it sticky, too little makes it crack.
  • Roll a slab about 15 cm × 15 cm × 3 cm.
  • Trace your paper cut-out of a face onto the slab with a pointed tool.
  • Remove a thin layer from the background so the face looks raised; keep the removed clay moist.
  • Add clay to build the forehead, eyebrows, eyes, cheeks, nose, mouth and chin.
  • Join clay parts with slip — a smooth clay paste that works like glue. Roughen both surfaces, apply slip, then join.
  • Refine features and textures, make a hole at the top for hanging, and let it dry for a few days. You may paint it when fully dry.

    • Tools can be clay tools or blunt kitchen cutlery: spoons, butter knives, ice-cream sticks.

    Everybody has a beautiful story — stereotypes

    A stereotype is a widely accepted idea generalising a person, place or community. It is not factual.
  • Examples: assuming a large person cannot run fast, a slender person is weak, or one skin colour is more beautiful than another.
  • Images in magazines, hoardings, films and social media shape how we think about our bodies.
  • The 'Descent of Ganga', and paintings like a Mughal portrait, a Jain manuscript, Bengal patachitra, Warli painting and Raja Ravi Varma's Galaxy of Musicians, show many body types.
  • Create sketches that challenge the stereotypes you find.

    • Key Terms

  • Proportion (अनुपात) — relative size of parts
  • Ratio (अनुपात/निष्पत्ति)
  • Facial expression (चेहरे का भाव)
  • Navarasa (नवरस) — nine emotions
  • Relief (उभरी नक्काशी) — sculpture attached to its base
  • Rock-cut sculpture (शैलकृत मूर्ति)
  • Kneading (गूँधना)
  • Slab (पट्टी/सिल्ली)
  • Slip (घोल) — clay paste used as glue
  • Erosion (क्षरण)
  • Stereotype (रूढ़िवादी धारणा)
  • Kinnara, Gandharva, Yaksha (किन्नर, गंधर्व, यक्ष)

    • Connect to Your Life

    Notice how advertisements show "ideal" bodies. Look around you — short, tall, thin, heavy, dark-skinned, light-skinned, bald — every body has its own story.

    Common Mistakes

  • Placing the eyes too close or too far apart — remember the one-eye gap.
  • Drawing ears too high or too low — they belong between eyebrow level and nose tip.
  • Joining clay pieces without scratching the surfaces and using slip, so they fall off.
  • Letting the slab dry out while working; sprinkle water lightly now and then.
  • Treating a stereotype as a fact.

    • Let's Reflect

    Did your relief develop cracks? What could the reasons be — too little water, uneven drying, or thin joins?

    💡 Key Learning Points

    • ✓Facial expressions change through the eyes, eyebrows, mouth and jawline
    • ✓The face follows proportions: one eye-width between the eyes, ears between eyebrow level and nose tip
    • ✓The 'Descent of Ganga' at Mahabalipuram is a rock-cut sculpture full of figures and stories
    • ✓A relief stays connected to its base; clay parts are joined with slip
    • ✓Stereotypes about bodies are not factual, and art can challenge them

    👨‍🏫 Teaching Tips

    • →Start with the Act and Guess game using the chapter's prompts to warm up expressions
    • →Let students measure their own faces with their index finger before drawing
    • →Link proportion work with the maths teacher by writing face ratios as fractions
    • →Project a large photo of the 'Descent of Ganga' and let students find Kinnaras, Gandharvas and Yakshas
    • →Demonstrate slip joining live before students build features on their clay slab
    • →Plan a field trip to a local heritage monument to sketch postures and expressions
    • →Handle the stereotypes discussion with care; ensure no student's body is used as an example

    📋 Assessment Questions

    1. Can the student draw a head with correct basic proportions?
    2. Can they show at least four distinct facial expressions?
    3. Can they explain what a relief is and describe how to join clay with slip?
    4. Can they identify figures in the 'Descent of Ganga' sculpture?
    5. Can they explain what a stereotype is and create artwork that challenges one?

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    Keep learning

    All chapters in Kriti - Arts Class 7

    1. 1. Understanding Emotions
    2. 2. Say More without Speech — Mime
    3. 3. Let’s Design — Stage Technicals 2
    4. 4. Story of India’s Storytelling Tradition
    5. 5. Making Music
    6. 6. Music, Emotions and Creativity
    7. 7. Ragas and Talas/Taal
    8. 8. The Music of the People
    9. 9. Performance
    10. 10. Dance and Sculpture
    11. 11. Dance Vocabulary and Techniques
    12. 12. Dance, You and Creativity
    13. 13. Personalities
    14. 14. Natya
    15. 15. Objects in Icons and Symbols
    16. 16. Nature’s Palette
    17. 17. How You Feel
    18. 18. Textiles and Traditions
    19. 19. The Art of Calligraphy
    20. 20. Integration of All Art Forms — Sculptures Come Alive!