Thursday, June 27, 2013

Celebration!

Wow!

Another Celebration is in the books. What a night. So many smiling faces all over campus all night long.

The evening kicked off with a wonderful performance by our orchestra under the guidance of Ms. Smith and Mr. Roulliard. The gates then opened for families to check out the art gallery in the auditorium and the classroom displays all over our south campus. Families could participate in art activities led by our fabulous classroom teachers around the campus. People could also take a chance at our prize table to win some goodies donated to the school and art made by focus artists, students, and art staff. All proceeds from the event go to "Keeping the Arts Alive" at Zamorano. The support we get from our families and community at events like these help us maintain supplies and positions from one year to the next in these challenging economic times.

We were honored to have several district guests in attendance- Area Superintendent Dr. Shirley Wilson, School Board trustee Marne Foster, VAPA coordinator Karen Childress Evans, and Multi-Media Specialist Daryl Prendergast. They all got to see first hand what a special place Zamo is and the wonderful community we call home.

Thank you to everyone who participated in the event. Without you this wouldn't be happening:)
A special thanks goes out to Danielle Guimond and Kathi Arinduque for rocking the set up with me this past week. Thank you Kathi, Danielle, and Ms. Vance for making some amzing art with our kids all year long. Thank you teachers for leading some great activities and doing it will a sincere smile on your faces. Thanks to our administration team for giving us the time to organize and put on events like this. I'm looking at you Principal Carol King, Vice Principal Kathleen Gallagher, and Dean of Students Don Nitzel. And last but by no means least, Thelma and your wonderful team of PTF volunteers, you have done so much this year:)

It's all about celebrating and supporting the arts at Zamorano. We offer students a chance to grow and thrive in academics AND the arts.

 parent volunteers along with Mrs. Borden and Mr. Pitel




 Vice Principal Gallagher, Area Superintendent Dr. Wilson, and Principal King

 some goofy old man;)

 torn paper monsters!

 a winner of a print donated by CSA Design after students did a project inspired by the poster:)


 silk scarves and stained glass done with Miss Kathi. last year's 5th grade mural is through the glass.

 fashion design with Miss Danielle



 VIP parking for some of our special guests:)



 Mr. Kasarda leading the pastel Picasso booth

 packing p-nut sculpture booth

 Ms. Gavino and Mrs. Miller at the cherry blossom booth:)

end of the night:) target installation inspired by the work of 3 different artists.


Here's something new.... The following items are for sale. All proceeds will go to supporting our art program at Zamorano. If anyone is interested in purchasing something, please contact me at dmasse@sandi.net

 collaborative 3rd grade print. Inspired by the work of Lu Summers.
27x19"
$100

ceramic pieces built by me:)
8x5" 
$25
 $25
7x5"
17" long
$50



Monday, June 24, 2013

getting ready for a celebration.

Whew!

We've been organizing and setting up for Zamo's annual Celebration of Art since last Wednesday. The official shindig is this Wednesday from 5-7 pm. The auditorium is shaping up nicely. It's always cool to see how it all comes together.

Our classroom teachers are swapped with trainings, grade level meetings, and teaching, but they are getting their class displays together on windows and boards located on our south campus.

Materials are getting organized for art activities to be led by our classroom teachers the night of the event.

People are out getting donated items to raffle off to raise funds for the art program. 

Busy, busy, busy...

Here's a sneak peek:)


Stained glass and silk scarves done with Miss Kathi.

My Matt W. Moore/ Georgia Gray install is coming along.
More to add:)

Miss Danielle hard at work under the fashion projects she did 
with our 5th graders.

Stay tuned! I'll post pics from the event Thursday morning.


Thursday, June 13, 2013

a buncha chiquitas.

3 more fifth grade classes worked on the DJ Neff inspired Chiquita rebrand project today. These are the best of the bunch:)
    








Wednesday, June 12, 2013

a lil' chiquita

A few years ago I started seeing these strong graphic t-shirt designs being worn by students on our campus by designer DJ Neff. Simple and bold characters our students were drawn to. A few weeks ago I stumbled across a fantastic redesign of a famous logo that was also done by this fine designer.

He and his team were tasked with making the iconic Chiquita banana sticker look a little cooler. The campaign has since ended, but they definitely brought a whole lotta fun and cool to those little blue, 
white, and yellow stickers.

.

As we looked at examples of the 25 different designs the Neff team created I talked about the constraints that they had to work with. The colors could not be expanded upon and they still had to work with that oval shape.

The 5th graders had some practice designing logos earlier in the year when they did the Shepard Fairey project, so I thought it would be interesting for them to revisit it while working within a different set of parameters.

The kids loved looking at these rebrands. I wish the interactive website Chiquita had up to go along with the original was still functional, because it allowed you to create your own stickers and play with a variety of shapes and sizes when adding features to the sticker.

I asked the students to do a minimum of 2 sketches for this project. The cool thing was that many did a lot more than that. After brainstorming and sketching, students were to color one of their drafts in to get a sense of color in their final design.

Once they thought they had something worthwhile, students took a rectangle and shaped it into the oval sticker. This was similar to the way that they shaped their Don Pendleton inspired skateboard designs earlier in the year as well.

They then drew out their design in pencil and colored it with crayola color sticks. Students chose from blue, yellow, or white paper. I told them to base their paper color choice on the color that they were going to do most in their logo. That way, they would save themselves some coloring work.















The kids have had a blast with this. So have I, as evidenced by the self portrait below:)