clay kimmys

Last year I introduced my 4th graders to the work of Kimmy Cantrell with a drawing exercise. This year we are going all the way and examining his work with a project in clay.

I shared a few images from his website with my classes today (and will continue to do so with 3 more 4th grade classes) and we talked about his use of asymmetry. We looked at how he plays with the placement, shape, and size of facial features. I pointed out how he stacks shapes of clay together to make his sculptures pop out towards the viewer more.

Students started by making at least two sketches of different face designs. when they were finsished with that step I demonstrated how to lightly draw the main head shape on a slab of clay, how to carve it out once it was big enough, and how to build features and glue them on with slip.

Next week, after the faces are fired, we will dunk them in a diluted mix of black acrylic and then paint them with other acrylic colors.

Students have been super engaged with the project and the clay process:)

a man called kimmy.

This 4th grade project was inspired by the work of African-American sculptor Kimmy Cantrell and the cool lesson previously done by Mary over at Marymaking.

I loved seeing and hearing the reaction of the students this week when I shared Kimmy's name before showing students a picture of what the artist looks like. Similar to the reaction I got last week when we did a project based on the work of Pearl Fryar.

Kimmy changed careers over 20 years ago to focus his energy on his art. He went to college for business administration and after 12 years working in that field he realized he would be way happier if he went back to making things like he did in high school.

When we looked at a number of his mask sculptures the class and I talked about how they were examples of asymmetry. By changing the sizes and placements of facial shapes, Kimmy throws off the normal proportion and makes work more interesting because of it. We also looked at how he uses pattern  throughout his work.

We looked at a couple of images by Picasso and a few African masks to see what has influenced Kimmy's style over the years.

Before students started on their large mask drawings they were required to do at least two sketches. They turned these in with their finished projects to provide evidence of their planning.

Once the sketches were complete they drew out their design on a larger sheet. It had to be based on one of the sketches or a combination of the two. Students traced their lines in marker, adding thicker lines to provide visual variety and emphasis to certain parts of their designs. They added color with marker and colored pencils. We revisited making shapes look more 3d by going from dark to light with colored pencils, and they were asked to show implied volume with that technique somewhere in their image.

The drawings were then cut out and glued to a piece of black paper to get them to pop a bit.

This project provided an interesting contrast to the Day of the Dead skulls we did earlier in the year, when proportions were more normal and the heads were examples of symmetry.

Great job 4th graders!