we're going to the zoo, how about you?

The kindergarten students rotated back to me this week and we focused on cutting and gluing to make a collage. we also used overlapping to create a sense of 3d space in our collages.

I shared the work of Melanie Mikecz with them. Melanie's style is perfect for our little ones. Her characters and compositions are deceptively simple. She has a playful sense of color and body proportion throughout her images.

We looked at a number of animal illustrations on her website and identified the different animals as we went through them. I also pointed out places where Melanie used overlapping to show that some shapes were in front of others. Very simple, yet important concept for the kinders to gain an understanding of in art and nature as they develop their spatial skills.

The lesson was pretty direct. Students did have choices as to where certain elements would be placed and what kinds of colors or shapes they would use to create patterns in their designs. By and large, the students did a great job cutting out a variety of shapes. They were rock stars with rectangles and squares. We will continue to practice cutting out shapes with curves throughout the year. Once they get familiar with turning the paper (and not their scissors) those shapes will be so much easier for them to make consistently. It's always "interesting" to see students turning the scissors around to their bodies to get around that circle shape:)

Thanks for allowing us to go on a field trip without leaving the art room, Melanie!

luke bott robot

Kids love robots. And rockets. It's a proven fact:)

Luke Bott is a Kansas based designer who is making very smartly put together images.  He has a keen eye for pattern, shape, and color in his professional and personal work.

The kids and I looked at a few images from the "play" side of Luke's work on his website. They got a kick out of the abstracted bird designs. We identified geometric shapes and patterns in these 2 pieces. They also picked up on how Luke repeats shapes and colors to create patterns.

We then looked at a couple robot rocket designs Luke made. At this point during all 9 1st grade classes there were cheers and a general excitedness filled the room. I love it when they react so strongly to an artist's imagery. Especially when that energy carries through the creation of their project. As long as that energy takes the form of intensely focused, whisper level creation:)

Before starting on the drawing exercise, I also introduced the students to the symmetry present in a number of Luke's designs.

The kids and I folded our papers so that we each had a line of symmetry running down the middle, and then we drew out our robot rockets together. Each class did a different type of rocket that was inspired by Luke's work.

Once the rocket was done, students were asked to add at least 5 patterns to their drawing. I limited their color choices to one of the pairs of complementary colors. Students then filled their rockets with color, shape, and line patterns.

The handling of the background in this project was modified as I worked with the different classes. Students in the first couple classes used marker color and crayons. The later classes had the opportunity to revisit mixing secondary colors from their primary colors. Even though all the classes did a wonderful job with their drawings, I think leaving the background white allows the viewer a better chance to focus on the robot rocket designs the kids came up with.

Thanks for the inspiration Luke and keep the robots coming!

in the woods with wolf.

This week the 4th graders looked at the work of artist Wolf Kahn. He is a painter who has been examining nature in landscape paintings for the past 60 years. In many of those paintings and drawings are trees.He often uses color in a fictional way. He isn't concerned with an accurate color depiction of the settings he paints, even though he does make his forms look 3d by using light and dark colors.

Students successfully identified the key characteristics of a landscape and they identified examples around my classroom. When we looked at Wolf's work they were able to identify his use of warm and cool colors as well.

The students job for this lesson was to create a landscape that used warm and cool colors, used light and dark color to imply volume, and used vertical placement to create depth in the image.

Students used oil pastels to create the trees, so that the colors would be rich and vibrant. They drew the trunks first, followed by the branches, then tree tops. After that, they added a darker or lighter color to make the trees more 3d. We used a stretched out raindrop shape to create the trunks. I thought the thicker shape would make it easier to add the light or dark second element, even though many of Wolf's trees are much skinnier. I was concerned about the colors getting mushed together if the trunks were thinner. Because of this modification, their landscapes look more like the Lorax's truffala trees than Wolf's wooded areas.

Once the trees were done, we switched over to watercolors to add the sky and ground colors. Students used the opposite color scheme of their trees.

I demonstrated how to apply more water to the paint to make a tint, or to make it lighter. i also showed them how to go back and add strokes of color to the grass to give it a different texture than the smooth feel of the sky. I emphasized that the strokes would be more clear if they waited a couple minutes for their base ground color to dry.

I got the idea for this project after seeing an image from a Wolf Kahn lesson posted on pinterest.

Thanks for the inspiration cleaver feather:)

all star artist

This is the first of a series of twice monthly posts that features the work and words of one of our many talented student artists at Zamorano Fine Arts Academy. To be selected, students must be models of respect, engagement, and creativity in the art room. A boy and a girl will be showcased each month.

The first student to be featured is one of our talented 5th grade students, Chris Schmitt. Chris and I sat down for a few minutes and discussed art making. Here's what he had to say...

Why do you enjoy art making?

It's fun. I like to make abstract art because you can't tell what it is at first and then it comes together. I like the surprise and the trip it takes to get there.

Is there a media or technique that you enjoy most? Why?

Drawing. I like it most because I have had the most practice with it. I also like collage because you can 

make interesting art with it.

What inspires you to make art?

Other people's art. I like to use theirs as a starting point. i look at it and say, "I could add this to it...".

Out of the pieces you have done, which is your favorite and why?

I like the collage we just did (based on Georgina Hounsome's work). I like it because it is more real than the others. It's just trying to be what it's supposed to be.

Are you thinking you will pursue an art-related career? What and why?

I would like to keep the work I make instead of selling it. Money you can't be proud of, but you can be of the work you make and see.

What if you could sell copies or prints of your work?  This way, you could still have the original.

I wouldn't want to sell copies because they are fake, they are not the real thing.  

So, is there anything you would consider making to support yourself as an artist?

I would do one of a kind skateboard designs and decks. From a business perspective, I could make more from one original than a number of copies.

Great interview Chris! Thanks for taking the time to sit down with me for a few minutes and keep up the great work!

lesson fail.

Don't you "love" it when you think you have a super cool lesson planned and when you go to execute it with a class, the wheels come off? Me neither.

It happens to the best of teachers.

Since I am using this blog to reflect on my teaching practice, I think it is important to share these experiences as well as all the success stories that take place in my classroom. This will be the first, in a (hopefully) short series of posts that deal with failed lessons or parts of lessons and how I changed them to make sure students don't have a frustrating learning experience with me.

Last Wednesday I had a project planned that introduced 1st graders to the work of British designer Lo Cole. I loved the translucent overlapping that he has going on in the above image and I wanted the kids to create that same effect. To create the birds, students would use tissue paper. To be more specific, they would cut the bird shapes out of tissue paper. This is where things went awry. The kids had such a hard time cutting out the shapes from the flimsy paper. Birds were tearing left and right. To make it even more complicated, I had the kids fold the paper so they could cut out 2 birds at once. They had a hard time keeping the 2 layers together as they cut, so a number of students ended up with 3 raggedy birds instead of 6.

I had done a sample myself before doing it with the students, and it didn't occur to me that they would have so many problems. 

After I met with that class, I decided to switch to using tempera paint and stencils. Students would use primary colors to paint the birds and wherever they overlapped, they would mix secondary colors to fill those new shapes. The results were much better and there were very few frustrated students.

I'm going to reschedule that first class, so they can have an another opportunity to feel successful in art making. 

In hindsight, I could have had students draw the birds on the big sheet and tear small bits of tissue to fill those shapes. Students could use modge podge to adhere the pieces t the paper with a brush.

Lesson learned- do not have students tear complicated shapes out of tissue paper.

3d teddy.

I just met with the 4th graders again. Their first 2 week rotation focused on using contour line to describe shapes. This lesson had them using value and color contrast to define edges of shapes.

I recently found out about the work of Teodoru Badiu. He is a designer and artist based in Vienna, Austria. He creates most of his images digitally using programs like photoshop, illustrator, and cinema 4d. His visual vocabulary is quite diverse and has created many surreal visual worlds and characters.

When I introduced the students to Teodoru's work I used images from one of his websites. The kids LOVED the characters they saw.

We talked about the fact that Teodoru makes these characters look like they could be real (or at least made out of clay) by using color contrast to define the edges of objects (no outlines!) and by using tints and shades to define their volume.

The image that we focused on was one that was inspired by the Mexican holiday of the Day of the Dead. We talked briefly about what the holiday was about and then revisited what made the image look 3d.

While viewing the image we also identified the symmetry running through every part of the composition. Symmetry creates unity in a design and it also tends to focus the viewer's attention down the line of symmetry. 

This art project involved a lot of folding, cutting, and gluing. Students folded each layer before cutting to reinforce the symmetry of their design. We designed the skull first. I talked about and demonstrated what each of the bumps were on our head. After cutting out e skull, students added shading with a black crayon to it look more 3d and added a symmetrical crayon design to it.

Students then cut the middle and back layers, tucking each layer into the fold of the previous layer to make sure each was big enough. All 3 layers were then glued to the background sheet.

Since Teodoru's design uses multicolored shapes at the top I decided this would be a good opportunity to use the tie dye paper that I had gotten earlier in the year. These are pre-printed 8.5x11 sheets that come in a variety pack. This created variety in their individual designs and also created it across classes for exhibition purposes.

Students cut and applied this paper into large and small shapes to add a variety of positive shapes to the background negative shape.

Different classes had different background colors. There are ones with red backgrounds that are not pictured yet. I chose white for the first class and they did an amazing job constructing their designs, but I do like the ones on darker colored backgrounds more. The skull and other parts really vibrate against the darker colors.

cloudy days.

I came across a cool print made by Georgina Hounsome the other day. I liked the multi-panel layout that she used and economic color palette she chose for the print. 

I thought the 5th graders would enjoy playing with this format as well. They see it all the time in comics or graphic novels, so they are familiar with the compositional format.

When I shared this image with the students we talked about how the dark shapes appear closer than the light shapes. Georgina creates strong depth very simply through the value of the shapes and their size. 

Students had to approach this project as a collage. 

They started with two gray sheets and could cut up one into smaller panels. I asked them to reassemble them on a larger sheet of white so that all the pieces had a white border around them. Once this was done then they could start adding clouds to the individual panels.

The clouds were done with torn paper and the black shapes were cut out, so they were better defined. It was interesting to see and listening to some students that were struggling with the torn paper step. I believe they are so accustomed to drawing the stereotypical type of cartoon cloud that they had a hard time letting go and creating more abstract natural cloud shapes. I emphasized that they couldn't really go wrong with the tearing as long as they had some variety in the sizes of the torn pieces. I also pointed out that overlapping of the different colors was important because it strengthened the sense of depth in the collage.

When students moved on to the black cut paper step, I modeled how to make shapes like light posts and utility poles have added height by drawing them tapering to the top. This changes the perspective of the image to a more realistic eye level. The objects look like we are looking up at them. I modeled a number of other shapes on the board and they could add other things to their images if they had different ideas.

Students glued the completed gray panels onto the white paper at the very end. By waiting to do this they could trim off any excess cloud or object paper and their panel edges would look nice and sharp.

I'm really pleased with the way these turned out. There were a lot of excellent compositions put together in all the classes. Yea 5th graders! 

Thanks for the inspiration Georgina!