Ahhhhh Monsters!

To help us brainstorm and plan, each sixth grader is making a monster from their imagination.  We will use these fabulous creatures as inspiration for our clay sculptures. They are sooooo excited!

We found the Zen in Zentangles

These were really fun. So much so that some kids made two! I have recently come to the conclusion that the elements and principles of design are not the end all be all of Visual Arts learning and that writing the definitions of them isn't really learning.  By making these zentangles we discussed and applied most of the E's and P's in a creative way.  

Finding our Zen.....

The E's and P's of Design are revived in a fun way with the Zentangle.  Rather than illustrate each separate element and principle, I decided to use the fad of the Zentangle for out foundations unit.  It has been a blissful journey this week while the students are calmed and entranced through the act of creating zentangles.  

Retablos to Diego Rivera

Our sixth graders went from retablos to Diego Rivera and Cubism.  We looked at Diego's early work as an artist in Europe during the days of Cubism.  Still life's and observational drawing were our focus, along with how to use a split complementary color scheme.  When we do these I like to set up several still life's and allow the children to choose one that works for them.  This also helps to not have to grade 60 versions of the same drawing.  

Retablos to Frida Kahlo

The eighth grade students looked at the work of Frida Kahlo for inspiration this nine weeks.  I feel that it is important for young artists to see how the events in our lives can have an influence on our work and how our work as artists can be our voice.  THe students worked very hard at drawing from a mirror and using proportions, for most of the students this was the first time they drew this way.  I was so happy to see so many of them begin to dig deeply toward a self expression.

A different kind of self portrait.

The seventh grade did so well on their self portrait projects.  I have been working on having the students use more of their personal voices, so I allowed them to guide how they organized their work to represent who they are and their personal interests.  Some of the students were very inventive in what they came up with and I learned a lot about them too!