Marc Chagall Self Portraits

I've been thinking more and more about choice in the art room. I definitely try to strike a balance in my teaching philosophy and practice. After all elementary students need structure. They are still learning to use materials properly, the rules and procedures in the art room, and I have curriculum standards to fulfill.

And yet, student choice in the art room reveals a path to a wonderful variety of expression, lends itself to differentiation and increased student engagement. I am finding that when we talk about art, and artistic choices of famous artists, that students are inspired to make their own decisions in how and what they are making. This simple project turned into something magical for me and my 3rd graders as we learned about the art of Marc Chagall.

Our first look at some of Chagall's paintings observations like:
Some people are green, upside down, different sizes.
Some things are floating, or upside down.
Sometimes people or animals are shown as just a face, or their whole body.

We talk about how Chagall made choices as an artist to create his paintings in this way, and students were asked to think about the following: What can we do in our artwork to demonstrate that it is inspired by the work of Marc Chagall?
Show us three things that tell us about you
Create a self or family portrait or memory
Include people, buildings and nature (plants/animals)
Have images vary in size
Use non-realistic and bright colors
Add an unexpected image
Change the direction of objects
Floating or flying people/objects
Create a feeling of happiness
Include a favorite animal or pet

The three things that that tell me something about my students is required, and all of the other criteria work more like prompts. I don't expect every item to be addressed. Those three things are a great opportunity for me to learn a little more about each as we work and discuss our projects. The one thing I do dissuade my students from doing is writing words on their project. Some students are inclined to label things, or just write words instead of draw, so we talk about that as well.

We sketch ideas on a 4x6 piece of paper before moving on to 12x18. And then the process is pencil drawing, tracing lines carefully in sharpie, smaller areas in oil pastels, and painting larger areas in watercolor or pan tempera.

In having choices throughout this project, students care about what they creating. And when everyone's artwork is different, no one's choices are wrong. Here are some of my favorites!

Kinetic Drawings

I just finished a unit with my 5th graders based on the art of Heather Hansen. She is an interdisciplinary artist, who combines her work in dance, choreography and drawing to create large-scale kinetic drawings. 

 We talked about Heather Hansen's work, and I showed them a brief Youtube video to give them a bit more information as well as a glimpse into how she works. We made connections to creating snow angels, and talked about the meaning of the term kinetic. We then saw the work of other artists who utilize movement in their work, like Alexander Calder, and Bridget Riley.

Then we began work on our individual drawings. The kids worked with chalk pastels, which I divided into trays, with two pastels of two different colors. They worked with the same pastel color in each hand, concentrating on creating a drawing that was symmetrical, showed various lines and movement, and used at least four colors. As a final touch to their work, students could create "smudge lines" using their fingers. I had them repeat after me, "fingers, not hands" and showed them the difference between creating lines with our fingers, and making mud with our hands. Some chose also to include thicker and thinner lines by utilizing different sides of the pastels.

Space is always an issue since I push into several rooms, so we prepped two 18"x24" sheets of drawing paper with a masking tape seam along the back. Each day as we finished our work, our paper was carefully folded in half to store it for the next class. 

For our collaborative drawings, I assigned partners, they prepped paper, and wrote their names, each on one panel on the back. This way I could grade the finished piece, as well as their individual contributions to it. Also, we could just separate the two halves of the artwork at the end of the unit, so each student could keep his or her own work.

My students were so engaged, and discovered that creating a nonrepresentational work of art can be even more challenging and rewarding than one with a concrete or representational objective. They also reflected on the differences in working on a individual drawing as opposed to working with a partner. I couldn't have been happier with their efforts. Their drawings demonstrated a great variety of line, movement, color, and symmetry. Individual drawings conveyed their choices and personalities. And their collaborative work showed their attention, communication skills, and expression of the lesson objectives as a team. Here are some of our final pieces:

 Individual Drawings in Pastel

Partner Drawings in Oil Pastel

Three Sisters Patterns

During my teaching assignment last fall I tried out a new lesson plan with first graders to learn about the Thanksgiving holiday, creating a pattern, and to highlight a living artist's work.

We discussed the companion gardening technique of the Wampanoag people, and why they called beans, corn and squash The Three Sisters. While researching this assignment I came across the website of a New England artist named Janice Schupak Frishkopf, whose works inspired my students to create their own autumn harvest patterns!

To make our patterns I provided tracing templates for ears of corn, beans and various types of squash. Students were asked to show each of the Three Sisters in their patterns, to repeat shapes, to let their shapes reach outside the border of their paper, and to start with the largest shapes first. They could also let shapes overlap. The first class they worked in pencil to trace out their patterns.

After the pencil drawings were finished, I placed ears of dried Indian corn, and decorative squash at each table. We looked at all of the different colors and textures, and then added color to the drawings with oil pastels. The last step was using cake tempera to add a wash of color to the background and/or as a resist.

Their color choices and attention to detail were more than I had hoped for! And they really had fun creating their own distinct patterns. I actually left this lesson in progress for the returning art teacher, and she finished up the assignment with the children. When I had a chance to sub again I saw their finished pieces on display. I just had to take a few pictures! Thank you Emily for letting me introduce this lesson in your class room, for helping the children complete their art, and for letting me share this lesson on my blog.

Inspired by The Scream

I have seen lots of lessons for Edvard Munch's The Scream, but my favorite was done at Art Projects for Kids. I loved the idea the student actually being the subject of their scream image. I had each child pose for me and I took their 'screamiest' scream picture. I then changed the images to black and white and elongated them slightly for a more expressive look. They had the choice of colored pencil or oil pastel to render the background image for their artwork. I then let them them color their figures and cut them out. We attached them to the background with foam dots to have them pop off of the page slightly.

 

 

Inspired by Gustav Klimt

My younger students created these works based on Gustav Klimt's Tree of Life. First we drew in pencil and had to think about how to create those swirly branches! After the drawings were finished, the children added bits of shape and color with oil pastels. We talked about adding only to the tree and the ground, to make a better composition and to have nice contrast which would highlight their trees. The final step was painting with metallic tempera, to mimic Klimt's use of gold leaf in his works. I think they are outstanding! Great job little artists.

Flower Field Perspective

This is a lesson in basic one-point perspective that I found at http://kidsartists.blogspot.com. I loved the choice of subject matter to create a colorful and stunning image. The children created a landscape image of Holland (home to famous artists like Van Gogh and Rembrandt) by drawing a horizon line and vanishing point. Long rows of tulips, hyacinth and daffodils were colored with oil pastels. Silhouettes of windmills and farmland were added to the horizon line in black.

One of my classes took some very interesting turns. Some students followed the lesson as explained, but we always talk about using artistic license! So one student asked if she could create her landscape as a night scene. I said yes, as long as she could utilize several colors. Another wanted to do a night scene in the winter. We then talked about how the landscape would change in the wintertime. For example, there wouldn't be any flowers! But her idea didn't falter and she created an interesting multi-colored scene as well. I love how she made a smoking chimney to keep the farmers warm. Sometimes you just can't forsee what kids will want to do with a lesson. Hurray for their vision!