Navajo Storyteller Figures

The children and I learned about the importance of storytelling as tradition in the Navajo culture. Storyteller figures in terracotta clay depict that tradition. Each student created a storyteller of their own in terracotta air-dry clay, and decorated it with acrylic paint. Some distinctive features of the figures are the round open mouth, closed eyes, and traditional Navajo dress. 

Standing figure forms were shaped like a bell, and then head, hair, and arms were added using score and slip method. For seated figures, children formed a thick coil, bent it into an 'L' shape, and then separated the bottom half into two legs. Again head, hair, and arms were added using score and slip method. Figures were painted using a limited palette and some areas of the clay were left unpainted. Details were added with fine brushes and/or black sharpie marker. Enjoy!

William the Hippo Sculptures

I recently taught a lesson about William the Hippo, who is the unofficial mascot of the Metropolitan Museum of Art. He is a small sculpture found in the Egyptian galleries, and is quite a popular artifact with museum visitors. William was found in an ancient tomb from about 4,000 years ago. Among many other objects, the hippo helps one on his journey to the afterlife. His blue color and lotus flower decoration represent the Nile River. It can also represent the celebration of the hunt. I thought, what a great idea for a sculpture project!

We worked in air dry clay, and started by forming a large fist sized ball of clay for the body, one about half that size for the headand neck, and then rolled a coil and cut it into four sections for the legs. The children then scored and wet the pieces to fuse them together and worked on forming a realistic hippo shape. After the clay was dry, we painted our "Williams" with Cerulean Blue acrylic paint. The last step was to draw on the lotus decorations with Sharpie marker. Here are images at work and of our final projects. I love them all!

Turkey Pinch Pots

I saw this lesson at  Deep Space Sparkle and was thrilled to give a new pinch pot idea a try. Plus I had parents talking about not having too many pieces of art that made good Thanksgiving decorations. This project seemed to fit all the criteria!

I have finally moved on from Crayola Air Dry clay, and I will never go back! Not having a kiln has made me hesitant to push on with clay projects, but it is so important to have that tactile experience, and to work three dimensionally. For this project we used Amaco air dry clay and it outperformed the Crayola by leaps and bounds.

We each worked with a baseball sized ball of clay, gently kneading it to use the warmth of our hands to soften the clay. Then each child pushed one finger into the center of their ball to create the center of the pot. We didn't thin out the walls of the pot too much, to allow for pulling the head and neck from one end and the tail feathers from the other. The beak, waddle, and wings were added with extra pieces of clay, and the children were instructed on how to score and moisten the point of contact to get it to adhere well. The turkeys were finished off with acrylic paint after they had completely dried.

Mexican Suns and Air Dry Clay

The final projects from this class were so great, but it was a long, hard road of a learning experience to get there! I practiced this class with the girls and found it very troublesome. What surface to work on was a challenge. We tried on wax paper (too flimsy), newsprint (the same and the ink would come off onto everything) and then I pulled out a couple of ceramic floor tiles we had for samples to use in our house. The clay stuck! Nothing was successful! I did a little research and found that a vinyl kitchen table cloth or canvas works best. The kids said that they each get a canvas mat to work on at school. I can't find any real art supply product for this activity, so I'm still wondering what to get.

Working with air dry clay was another challenge. I tried the lesson with Crayola air dry clay, and wasn't too impressed. It broke very easily and some repair work was done to a couple of the projects. Now, I'm working from my home studio, and firing clay and a kiln will never happen, so I need to find a better alternative. And over and over I find that Crayola makes great crayons and markers, but not much else as far as art supplies go.

I found an entry on an online resource by a clay artist who was asked to try out different products and give his opinion. He said that Amaco air-dry was the best product or to use Della Robbia oven bake clay. Any suggestions art teachers?

All in all, the suns were beautiful, and I definitely want to keep clay sculpture in my repertoire. Here are some images. One student loved his so much, he drew it over and over, and made drawings for me to keep as well. That is success!