Studio Art: Candy Bar Triptych

Whew!  I'm finally starting to get things caught up on Artsonia, in my grade book, and on my blog!  It's been a New Year's resolution to keep on top of my grading this year, and so far so good!  These triptych drawings were the last thing students finished up right before our Christmas break.  It was also the final project in the drawing unit.

For this project, students had to bring in a candy bar (or similar type of food item) from home.  At this point, we had practiced with different drawing media in our sketchbooks, so students were allowed to draw with any medium they wanted.  The only stipulation was that one drawing had to be full (true) color, one had to be black and white, and the last could be done however they wanted.

On a side note, while we did these drawings, I used pop artist Wayne Thiebaud as their bell ringer artist in their sketchbooks, since the subject matter students were using was similar to his.

Most students stuck with drawing pencil, ebony pencil and colored pencil, but a few ventured into oil pastels as well.  We haven't actually framed these with mat board yet (I cheated and just photographed them on top of the mat board), but right before the art show, we are going to have a big mating day to frame artwork for the art show.  Students have mated two projects themselves so far, so they should be pros by the end of the year!

Studio Art: Finished Pop Art Reduction Prints

This project is also one that students were working on when I left for my maternity leave.  I am EXTREMELY pleased with this project!  Reduction printing is definitely a hard and lengthy process but they stuck with it and completed their prints!  My sub wasn't comfortable with having them mat their artwork, so I taught them that process when I got back.  I have two mat board cutters and it took us all week to complete this project and wrap up the other two that they did with my substitute.  Each student measured out and did the math to cut their boards...even the ones that had a hard time with the process did a great job as matting more than one print on a board is way more difficult than matting one artwork in a frame.

Kindergarten: Jasper Johns' OIl Pastel Numbers

The second official project that kindergartner's finished up before my leave was this Jasper Johns number project.  This is a repeat project that I did from last year, with some alterations.  Last year I was able to spread this out into more of a complete unit because I saw students twice a cycle, but this year I didn't feel I could spend that amount of time on this project, so I shortened it and altered it a bit more to fit within the Kindergarten Common Core Math standards. 

This project took about 2 1/2 days for most students to complete.  On the first day, I showed students my power point about Jasper Johns and we talked a bit about pop art.  One of the math standards for kindergarten is being able to count objects that are in a row, a column, a grid and in a random assortment, and then write the appropriate number.  To mirror that, I paired students up and gave them a brown bag filled with 9 wooden beads of different sizes.  One at a time, I had the students pull out a handful of beads, count them and write the number down in the first square on their paper in pencil.  Their partner was supposed to double check their counting and the number they wrote.  They alternated until each partner had their six squares filled with a number.

For the second class, I passed these back and showed the students how to turn their numbers into bubble numbers.  For their next set of directions, they were asked to choose ONE oil pastel color to color in their numbers.  For the most part, everyone followed that direction quite well.

The final portion of the second class and the subsequent class was to color in the background.  My directions were that students were supposed to choose THREE oil pastel colors to color in the background behind their numbers.  This is where some students didn't follow directions, or appeared to not be able to follow directions.  Many students grabbed an oil pastel and started coloring right over the top of their numbers.  Some colored around but used more than three colors.  I gave multiple demonstrations at each table to try and show students how to color AROUND their details, but many still struggled, so I sense that this is something that this group will need more work on!

Studio Art: Reduction Prints Progress

Here is a sneak peek at the progress of my Studio Art's pop art reduction prints before I left on my maternity leave.  I expect that they should be just about finished by this point...  I required that they make a total of 10 prints and that they must have at least four colors in each print.  When I return, they will have to turn in their four best prints and I'll teach them how to properly mat their projects using a mat board cutter.

This student chose to use an iPhone app as her pop art...any guesses?

I'll probably sneak over to school this weekend to check out project progress and to pick up some books I ordered for Christmas presents from a fund raiser...can't wait to see their progress!

Studio Art: 2-D Media, Printmaking

Now that we have finished up the cubist superhero paintings, the last and final aspect of my 2nd unit in Studio Art is the printmaking portion.  For this unit, we are covering Andy Warhol, pop art, and reduction printing with linoblocks (I don't have all of the materials to do screen printing, nor am I as familiar with screen printing, otherwise I had considered doing screen printing like Andy Warhol).  This will probably be the last project I get completed with this class before my maternity leave.

My Studio Art bulletin board in the classroom.  

My example of a reduction print.  I did this during my student teaching with a printmaking class.

For the first two days, we have been working on planning out our pop art object print.  Students were required to bring in an object or photograph of a person/character from pop culture today.  (Some of the items that have been used are baseball caps, the bear from the movie Ted, a rubics cube, Minions, etc.

After students draw out and plan what their finished print will look like, I have them plan out each step of the reduction print process using tissue paper layers.  The first step is to make a print of their entire linoblock.  If there is anything they want to keep white for every print, they must carve it out first.

The second step is to carve away the area around the object so that you just have the contour of it.  

For this project, I am requiring that they have at least four colors/steps in their prints, like my Coca-Cola can.

Another example I did during my student teaching.  I created this and took a photo of every step to create a visual poster with directions.  This particular reduction print had six steps to it.

These are three student samples from my student teaching.  I did this with a printmaking class that had only 3 students.

Here are the close up shots of my visual poster that I had made.  Sorry for the bad photos...it was laminated and didn't photograph very well under the poor lighting at school.

Draw the design on the block, carve out anything that needs to stay white, and make your first print.

Carve out the area around your object...make your second print...

So, basically by the end, you have nothing left on your linoblock!

Currently the Studio classes are working on making their 10 background prints.  Those are due by the end of class today.  Tomorrow, we'll carve out the area around their object and I'll show them how to carefully line up their block with their first print to layer the second on top.  When finished, students will have to submit to me four of their best prints and eventually we will mat them (whether my maternity leave sub is comfortable teaching that or it waits until I return to school...)