Inspired By Matisse

Inspired by Matisse this week students created some amazing bird images by cutting and pasting paper. They also included wonderful organic shaped borders to their frames.
Enjoy the holiday weeks to come and all the snowy fun that you can!

Snowmen! Near, Far and In Between!

Today we used an imaginary telescope to zoom in on a snowman. I read the book All You Need For a Snowman by Alice Schertle. We looked closely at the illustrations and talked about pattern as well as foreground, middle and background.Students drew three different snowman pictures using colored pencil demonstrating near, far and in between!

Happy Thanksgiving!

Have a wonderful and safe holiday!

Mayflower Art

This week we continued our discussion of shapes. I read the book Ship Shapes by Stella Blackstone. We had a lovely discussion about different types of shapes including the semi-circle, which was new to many students! The book has wonderful collage like illustrations. Since Thanksgiving is nearly upon us it seemed appropriate to do a project incorporating the Mayflower!

Miro Inspired People in Motion

Today we took a look at a book titled Shapesville by Andy Mills, Becky Osborn, and Erica Neitz. This is a wonderful book about being happy and proud of who you are and respecting those around you. The illustrations are characters made from many different shapes, sizes and colors emphasizing the point of accepting everyone for who they are.
Next, we looked at some work of Miro. We discussed what a drawing might look like of a person standing still with straight limbs and what one might look like of a person in action. Students then drew an image of a person in action in oil pastel and finished it off with brilliant watercolor!

Alphabeasties

This week we are working on a wonderful alphabet project, soon to be displayed in the hallway, which made me think of the book Alphabeasties.
I am crazy about this book! It is a beautifully designed book about the alphabet for children and, in my opinion, adults too! It could even be a coffee table book! This is not an ordinary abc book. There is so much to see which makes it easy to read and simply look at over and over again. Not to mention it has a local connection having been created by two designers in St.Paul. They also have the most amazing flash cards that would be great to decorate a room with. Here is the amazon link for the book!

p.s.If you have an iphone and are inspired by the book, the app TypeDrawing is a lot of fun!

Inside Out Pumpkins!

Halloween is all around this week at school! So in the spirit of the holiday we created pumpkins. Not just any pumpkins though! Today we spent some time talking about the shape and texture of the outside of the pumpkin and then we talked about the gooey, slimy, inside part! (the kids loved this discussion the most)
First students created the outside pumpkin drawing and designed the carving how they would like it. Next, they created the inside of the pumpkin. They drew a pattern of the "slime" and seeds for the texture on the inside. The completed both drawings by adding a shadow to the base to ground it and a stem and vine to the top. Side by side they look fantastic and very Halloweeny!
Enjoy the weekend!

Nature Jars

I wanted to make sure that before the ground gets covered in a beautiful blanket of white frosty snow that my little guy and I collected some bits of nature. There is something about having these little jars of rocks or jars of twigs and things sitting around that are comforting on those really, really frigid days. It's a reminder that there is something under all that white stuff.
We set out on a nature walk to gather things that inspired us and put them into a little jar. He can use this as inspiration to paint, sketch, assemble a collage or even take out and drive hot wheels around for an obstacle course!

One Line

The upper level worked on some amazing one line drawings today. After reviewing Picasso's One-Liners, a book by Susan Grace Galassi the children tried their hand at creating some Halloween art using only one line. The end results are outstanding and the creative challenge was welcomed by these young artists with enthusiasm!

Scaredy Cats!

The spooky season is upon us so I thought it might be fun for the kids to create some scaredy cats!
Today I read the book Scaredy-Cat Splat! by Rob Scotton. It's a perfect Halloween book about a little cat that wants to be the scariest! The illustrations are very expressive.
After the story students used a white oil pastel to draw a scaredy cat on black paper. Then they cut around the outline of the cat and glued it to blue paper. They added detail using more oil pastel! The children had a great time creating these felines!

Mercer Mayer Books

We have been working on drawing in art class and I always think of Mercer Mayer's books as great examples to look at for inspiration. Mercer Mayer's Frog books are wonderfully illustrated books that show texture in the imagery through different drawing techniques. These books tell a story through pictures rather than words. This makes them perfect to look through with a beginning reader to build confidence to tell a story by observing what is happening in the illustrations. And, to teach children how to tell a story through their own illustrations!

I've included links below to some of the other titles-
Frog on His Own
Frog Goes to Dinner
One Frog to Many
A Boy, a Dog, and a Frog
A Boy, a Dog, a Frog and a Friend

Lines, Lines, everywhere a Line....

Today we read the book Lines That Wiggle by Candice Whitman. It has fabulous illustrations to look at and raised lines to give a great texture to the book as well. This book was great for students to look at because it illustrated to them how a curved line could be a path, or short straight lines could be the texture of fur.
After the story, we took a look around the room to see how many different types of lines we could see to help warm up our "art eyes". Next, students created their own creature using oil pastels starting from the head all the way down to the toes and including texture of fur, scales or feathers too! After their drawing was complete they added some brilliant color using tempera cakes.
Once they were complete they named them! The room came alive throughout the process and certainly during the naming!


Before painting

Pattern Fish Pattern Fish Pattern Fish

Today was all about patterns. We discussed what a color pattern might be (red, green, red, green), and what a shape pattern might be (square, circle, square, circle). Then we read the book Pattern Fish by Trudy Harris. This an engaging book that teaches pattern not only through the illustration but also through rhyme. This was the inspiration for the project today. Students started by doing a warm up pattern drawing exercise. Next they created their very own pattern fish by first drawing the outline of the fish and then creating a pattern within it. Beginning with the tail first they used oil pastel to fill in the fish with brilliant color! These were later cut out and mounted to bright paper to really make them stand (or swim) on their own!
Enjoy the week!

Little House Drawings

This week we read Tomasso and the Missing Line by Matteo Pericoli. The book is about a little boy that carries a drawing he created in his pocket and one day he discovers the horizon line is missing. Through this story he takes a journey and discovers many different types of lines that make up drawings and in the end he finds his missing horizon line.
After the story we looked at work from Vincent Van Gogh to help students see how artists illustrate things in the foreground smaller and things in the background larger. We talked about horizon line, foreground, middle and background. Students used their pencils to create a drawing demonstrating these things.
The drawings are great representation of what they learned today. It is fun to see their interest and enthusiasm when their drawings take shape!

The upper level experimented with one point perspective drawing. This was new to many students but they were all eager to learn and try. They did amazing! I can tell they are excited to keep going with it next week!


Have a great weekend!
ps Look at the yellow frame in the window of the office. The school self portraits are done and they are adorable!

First Day of Art!

First day of art, Hooray!!!! Today we began class by reading a book called The Clever Stick by John Lechner. The story is about a little stick that doesn't think he has a way to communicate. He soon discovers he has a voice through his illustrations and is able to share what he wants to say to his friends. This is a great lesson about how illustrations are a form of communicating. We shouldn't underestimate what the artist is trying to tell us.

After the story and a look at some of Picasso's wonderful line drawings students then took out their pencils and began to work on sketching different types of lines (zig-zags, loops, curves, dashes) and circles. Next, students began to draw their self portrait paying close attention to the shapes and lines on their face by feeling them first. The end result was brilliant! Their faces were shining on the paper and in person! Each student also did a miniature self portrait to put together in a frame with the entire school. The end result will be up some time next week!

Happy Back To School!

Fall is the best season! Right behind Summer, Spring and Winter!
Going to school for the first time or heading back to school is so exciting! I am looking forward to another school year of art and creativity with new and old students. This year is sure to be full of creative chatter and wonderful artwork hanging in the halls!

We will begin the year with drawing techniques. For some, simply using a pencil each day will be new. To others, the act of drawing may not be a daily practice. At the end of the unit it will be wonderful to view the progress of each student to see how his or her skills have changed.

Thank you for checking in to the blog! I'll post again after our first day of art!
Enjoy the week!

A Marvleous Summer!

Hello!
The summer has consumed me with magnificent days of warm sunshine, bubbles, sidewalk chalk, bug hunting, butterfly watching and dirt digging not to mention a little art exploration too! While I am sorry to see the pool and popsicle days gone I am delighted to get back to a routine and see all the bright faces that will be coming to school for the first time as well as the familiar smiles that I know from last year! I have some great things I've been collecting and experimenting with over the summer and I am looking forward to seeing what can be created!

Wee Little Nature Cups

My three year old and I were cleaning out the long over due pots of winter greenery and found tiny little pine cones. He wanted to keep them, because he is interested in all things very tiny right now. Recently, I ran across a post on this wonderful blog about making these sweet little cups and I thought it might be fun to give it a try.

We modified the project because of lack of time but they could be easily embellished with tissue paper and glue, paint or marker!

We took an egg carton and cut out the cups, punched a couple holes and added a paper handle with brads. My little guy was more focused on filling them so we skipped the color tissue!

I have a feeling we will be making several of these for our nature walks!

Recycled Desk Art

My littlest one has started eating solid food and I have not had the time, like I did with my first child, to make all of her food yet. Therefore, we have these little containers available for endless possibilities at our house. They can not only act as a little garage and hold toy cars, be a "very special" snack container for big brother but they are perfect for creating "desk art".

I cut paper to fit in the inside of the lid and the little artist in our house created a wonderful work of art using glue, markers and one button (carefully chosen). Then we spread glue on the inside of the container and sprinkled glitter (the best part!). To complete it I helped him glue the top to the bottom so we were certain it would not come off!
I think this might be just one of many recycled spring break projects this week!

Postage Please!

Today students created postage stamps by looking at images of different bugs. We talked about how to begin drawing bugs and that they are made up of different lines and shapes. This seemed to ease the minds of many students that have never tried to draw bugs! We also discussed including USA and the price of the stamp on their artwork. They look like a wonderful collection of stamps!
If you want to create real postage stamps out of your artist's work here is a website that you can easily upload images to http://www.zazzle.com/stamps.
Enjoy Spring break!
See you in April for recycling projects!

Happy St.Patrick's Day!

With the excitement of Lucky the Leprechaun visiting the classrooms and the beautiful sunshine outside today I couldn't have asked for more creative enthusiasm!
Today I read the story Jack and the Leprechaun by Ivan Robertson to inspire the project. Although, there was plenty of inspiration in the room with Lucky leaving behind shamrocks, gold coins, and foot prints. Today students designed a house that they thought a leprechaun might live in. They began by drawing a tree to illustrate the scale of the house better to the viewer. We discussed how to show the texture of the tree and what a Leprechaun might have in his backyard - rainbows, shamrocks and pots of gold of course!
Next, imaginations went wild!

Wordless book for the imagination

Where is the Cake by Thé Tjong-Khing is a wordless book with illustrations begging for a story! The pictures allow for very imaginative discussion especially with a young one. There is so much activity happening in the illustrations that the story can change each time you look at it! It is a wonderful way to demonstrate the power of story telling through art.

From Scraps to Cities!

We have started to look at landscapes this week. Today we began by talking about cities. We looked at some of Paul Klee's work including Castle and Sun. We discussed the endless possibilities of what could be happening in the painting as well as the use of many geometric shapes. Students used scraps that we have been collecting all year to create their cityscape. They turned out amazing! Each city has it's own creative story. Be sure to ask your artist what is happening in their scene.


Tunnels and sky scrapers

This student found heart scraps from a Valentine's day project and turned them into birds!

A busy city with bridges and tunnels and buildings


One student saw his city with more dimension. Maybe a future pop-up artist or architect?!

Spring Has Sprung!

Spring is here!.... at least in the halls at school! Today we looked at more of Georgia O'Keeffe's beautiful floral paintings. Students used view finders to "zoom" in on one of the live flowers from the bouquet on their tables. They used pencil to draw an over sized bloom on their page and included texture to their image by taking an even closer look at the actual flower. Next, they carefully and slowly painted these wonderful spring blooms!
Can't you smell the fresh spring air?!

Plenty o' Poppies!

In preparation for the play this year we have started to transform the hallway to a field of poppies from the Wizard of Oz. The kids created more than 300 poppies to decorate the hall!
Not only does it get us in the spirit of the play but it's also a nice preview of spring!
Enjoy the sunshine and snow this week. It's perfect for forts, snowmen, sculpture and if you happen to find a stick, like my three year old, it is great snow to draw in!
See you in the halls!

Happy Valentine's Day!

This week we kicked off Valentine's Day a little early in art class. The project was to create a Valentine animal and incorporate a heart into it. Here are some of the examples of fun and wonderful artwork! I wish I could frame them all!

A Shadow Book

The Foggy Foggy Forest by Nick Sharratt is a perfect book to talk about shadows and silhouettes. I wish that I had found it before we were talking about the shadows of Punxsutawney Phil and our Matisse shadow art project from last week!
It has wonderful silhouettes that are printed on translucent paper. It is fun to guess what might be behind the dark images. When you turn the page it reveals what it is in color! I think this book could be a fun read for kids of all ages!

Matisse Shadow

There was a lot of discussion last week about what was happening in Matisse's Icarus so we took another look at it again this week. Some ideas that students had were that the image was dancing, swimming, leaping, doing a cartwheel or floating in space. We talked about the idea that perhaps the image was a shadow of someone.
Today students started by cutting out a shadow image. Next, they used the skills they learned last week to draw a person in the same position as the shadow. After the outline of their person was complete they added background and features to their person to allow the viewer to recognize what activity is happening in the image.
It's wonderful how many ideas came out of one shadow image!