My grade 9s are kind of my experiment class. We do 4 units in the year (still-life drawing, landscape pastels, painting & graphic design). We’ve just completed the third unit on painting. This unit builds on the previous units and students were required to conduct their own research and experiment in a style they see fit, or inspired by. I decided to give them a choice on whether to paint a landscape or a still life. All worked from a reference photo, but have had to have taken the photo themselves. Students thought of inquiring questions regarding styles/movements/artists as well as techniques regarding paint.
They basically taught themselves and several learnt via YouTube. From this, it led them to conduct a few personal experiments and make choices on how to complete their summative piece. I simply guided from the side and offered simple feedback on their planning doc and whilst painting. An interesting note is that one student said “this is art, we should’ve have to do writing.” This student may be in for a surprise if they continue onto IB Art.
To be honest, some were very derivative of famous artist’s works, but I thought I’d take a step back to see what they would come up with. Most showed a marked improvement over their initial monotone still life painting that was done as a pre-assessment. I think the work was an improvement over last year, but I’m not sure if it was the learning process or individual student talent. Ideally, I’d like to have them create more than one piece, but unfortunately we must plough through : (
View the student work here via Flickr and feel free to read a student reflection from the unit hereandhere if interested. Is it interesting that several girls chose food?!
Here’s a short (41 seconds) time lapse video from one of our grade 11 IB Art students for her acrylic painting of a woman in a shower. Congrats Maria! (For some strange reason, Edublogs is not permitting me to embed the video, so you will have to click the link. Sorry.) You may click the picture below for a slightly enlarged version.
I am currently developing a new unit for my grade 8s on abstract art. I’m thinking of making the unit question, “What makes art attractive?” or “Why is non-representational art attractive?” I’m also thinking of the concept as being that the principles and elements of art help us read and create art (or something along those lines).
I’m trying to keep it focused but find myself going off in tangents unintentionally. Regardless, I’m currently gathering and filtering some activities to help them explore line, colour, space, shape, balance and movement/rhythm. The unit will be about ten 80 minute lessons with various mini activities to explore these elements, resulting in them creating their own summative abstract painting. Here’s the first painting activity I’ll probably go with about balance and equilibrium.
If you have any great ideas or advice on this topic, please drop me a line. Once I get the unit planning done, I’ll most likely post it here.
Since I am on the topic, students will also begin the unit by exploring: What is art? What makes some things art, and others not? What makes visual art appealing? Whilst researching this, I stumbled across this interesting video where he explains what art is by looking at an apple.
I am currently teaching painting with my grade 9 Art Foundation students. We’re doing landscapes. Some of them have never painted before so we are looking at colour and brushwork. For inspiration, I created this basic slideshare with various international examples and styles to hopefully, get their creative juices flowing. Feel free to use it if you wish or offer feedback etc. You can view the unit outline here.
This is not my personal art blog, not my personal art blog, not my personal art blog. There. Apologies to readers awaiting IT info. This is not my personal art blog. I think I mentioned that.
All this recent artwork posting is due to several of my units finishing simultaneously and me making the conscious decision to try and do more art. Next year I’ll start that personal art blog.
In the meantime, allow me to indulge in sharing this quick painting/ink sketch of my dad and I in a photo booth when I was approximately 5 or 6 years old. He regrettably passed away this year.
Here’s another short (photo) time lapse of a painting I did. I’ve been sick with a sore throat for about 4 days now. Not much of a holiday. Apologies to readers waiting patiently for IT related info. Something soon, I promise. (You must be tired of all this art stuff. Video link here.)
We’re on holiday for our mid-semester break and I decided to stay put to get some art done. Well the break is halfway over and I finally managed to squeeze some time in. I thought I’d do a self-portrait with acrylic gouache as I teach this next semester and I am a little rusty. Four and a half hours later I managed to pump this out in A3 size. I also photographed the process to create the video below. Not my best work but it feels good to do some artwork again! (That’s the problem when you teach art, you don’t have time to do your own.)
I stumbled across the Painting & Drawing Channel, a TV show that offers tutorial videos related to well…painting and drawing. The site itself offers videos from that week but they also post their videos on YouTube. Their channel is here. I have included one video below to give you a taste.
I often create basic video tutorials for my classes. They are mainly used as a secondary “refresher” resource for students and linked via our class portal web page. What I like about making them is it saves a lot of time in the long run for both myself and my students. Parents also get an insight into what we do in the class and it helps them understand some of the elements on the rubric. If you relocate to another school, the resources also easily follow. The videos do not have to be elaborate (though efforts should be made to make them well in order to reach and appreciate a wider audience), but I myself am occasionally guilty of rushing, resulting in, well…sometimes basic stuff.
This series of photos demonstrate one process to produce a painting. I used acrylic gouache. First, layers of black tones are applied and then a layer of diluted colour is added on top. This is known as grisaille.
In this video, I used blending stumps (tortillons) and graphite to create a landscape drawing. Scumbling and smudging with these produce some nice results.
I think my next step is to get into Adobe AfterEffects, start actually using my copy of Final Cut Express and have some students produce some of these videos instead and then also get them up on iTunes.
My grade 9s are kind of my experiment class. We do 4 units in the year (still-life drawing, landscape pastels, painting & graphic design). We’ve just completed the third unit on painting. This unit builds on the previous units and students were required to conduct their own research and experiment in a style they see fit, or inspired by. I decided to give them a choice on whether to paint a landscape or a still life. All worked from a reference photo, but have had to have taken the photo themselves. Students thought of inquiring questions regarding styles/movements/artists as well as techniques regarding paint.
