Tuesday, January 19, 2010

The school year is flying by!!!

Sorry it's been so long since my last post. The art room has been busy lately!
The students have been working hard and have created some really amazing artwork. Check out the latest masterpieces on Artsonia. Remember that 15% of all sales from Artsonia comes back to Art at Irving.

Here’s a look at what we’ve been working on:

5TH GRADE
The 5th Graders looked at visual culture images of iPod advertisements as inspiration for their latest paintings. Using overhead projectors and cutouts from magazines, each student traced a silhouette of a person in motion. The students added lines around their person to emphasize the action.
In class we discussed complimentary colors, opposite colors on the color wheel. The students chose a pair of complimentary colors for their painting, one for the person and one for the background. We also talked about value and how to create lighter or darker values by adding white or black to a color. When a color is mixed with black, it becomes a shade. When a color is mixed with white, it becomes a tint. By mixing tints and shades of their background color, each student created 4 or more values in their silhouette paintings.












3RD GRADE

The 3rd graders looked at many examples of self portraits by famous artists such as Vincent van Gogh, Edvard Munch, Frida Kahlo, Andy Warhol, Chuck Close and Jean Michele Basquiat. We discussed the different styles the artists used and the basic proportions of the face. Then the students were ready to start their own self portraits! They drew themselves from memory, without looking in a mirror. Once the initial drawings were done, the students helped each other find colored pencils that matched their hair and skin color.

Everyone got a special treat before winter break when Robin, a local artist, came to talk to each of the classes. She showed the students some of her own portrait work and gave them tips for drawing people which they were able to use for their self portraits.
See if you can name the students from their portraits below: