What we will be doing and learning about this quarter...
7th Graders will be working with clay this year and are focusing on creating structures, specifically dwellings. They will first be introduced to Canadian-born, American architect Frank Gehry. We will begin by looking at several of his famous works such as the Guggenheim Museum in Bilbao, Spain, the Walt Disney Concert Hall in Los Angeles, CA and the MIT Ray and Maria Stata Center in Cambridge, MA! We will also learn about Spanish architect, Antoni Gaudi who had an "exceptional creative contribution to the development of architecture and building technology in the late 19th and early 20th centuries. And lastly we will look at artist, Richard Serra, an American minimalist sculptor known for working with large scale assemblies of sheet metal. Check out our pinterest page to see what else we are getting inspired by:
Or take a peek below at some images of examples of the artists/architects work we will be learning about!
11/16: Day 1 of quarter two art!
Day one of quarter two art has begun! Today, instead of spending the first whole day talking about logistical stuff we decided to spend the day making. Today students were asked to think about:
"How can I express something about myself through a non-representational mark using only paper?"
Students were asked to first measure and cut a 4x4" square out of their choice of colored paper to act as a background or a base, then students would create a "mark" out of scraps of paper that somehow represents something about themselves through the idea of color, pattern, shape, line, etc.
The point of this project is for students to feel ownership of their classroom space. I want my students to feel like the classroom is as much theirs as it is mine. So, once they make their mark I hang them throughout the classroom. Quarter 1's marks are still up as well, so hopefully by the end of the year, we will have a whole bunch of marks throughout the classroom to show ownership of all the students!
Take a look at the marks my students made today, they are in no particular order:
11/24: A really productive first two weeks of art!
Seventh graders have been blowing my mind with all the amazing things they have been doing! To start the quarter students will be beginning with clay! Before we dive into clay however, we needed to talk about our project, the clay building, and look at some artists / architects and their work. To begin we looked at a few different videos about architects, Frank Gehry and Antoni Gaudi. Click the links to watch the videos we saw in class! We talked about what makes these two architects' work so successful, interesting, unique and original.
Students were then challenged to work in groups to practice making structures while thinking about this idea of expanding what a building could be and trying to create a building that is unique, interesting and original. What students made absolutely blew me away and though this was just a practice project, the end results are amazing! Check out some in process photos of students working as well as some finished products! After thanksgiving students will finally get a chance to get their hands on the clay and start building their individual clay buildings!
Now some final products after all that hard work! Check them out below:
12/2: What we've been up to in art lately...
7th graders have been hard at work in the art room getting going on their clay buildings! Today they actually started building them out of clay and it is amazing to see the beginnings of some amazing pieces! Check out some in progress photos of 7th graders beginning their work with clay!
12/11: Progress made in art class this week...
7th graders have been busy working on their clay buildings and they are coming along great!! Check out some more in progress photos of students working as well as a few finished pieces!
Super short half days call for some observational drawing!
On our super short half day, clay just would have been too chaotic with such little time. So instead of doing clay we decided to dip our toes into some observational drawing as that is where we will be headed after clay is over! We had a very informal trial day of observational drawing where I just sat some objects down on the tables in front of students and had them draw. We didn't talk too much about drawing as we will once we get into the drawing unit. But, for now, this was a helpful way for me to see where students are at in terms of drawing. There were tons of amazing results! Check out some images below!
12/15: More progress on our clay buildings!
Many students have begun finishing their clay dwellings and I am so excited to fire them in the kiln!! Check out a bunch of images below to see both in progress and finished clay dwellings! Finished meaning just the building phase is finished, next they dry out, then get fired in the kiln and then students glaze and lastly get fired in the kiln once more!
1/3/16: Starting off the new year in the art room...
Today is the last day of winter break, I hope all my students and their families had a great break from school and are ready to get back to the art room! 7th graders are in the transition period between projects; most students have finished their clay pieces, they have begun to be fired, while others' are still drying out in the kiln room before being fired...these students have moved on to start the new project while a few people make last touches to clay pieces.
Our new project is inspired by contemporary artist Daniel Gordon who works with the idea of a still life, but in a totally new way! We started out by watching Daniel Gordon's Art 21 video to learn more about him and see what he does in his studio. What makes Daniel Gordon so interesting in terms of working with a still life, is that he doesn't just set up objects in a cool way, but he actually CREATES all the objects in the still life, then sets it up and then photographs it!
Similarly to Daniel Gordon's practice, I had 7th graders create their own still life object out of the found objects that we have in our classroom. They made some amazing pieces! Then each student chose a few of the objects made from their class and set up their own individual Daniel Gordon inspired still life. Once set up, the student would use one of the art department iPads as a viewfinder and take various photos of their still life from different perspectives. They would then go through their photos and choose their favorite one, the one they would want to work from to then create their mix media still life.
Students emailed me their final photos and I printed them on copy paper and then experimented with different mediums directly on their photos. This way they could test out some of the various media that they could choose to work in to create their final mix media still life. The final mix media still life will be a "drawing" of the photograph they took but then created with at least 3 different mediums. Students have the choice to work in several different mediums, including: pencil, charcoal, colored pencil, marker, sharpie marker, pen, pen and ink, ink wash, watercolor, watercolor crayons, acrylic paint, collage with paper/fabric, oil pastel. Students will be expected to choose at least 3 of these various mediums to include in their mix media still life.
Check out some of the photographs that students took below!
1/11/16: Making progress on mix media still lives!
I think this is one of my favorite projects! Students are blowing me away with their mix media still lives, it is amazing to see their talents come out and also see them experimenting with new media!! One of the reasons why I love this project so much is seeing students try out new media that they have never used and seeing them get really excited about trying those new mediums and also realizing they really like some of these new mediums!!
Check out some in progress photos of students mix media still lives!
1/16: Beginning to finish our mix media still lives...
7th graders have been very busy working on their mix media still lives this past week. Towards the end of this week we began to have the first group of finished still lives...check them out below!
At the same time, 7th graders have paused for a day or two to glaze their clay buildings! Check out an image below to see a whole bunch of the clay pieces after being fired in the kiln! The first batch of clay buildings that were finished glazing were put in the kiln on friday, so stay tuned for images of finished, glazed pieces!
ATTENTION OMS PARENTS! Your children have been hard at work in the art room during quarter two creating all kinds of amazing artwork! To honor their hard work, we will be hosting a quarter two ART SHOW on THURSDAY, JANUARY 21st, 2016 FROM 6-8pm! Your child may have brought home an invitation to invite you and whoever else would like to come see their amazing art work! We hope to see you all there!
If you cannot come to the art show on it's opening night, it will be up all day Friday, January 22nd and then will begin to come down the following week. If you still do not get a chance to come see your child's work, I will be taking tons of photos documenting the event and posting them to my website after that. Be sure to check them out by clicking on the OMS ART SHOW tab at the top of the page and click on 2016: Quarter 2 Art Show.
1/26/16: Some final images of the amazing finished clay buildings!!