Klimt's Cozy Quilts

In Model Masters we explored the ornamental art of Gustav Klimt.  Klimt was an Austrian artist whose work is inspired by his gold engraving background.  He's considered to be part of the Art Nouveau movement, which was popular from around 1880 to 1915.  

 The Art Nouveau style is characterized by:

•  organic, mostly floral and plant inspired motifs
•  highly stylized swirling forms
•  spirals
•  metallic elements
•  curling scrolls

This style became popular in paintings, sculptures, architecture, furniture, fabrics, and jewelry.  We were especially inspired by Klimt's "Cradle" painting, which features a baby wrapped in warm colorful quilts with lots of patterns.

Supplies:

Tube Watercolors

11"x15" watercolor paper

Styrofoam plates for palettes

Metallic paint markers-I like Sakura

Fine Point Black Sharpie

I began this Art Nouveau art project having student take turns coming up to the white board and filling a square with different patterns and designs.  This part of the project was especially fun as students were given the chance to brainstorm and come up with a unique design to add to our "line and pattern vocabulary"

1. We then began our art projects by drawing a simplified self-portrait at the top of watercolor paper.  We add a variety of curvy lines that reached out to all of the edges of our papers to create the "cozy quilt" around our bodies.  Some students even chose to put a sibling or favorite bedtime stuffed animal snuggled into their quilts.
2.  Next, we filled each space of the quilt with a different pattern.
3. We continued this project the following week by using watercolor palettes to paint each quilt shape.  Students were shown how to glaze with a light color, and then once the area dried, to go back over it with a darker color to create the patterns. 
4. When all the areas were painted and dried, we used black sharpies and gold and silver paint pens to embellish the patterns, add stitching, and sewn on patches. The metallic elements were added to eccentuate Klimt's use of gold leaf.**Make sure paintings are completely dry before using markers and pens, wet paint ruins these expensive tools!

I think these projects turned out fabulous and the students are extremely happy with them.  Many would not give them up to hang in the on-site gallery at the school!

            Adam                                     Camille

          Gaia                                          Heather W.

          Jake                                      Josh

            Yula

          Stephan

     Maggie                                    Miss Vanessa

                   Megan

     Kenna                                     Heather S.

                 Andrew

"Old Bear" prepares to Hibernate!

This week in Art Through Children's Literature we read "Old Bear" by Kevin Henkes.  This is a fabulous children's book that tells the story of a bear hibernating during the winter and dreaming of being a cub again.  He imagines the the springtime flowers, the summer butterflies, and the fall leaves blowing.  After reading, we discussed how animals prepare for the cold winters by eating lots of food or stocking up like squirrels do.  We even talked about how some, like geese, fly south for the winter to warmer climates.

This project took one class and used the following supplies:

Black and/or Blue Construction Paper-9"x12"

Manila Oaktag-9"x12"

Leaves

Tempera paint in warm colors, white, brown, and black

Scissors

Glue

1. We began this art project by taking on the tedious, but fun, task of learning how to draw a bear in two different poses, walking and standing.  We started by drawing the snout, then the head, and finally the body on manila oaktag. 

2.  Next, we used brown tempera to paint our bears. Students were shown how to add orange to add "highlights" to the parts of the bear that the sun hits, such as his head, back, and the front of his legs. We used the back of our brushes to scrape the wet paint to create a furry texture. We used bold black paint to outline our bears and add eyes and fur ruffles.

3. While our bear paintings dried, we used a variety of real leaves to print leaves on dark blue or black backgrounds.  We simply painted the underbellies (veined part) of the leaves with warm oranges, yellows, reds, and browns, and then turned them over and pressed them to the paper. A paper towel placed on top of the leaf while pressing helps get an even print and keeps hands clean!

4. Lastly, we carefully cut out our bears, leaving a bit of the manila border to make them "pop" off the dark paper, then used glue sticks to attach them to their habitats.

Here are some of our fabulous "Old Bears!"

                      Jake

                            Aidan

          Jack

                           Chloe

     

                    Eddie

               Maddy

                         Maxwell

           Megan

         Meredith

            Gaia

  

        Yula

     Miss Vanessa

Fall Harvest Bean Mosaics!

In The Sights and Sounds of the Season we welcomed the fall harvest by paying homage to all the colorful foods that could be used to create mosaics. I began by explaining that the history of mosaic art goes back some 4,000 years or more.  The Greeks began using this technique by arranging pebbles in precise patterns to create scenes of people and animals.  Later in Italy, wall mosaics were made using "Tesserae," tiny glass and terracotta pieces, which were vivid and reflected light.  Students were also shown examples of Byzantine and Islamic mosaics, which decorated glorious mosques, temples, and other places of worship.


After a brief mosaic history, I showed the students some of the materials we were using to create our own mosaics. They took turns identifying the items, as we used common dried foods like split peas, black beans, pumpkin seeds, rice, navy beans, kidney beans, and more.  I even passed around a spice jar of Anise stars and had them use their little noses to make their best guess as to what common candy they smelled like (Licorice!). 

This project took two classes and used the following supplies:
6"x 6" matte board or cardboard square
various beans, seans, twigs...etc
Leaves
white glue
warm colored tempera paint
string
hot glue gun/sticks


First: Each student was given at 6"x 6" chipboard square.  I showed students some leaves and asked them to identify what tree they were from.  Most were common like oak, maple, and birch.  They then traced the leaves onto their board (some did one, others did 2 or 3, depending on leaf size)

Next: Students filled in one leaf at a time with glue and covered the leaf area with dark colored beans or seeds.  They repeated this step with the remaining leaves.  They used light colored seeds and rice to fill in the background area. 


In the next class: To introduce warm fall colors into this mosaic, we added craft stick frames for the border.  Lastly, using red, yellow, brown, and orange tempera paint, the artists painted the frames and any empty spaces of their chipboard.  We even attached a yarn string to make these mosaics hangable decorations! Some chose to go without a string and use them for trivets.


Here are some examples of our Fall Harvest Bean Mosaics!

 
























                Cullen





       

                 Chloe

         Aidan

  

      


















          Eddie



            Jack



                Gaia



          Karlee

           Jake
        

























                   Levi





                   Maddy

       Megan


























           Meredith



























         Seth





        Beth
                                               
                                           Miss Vanessa

                     

                         These looked so artsy while

                  they were drying on newspaper all in a row!

"If I Were A Tree"

Last week in Art Through Children's Literature we read the book "If I Were A Tree" by Dar Hosta .  Dar Hosta (prononced hoasta, with a long "o") is an award-winning collage artist who specializes in children's books. She combines unique papers, paints, pastels, metallics and other creative elements to show brilliant scenes and fantastic creatures that leap off the pages.  I am looking forward to introducing this class to more of her exciting and visually stimulating books.   Below are some examples of her tree art.

 

      Book Cover    Picture we used to inspire "Birch Trees" Art

     "Cobalt Tree Night"               "Owl's Tree"

After reading "If I Were A Tree" we focused on the line "If I were a tree, I would show you colorful leaves in the fall," which is illustrated with a warm colored birch tree. 

 We began our art by using watercolors to create a blue sky and green grass background for our tree to live in.  Next, using a smaller sheet of watercolor paper, we drew a tree with branches.  Some of the younger students traced their hands, transforming their fingers into branches. We cut these trees out and used black watercolors and toothbrushes to splatter on birch tree markings.  We glued our trees to our backgrounds so the trunk touched the ground. Lastly, we cut out leaves using warm colored construction paper and metallic paper and attached them to our branches.

Here are some examples of our "Fall Birch Trees"

              Victoria                                  Nicholas

             Adric                                              Aidan



        Jake                                          Yula

             

     

     Megan

*Some artwork did not have a name--if one of them is yours, please let me know!

Later during the day in The Sights and Sounds of the Seasons we celebrated the arrival of Autumn by learning more about collage art.  We collaborated to create a fall tree mural featuring cut paper, watercolor, and metallic elements.  First we applied a watercolor wash to a large paper background to create a sky.  Then I drew a big tree outline in a bold marker.  The children took turns covering the tree with glue and then using torn pieces of brown and gold papers to fill in the trunk and branches.  All students made leaves using a few different techniques.  We used washable markers on coffee filters and then spritzed them with water to diffuse the colors.  We also embellished cut paper leaves with markers and gold paint pens.

Here is the end result of all our hard work and collaboration!