Hunderwasser Landscapes

Hunderwasser inspired landscapes done by my 4th graders.  Created with painted paper and colored sharpies.  A pattern idea sheet helped create the patterns between the painted paper strips.  THis lesson is from the Deep Space Sparkle blog.

Native American Art - Self Portraits

George Caitlin is the artist I use to inspire us to create these amazing self portraits.  George Caitlin was a portrait artist who traveled the path of Louis and Clark documenting Native American life before photography was available.  He knew the importance of capturing these cultures that were just beginning to be in the grips of war, disease and devastation.  I have many copies of his portraits for my 3rd graders to look at and use for hairstyles, makeup and clothing.  We spent a long time developing our skills for drawing facial proportion.  I give credit to Tricia Fugelstad over in neighboring Arlington Heights for this great lesson.

1st Grade Self Portraits

A work in progress as 1st grade artist paint their self portraits holding a heart.  Our messages were inspired by candy conversation hearts we read and ate last week when we just did a pencil and Fine sharpie drawing!  That left enough time to watch a power point on artists who have done self portraits and watch a video on Chuck Close over on Sesame Street's wed site.

These are my liquid water colors and Prang watercolor boxes being used.  This guy is saying, "You rock".  One of the candy hearts said U R Hot....had to tell a little girl not to use that one!!!  Ugh!!

Native American Art - Clay Looms

3rd graders are working on clay looms we made from terra cotta clay.  To begin this project we rolled out a slab and I had a pre made stencil to cut out the center rectangle.  Then holes were added with the end of a wooden stylus clay tool.  I made sure to go over everyone's holes one more time.  After doing this some were still too small...I'll make sure that never happens.  We also allowed some time to create some designs with our clay tools.  Finally a hole was made so we can hang them when they are complete.  After they were fired we painted them with acrylics.  

Today we added the warp sting lines with twine.  It was a challenge for these guys to tie knots and think about the pattern of the string.  Some of the twine needed a little masking tape to make it fit through the holes.  About 7 kids started to weave.  These are going to look great...I have some funky yarn to use from some leftover knitting projects.  I also invited my students to bring any treasures to weave with for next week.

Native American Art - Totem Faces

Totem Poles represent the ancestral makeup of a family.  This is the starting point for thinking of what totem animal my students will choose to represent themselves or a member of their family.  These are done with stylized shapes and facial features of the chosen animal.  We use watercolor paper, watercolors and Fine sharpies.  As you can see we also use a limited color pallet based on Northwest Coast Indian Art.

This is my son at Epcot.  A great example of Northwest Coast Indian design.  I also found some great videos on youtube to show my students this year.  We are also lucky enough to live in Chicago and have the Field Museum of Natural History at our disposal.  They have an amazing exhibit of Totem Poles that are housed in a dark and spooky gallery.

Self Portraits - Torn Paper Style

Self portraits are one of my favorite things to do with my students.  In 2nd grade we created these with only torn paper pieces (a great way to get rid of paper scraps I have color coded in boxes).  The shirt is done with "treasure paper" my word for very special paper that is in a different box.  It includes foil, holographic, oragami, and tons of paper samples I have from a paper company a students father owned years ago.  The border is done in cut paper patterns so this is a nice way to see how fine motor skills are working with your little ones.

Native American Art - Drawing Pottery

 These were done by my 3rd graders who spend the year doing nothing but Native American Art.  I found this lesson on ArtSonia...sorry I'm not sure where.  I have found this to be a great starting lesson to actually making clay coil pots.  There is a fabulous book that I use that goes along with this that is from 1972 called When Clay Sings by Byrd Baylor.  I bought mine on amazon.  I use white charcoal pencils and black china pencils to create the designs.  The light source and shadow effect are done in chalk pastel.

Next week I'll show you our clay looms we just started to weave on.  I'm super excited because I have never done this before and I think they are going to be really amazing.  Do you do Native American Art?  If you do tell us about it.

Story Quilts inspired by Faith Ringold

These begin with a discussion of who is your hero.  We brainstorm who this person is and what image would capture this idea.  All pieces are done with as little drawing as possible..."drawing with scissors" as Matisse used to say.