A New Look At BES!

The 2013 year as has been very productive in the BES art room!  If you have visited lately, you may have noticed a new look in our main office.  With some of our fundraiser money that we earned at last spring's Art Extravaganza, we purchased poster frames to display student artwork in the office.  Now our beloved Weaver T. Beaver has some beautiful artwork to admire each and every day!  Isn't he lucky to be able to view the artwork of such a talented group of elementary school artists?  I'd say so!  I certainly know how lucky I am to see our students grow in their artistic talents and minds each and every week!  Take a look at the work that is in the office right now.

What is great about using poster frames is that I can change up the artwork and many different students can have the chance to be on display in the office.  And it keeps things interesting for Weaver T. Beaver :)

We have some different artwork on display in the main hallway, too!  Like I said, our students have kicked off 2013 with an artistic BANG!  Take a look at some of the masterpieces that have been compelted since we have returned from winter break.

First grade finished their wild animal masks and here are some that are on display.  They had the choice to create a lion or an elephant but most of them wanted to make a lion mask.  These turned out so wonderful!  You might call me crazy, but these were done with paper mache!  Yes, thats right... first graders doing paper mache!  But let me just say, they did a wonderful job and had so much fun doing it that I would not hesitate to do it again!  

Below are fourth grade ceramic suns.  In the previous post, you saw these in progress and now look how gorgeous they are!  Full of color and emotion just like the Metapec suns of Mexico that we were learning about during this unit. 

To the right, you can see the fifth grader's one-point perspective drawings.  These are absolutely stunning and especially in person.  Fifth graders learned the skill of creating depth on a 2D surface using the steps of one-point perspective.  Once they were done with their drawing, they used their creative minds to add colors and details.  So much talent right here!  And they are so proud of their ability to draw in perspective, it makes me extremely proud!

Our kindergarteners just finished learning the B is for butterfly!  We learned about the characteristics of a monarch butterfly and created symmetrical butterflies by folding our paper in half, opening it up, painting on one side, and then folding it to transfer the paint to the other side.  This was a great lesson on symmetry and mono prints!  The next day, students used cool colors to finger paint their background sky and the third day they added details to their backgrounds.  Take a look! :)

And last but not least, first grade! They learned about tints and shades and complimentary colors when they created these hearts.  They decorated the office just in time for Valentines Day and our Valentines dance here at BES!

I hope you get the opportunity to swing by and see the new look at BES in person!  It's like an art museum around here! :)

Finished Storyteller Dolls

With holidays and snow days, January has really flown right on by!  We are looking forward to February in the BES art room and catching up on our artwork.  Second grade has finished their ceremic storyteller dolls inspired by the Native American Folk Art.  We completed them using colored permanent markers so that we could make fine details and have more control over the facial features and patterns on the clothing.  We LOVE how they turned out and we have quite a few on display in the main hallway at school.  Come by and check them out!  Here are some images of a few :)

Happy New Year!

It is great to be back at school after a nice winter break where I got to spend lots of time with family and friends.  Coming back to work, I can't help but think about how blessed I am to work at such an amazing school with such talented, creative, and loving students!

Since the last post in late November, it has been a whirl wind here at BES!  The few weeks we have here in December flew by and now I have so much to share with you all about what has been going on  in the art room!  Let us start with fifth grade...

Fifth grade just finished a fun unit learning about the ancient textile art of batik.  Unlike the tradition method of batik that requires hot wax, fabric, and fabric dyes, we used flour paste, fabric, and acrylic paint!  The process of a batik fabric design is based mainly on the idea of resist.  The wax, or in our case the flour paste, is applied to the fabric in whatever design the artist wants to create and resists the dye/paint from getting underneath onto the fabric.  This way, once the resist material is taken off, the design is revealed.  Here are some of the abstract fabric surface designs that our students did through our faux batik process.

Aren't they GEORGEOUS!?!  Now fifth graders are moving on to learning one-point perspective drawing and they are looking great!  Can't wait to share them with you in a few weeks!

Next up, we have fourth grade!  These students have been learning about the Mexican folk art of ceramic Metapec suns.  These bright and beautiful clay suns have faces and are an art that has been passed down by the Nahua Indians in Metapec Mexico for generations.  Students are exploring various clay hand building techniques such as throwing a slab, rolling coils, and scoring and slipping to attach clay peices together to create a sun that shows a specific emotion.

The suns have all been fired and now the students are on to painting and adding details to them!  Images of the completed work will be coming soon!

Third grade has just started exploring Greek pottery and next week will be creating their own ceramic vessels through the coil building process.  I will be sharing some images of them knee deep in clay soon ;)

Second grade has been learning about the ceramic Native American storyteller dolls.  Through creating these dolls, students learned about how to create coils and slabs in clay and how to attach them using the score and slip method.
Over break, the clay dolls have dried and been fired in the kiln and students are working to add some finishing touches to make them uniquly their own.  Images of these final works will be here soon!


First graders have been having an AWESOME time getting really messy in the art room!  We have been learning about animal masks from different cultures and creating our own using paper mache and milk jugs!  Students could decide if they wanted to create an elephant or a lion for their mask.  This week we learned about the textures of each of these animals and have started painting and decorating them.  I can't wait to see these masks complete because they are looking great so far!



Finally, last but certainly not least, KINDERGARTEN!  These little ones have also been getting messy in the art room with clay!  They have learned how to create a pinch pot by making a ball of clay, sticking their thumb in the center and pinching all the way around to make a a little cup shape.  This week the students were able to see how their clay has changed since it has been in the kiln.  The students observed that the color, texture, and hardness has changed due to being fired in the kiln.  This week, the students painted them using tempera and clear gloss.  They did such a great job and I know they had a great first experience with clay!

I know that was a lot of catching up to do but I hope you enjoyed checking in to see what the BES artists have been up to!  As we head into this brand new year, I look forward to keeping you all in the loop about the creativity that is always going on in the BES art room!!

Second Grade Van Gogh & Kindergarten Pumpkins

We sure did have fun learning about the artist Vincent Van Gogh, his sunflower paintings, and the still life genre of art. When the students came into the room, they knew something great was about to happen because all of the tables and stools were moves out of the way. In the middle of the open floor was a vase with sunflowers in it.  The students sat around the still life and drew using observation. We also talked about using the space on our page and how to make our vases look as though they are sitting on a table rather than floating. The next class we discussed the brushstrokes that are characteristic of Van Gogh's paintings.  The students went to work painting their still life and exploring different ways to create brushstrokes in their own artwork.  Look at these beauties!

 

The next few images are some of the Kindergartener's latest masterpieces.  In this lesson, we linked what they were learning about pumpkins in their classrooms to art knowledge.  Students learned about primary and secondary colors and experimented with mixing their primaries to create secondary colors orange and green.  Later, we reached back to our knowledge of collage from their self-portrait unit and created pumpkin collages using the orange and green paper they created.  We also talked about facial expressions showing emotions and they worked hard to show an emotion through the shapes of their eyes and mouths.  These really look great!  I am so impressed with our Kinder's and their cutting and gluing skills!

Fifth Grade Double Self-Portraits and Third Grade Cityscapes!

Fifth grade just completed their mixed media self-portrait unit inspired by the artist Chuck Close!  We call these double self-portraits because they drew themselves and created value using their finger prints and black ink!  They learned about the artist Chuck Close and his various art processes for creating realistic portraits and then incorporated them into their artwork.  This unit taught so many skills and art vocabulary such as drawing correct facial proportions, color value, using a ruler, painting pattern, contrast, and oil pastel techniques.  The students and I really enjoyed this art smart jam packed unit!  Take a look at these beauties!

 

Here are some that are hanging in the main hallway at school! :)

Next up! Third grade learns about the big ol' city!  First we discussed the different characteristics between a cityscape and a landscape.  Then we explored America's top 10 cityscapes to get an idea of what cityscapes look like around our country.  This was a great geography lesson as well because students had to name what state each city was in.  They did a fabulous job!  Then it came time to create their own cityscape.  Students drew their cityscape on a foam printing plate and then cut along the top edge.  For the background, students learned about cool and warm colors and the horizon line.  We define the horizon line as the line where the sky meets the land.  After the students drew their horizon line, they used cool and warm color schemes to paint above and below the horizon line using watercolors.  Next, we learned about the art process of printmaking, inked our cityscape printing plate, and printed the first print above the horizon line and a ghost print on the bottom of the horizon line.  A ghost print is when you re-print the plate without re-inking it so that it has a faded look.  These two prints represent the cityscape above the horizon line and the reflection of the city in the water below the horizon line.  These turned out so beautiful!  You can see some of them below and in the front office when you visit school!