Middle School Art: Independent Projects

Watercolors Inspired by the Greek Gods, Poseidon, Zeus and Hades

Seasonal dioramas; a spring tornado, sunny summer day, autumn rain shower

Anne of Green Gables illustration inspired by the illustrations of Patricia Polacco; "The White Way of the Light"

Ocean Inspired Abstracts

Winter Pop Art Prints

"At the Spring"; clay sculpture inspired by Greek and Roman art

Personal Mixed-Media Collage

High School Art: Pencil Portraits

Students learned basic skills of placement and proportion then used this knowledge to create a pencil self portrait using a photo or mirror.

(Top to Bottom, Left to Right: Elizabeth O., Isabella I., Jonathan T., Paige F., Savannah S., Christie B.,  Abby B., Alex C., Lissa G.)

Middle School Art: Pencil vs. Camera Drawings

Students in Middle School Art studied the art of Belgian contemporary artist, Ben Heine; specifically work from his project "Pencil vs. Camera".  Students chose a photo image to use as a background and then tore a piece of drawing paper to cover part of the image. After attaching the drawing paper to the background, they drew parts of the real scene as well as a surreal or unexpected additions.

Middle School Art: Tint and Shade Landscapes

Students learned how to mix tints (a color + white) and shades (a color + black) then used this skill to create an atmospheric landscape with tempera on paper.

High School Art: Floating Art Museums in 3 and 4 Point Perspective

Students learned basic principles of 2, 3 and 4 point perspective.  Each artist chose either 3 or 4 point perspective and used these guidelines to design a futuristic floating art museum. They finished the pieces with colored pencils.

Middle School Art: Pueblo Storytellers

Students studied the art of Pueblo artist Helen Cordero and her storyteller figurines.  Inspired by her sculptures depicting a storyteller and many little "listeners" attached, students created their own storytellers using clay building techniques. They were then painted with traditional Pueblo colors and patterns. 

(Laura F's coming soon!)

Middle School Art: Pop Art Shoes

Students studied the Pop Art movement, specifically the art of Andy Warhol. Inspired by his shoe drawings and colorful prints, students created their own Pop Art shoe prints by carving rubber and creating multiple prints of varying bright color schemes.

Middle School Art: Oil Resist Stained Glass

Students studied the artwork of Georges Rouault, a French expressionist painter who was greatly influenced by his time as a stained-glass apprentice.  His work is marked by bold, luminous colors and black outlines. Students used his style as inspiration for their own stained-glass inspired compositions. They used oil pastels for blocks of color and painted over the entire piece with black watercolor to create a resist stained-glass texture. 

High School Art: First Quarter Independent Projects

High School Art: Object Transformation Drawings

"Creativity is seeing something everyone sees with a fresh pair of eyes" - W. Wilson

The Challenge: To transform an everyday object (a No. 2 pencil) into a new image (an animal).   Students used the form and basic color and proportions of a No. 2 pencil, but had to stretch, curve, bend and otherwise distort their pencils in interesting and ways to create the likeness of their animal.

Fantasy Art: Medieval Castles

Students studied the history and purposes of castles in Europe during the Middle Ages.  After looking at many examples of these amazing structures both real and imaginary, students created their own castle with pencil, ink and watercolors.

Middle School Art: 1 Point Perspective

Students in Middle School Art learned the history and principles of creating the illusion of space in 2-d artwork.  The students learned how to draw in 1 point perspective, creating buildings, roads, fences etc that all lead to a vanishing point on the horizon line. These drawings were then completed with colored pencils.

High School Art: Trompe L'oeil Drawings

High School Art students studied the art of Trompe L'oeil (French for "trick of the eye") an art technique that aims to trick the eye of the viewer into thinking a small 2-dimensional object is actually 3-D. Students chose a set of small objects and created a personal still life to portray as realistically as possible with pencils.  They were encouraged to draw their objects true to size, as detailed as possible and with convincing shadows and shading.  This is not an easy technique, but the students rose to the challenge and creating very realistic looking drawings!

Middle School Art: Contour Nature Drawings

One of the "tricks" of being able to draw well is learning how to teach your eyes and hands to work together effortlessly.  Middle School Art students practiced this skill by creating blind and modified contour drawings of natural elements such as leaves, flowers, shells and sticks.  Some students went on to use value to create shading and shadows. 

Fantasy Art: Hybrid Creatures

Fantasy Art students studied various kinds of hybrid creatures from Greek and Roman mythology and went on to create their own creature by collaging various patterned and textured wallpaper samples.

Fantasy Art: Wild Things!

Students read "Wild Things" by Maurice Sendak and studied his art and illustrations.  Students listed characteristics of "Wild Things" and then created their own version of these fantastical characters with oil pastels on cardboard.

Fantasy Art: Dragons!

Students in the Fantasy Art workshop read the description of the dragon Smaug from the Hobbit and then discussed characteristics of dragons.  They studied drawings and paintings of dragons by various artists and used these to inspired their own dragons.  The students created each part of their dragon separately then attached the parts with metal fasteners.

 

High School Art: Altered Book Pages

Students in High School Art began the year by working on an altered book which will be worked on throughout the year.  Each student chose an old, used book and began altering its cover and pages by drawing, paintings, glueing, cutting, folding, collaging it's pages.  Their first assignment in these books was to create a few pages inspired by specific elements and principles of design.