Art History: Prehistoric Art

This year, I am excited to say that I have an Art History course that I am able to offer students college credit through SUNY Potsdam, the institution I attended and earned my degrees through.  While I originally had 3 students in it (which I thought was amazing, considering history is a tough sell at my district), a math class was moved during the summer and I lost two students, leaving me with one student.  Either way, it's still great, we are getting some bonding time, and I'm making art along with her!

We are using the Annotated Mona Lisa as a textbook for this class, and we began with Prehistoric Art.  In an attempt to make this class not just lecture (and I'm glad I decided on this because it would be really hard to lecture every day to ONE student), we are incorporating a historical art project every few cultures.  As part of the project requirements, my student can create whatever she wants, as long as she displays the characteristics of that culture AND uses an artistic technique by the culture, such as making her own brushes and paints, or using a paint technique or a material specific to that culture.

We started with prehistoric art, of course, and when we got to the project, she decided (and I thought it was a GREAT idea) to make a diorama for each culture!  So, as we progress through the year, she will have a pretty awesome, 3-D timeline made!  Along with each project, I ask her to write a two page essay that discusses her project in terms of the techniques and materials she used, how those might reflect the ancient culture, and how her project and decisions as a whole represents that culture.  In a college art history class, you usually have to write some sort of term paper, usually 10 pages minimum (at least I had to!).  The cooperating professor approved my plan of multiple 2 page essays, and as we progress through the year, I will teach her how to properly cite using the Chicago format of footnotes/end notes.

We used tissue paper, hot glue, and then Liquitex Spray Paint (which is INSANELY AWESOME!) to create the caves.  We also made our own egg yolk tempera, which we will utilize again for our Egyptian dioramas, except that we will have to make some gold paint!

My current student taking the class is a senior and is potentially going to college for art, whether she majors or minors in it.  She loves writing, so I've sort of tailored this class with her in mind.  Here is her first completed project and her first short essay, written completely by her without an edits from me:

          The Prehistoric Era dates back to about 35,000 BC and is one of the first eras known to create artwork. Artworks were created during this time mostly to adorn the body or to decorate.  The artwork created by people during this time period can be defined as cave paintings and small sculptures.  The artists, mostly female, would make all their own materials, such as the paint created from charcoal, clay, water, blood, and even urine.  The paintbrushes would also be handmade, from materials such as twigs, human hair, and grass.  Sculptures would be made of ivory, bone, stone and antlers.  This time period had a long lasting effect on artists and people around the world, as this was the beginning of the world of art.

         For this project, I chose to create a diorama to represent a cave filled with cave paintings, a fire, paints, and a cave woman.  I spray painted the diorama to look identical to a cave, and also built tissue paper up along the left side to give the cave a more realistic appearance.  I added texture to the inner part of the cave to show a rough, rock-like texture on the floor and walls.  Next, with the help of my teacher, I made my own paint from pigments, water and egg yolks.  This process was very interesting and I loved the experience.  I used these paints to decorate the inner walls of the cave, painting such things as wild animals, hunters, and hand prints. The idea for the wall paintings came from the notes I had taken in class, and are accurate depictions of what would have been present on cave walls.  I also added a human figure, a cave woman, to the diorama.  She is dressed in a leather "dress", which would have been created from an animal hide hunted, most likely, by the men.  I chose to add a woman over adding a man because most cave painters would be women, which we know because of the small hand prints visible on the walls.  The hand prints were used as a "signature" for the artwork, and can be found throughout many caves.  I created a fire displayed on the inside of the cave because the paintings were normally found deep inside the caves, where it would have been colder.  I also added some of the paint I made into small shells, since these were used to hold paint during this time period.

         Overall, I found this project to be a great experience and I really enjoyed it.  I believe my diorama accurately represents a cave woman and the wall paintings.  The overall process was unique because I've never made my own paint before, which I found to be interesting.  I also like that I added several identifiable factors into my diorama, which helped to show that it's based in the Paleolithic Era.

My diorama I made with my student.  :)  Not nearly as good as hers!

Sixth Grade Cave Paintings

My sixth graders have just finished up their first project, which was, of course, cave art!  When talking about curriculum for my elementary grade levels, sixth grade and kindergarten are really the only two levels where my projects tend to remain the same each year, and it really doesn't bother me either!  (Ask me about my high school curriculum?  It's ALWAYS changing!)

Don't get me wrong, I have yet to do cave paintings the same way more than once, but the premise is there.  This year, students received a huge piece of brown kraft paper.  We tore off the edges, crinkled up the paper, and then took it outside to create our rocks.  We used neutral chalk pastels to rub over the crinkled paper, and then used a paper towel to rub and blend the pastels together.

I HIGHLY suggest doing this process outside, as the chalk pastels tend to get really dusty.  Interested in seeing a previous years technique for creating our rocks?  We have used tempera on tag board in the past as well.

Now, here comes the fun part, where I kind of changed it up for my students a bit.  Once again, we did make our own egg yolk tempera paint.  If you're interested in seeing specifically how I do it with them, you can check out one of my blog posts from a previous year here.  Here's the adaption for this project from this year!  I did the best I could to turn my room into a cave!!  I pulled the blinds, covered up the cracks with black paper, and did my best to turn it into complete darkness.  Then?  I put a bon fire on my smartboard as their light source for painting!

These pictures aren't that great at showing how dark it was, but it was dark enough!  It was a bit comical too, as students started complaining that there was too much light coming through the windows and that this wouldn't work, but once all the lights were off and they had to work with just the fire out the smartboard, they found it was pretty difficult to see to paint accurately.

This was a super great experience for them and I definitely plan on incorporating the bon fire next year as well!  There was a lot of conversation about the actual project and the way they were painting.  Many noticed that their paintings got a bit better as their eyes adjusted to the darkness.

As for the bon fire video, it's pretty easy to find them on YouTube!  The video I used was actually an 8 hour video of a bonfire.  This is the specific video I used below.  It's nice and quiet, nothing distracting in the background...just the calming sounds of a bon fire crackling away!

 My goal next year is to actually use real charcoal, dirt and berries to create the paint.  I never seem to plan well enough in advance but I will next year!!

Studio Art: Painting Unit, Tempera

For our second painting in my Studio Art painting unit, students made their own egg-yolk tempera to do still life paintings.  I thought for sure that I would get complains about the subject matter, but they loved it!  Making their own paint really helped them to understand what a pigment, binder, and solvent is tool  We made our paint the same way I have my 6th graders do it for the cave art project.

Every day at the end of the day, i would put the paint in the refrigerator next door to make sure it didn't start smelling rancid from the eggs.

This project took us about a total of two weeks from start to finish.  Students chose an area of the still life below to draw.  It was set up in the middle of my room for the entire time...in that time period, I lost a fake banana and had two bottles break during clean up, of all times. :(

As we started the process of painting, we painted the background first, using cool colors because they recede.  Next, I had them choose a neutral color for the ground/cloth, and lastly they were encouraged to use warm colors for the bottles. 

This student did an AMAZING job, and it breaks my heart because she has such low self-esteem about it.  :(  It was a struggle to get her to do this all on her own, but she did it!  She totally has her own painting style, but I don't think she feels comfortable enough to embrace it yet.

This student has struggled all year but he did what I would consider a great job, based on his past projects!  I'm so proud of some of these guys...they really got into the painting!  This student is so psyched about our next project...I can't wait to see what he does then!

Again, I had students mat their own artworks too.  They are getting so much better at this!  It makes me proud, and them, to have their artwork framed in such a way.  I've decided that I must make it a priority to make sure I have enough mat board for a school year, at least on the high school end.  It's going to make my art show look that much more professional too. :)

What really surprised me about this project, is that the students asked why we didn't do a black and white drawing of the still life first!  Wait, what?  I figured they would get bored drawing and then painting the same thing...but now this idea is on my radar for next year!  I think they saw my projects from high school, which I have hanging above my computer, and liked the idea.

Our current and last project of the painting unit is the cubist superhero paintings in acrylic.  We have just started those so expect a post about them in a week or two. :)

6th Grade: Prehistoric Cave Art

Sixth graders have finished their cave walls!  Last year I didn't get to do a cave art project with the students because they breezed through the unit in social studies and started right in on the Ancient Egyptians.  This year, I made sure I started this early, so as we have finished this up in art class, the students are just starting cave art in social studies...perfect timing!

Tomorrow is parent-teacher conference night so we managed to get this done just in time.  Unfortunately, I couldn't get the paper into those nice display strips I bought last year through the Parent's Association, but they were still useful to tape up the cave walls on.  (The crinkled paper just wouldn't slide in the strips!)

This project took us a total of about 2 1/2 class periods to complete.  On the first day, which was essentially the half day, I showed my power point about prehistoric art and we did the virtual tour of Lascaux Cave on the smartboard.

On the second day, we unrolled and took a huge sheet of brown butcher paper outside on the sidewalk.  I had the students all line up on both sides and in pairs.  Then then slowly crinkled and unfolded the paper to give it physical texture.  Next, we took natural colored chalk that I have and rubbed it all over the wrinkled paper.  Using paper towels, we wiped it to blend all the colors together.  One class did a better job blending the colors than the other, but then the other class did a better job (in my opinion) of filling their cave wall with large cave paintings! 

On the third day, we took about 15 minutes to talk about and mix our egg yolk tempera.  I gave each table four cups.  One had pigment in it, two were empty, and one had the egg yolk.  I sent one person to the sinks to fill one empty cup and get a paint brush for mixing.  In the other empty cup, I asked them to fill it about 2/3 full with the powdered pigment I gave their table.  Then, they had to slowly add water to create a paste, about the consistency of tooth paste.  Lastly, I had them add the paste mixture to the egg yolk, mix and shake.

I added these signs on the wall across from the cave walls...

My first year of teaching, I actually set up a real "cave" for the cave art we did.  That year, I had the students rip the edges and then crinkle Manila tag board.  We painted them with tempera and then quickly rinsed the tempera off the paper before it dried.  This created a similar effect to the chalk.  That year, we didn't make our own paint.  Then, I also had the students use chalk and paint on rocks to create a painting on an actual rock.  I set up my easy-up tent in the media center (I only put it up about half way) at our school and then attached blankets all the way around.  I pinned up all of the cave art inside on the blankets, laid the rocks down at the bottom along the edge of the blankets, and then set a lantern on the outside so people could crawl in like a real cave to view the artwork.  It was a huge success, but A LOT of work!  I set it up the next year for our art show as well (if you check out the 2012 Art Show page, you can see two pictures that sort of show the cave.  One shows a "cave man" inside the cave (it's a dark photo) and the other shows our other "cave man" standing outside of it!)