the abstract front and back.

This week the 3rd graders are continuing to work with foreground and background as they do a project inspired by a  quilt by Elizabeth Balderrama's titled "Gradient". They have now done several projects dealing with 3d space. They have created space with cut paper layers, they've overlapped, changed size, used placement, and used color values. They have made a couple images that are figurative in style and now this one works within the abstract realm.

Before looking at Elizabeth's quilt, we review how 3d space was made in their cloudscapes last week. We also talk about how they can make tints and shades of color.

Elizabeth's quilt has been received with a lot of enthusiasm. The kids really dig the optical illusion quality of it. They pick up on how the values flip in the foreground and background elements.

For this project, students build background gradients with chalk pastels going from dark to light. I make sure to model keeping their drawing hand off the paper to keep things from getting out of control and super messy. For the foreground, they use oil pastels and go from light to dark.

The foreground design is up to them, as long as they have the transition from white, to tint, to color, to shade/black. It's been interesting to see what kinds of shapes kids come up with for their foreground elements.

shape skate.

This week the 5th graders are working with shape to create a cut paper skateboard design. After all 6 classes complete the project, I will be selecting a few students who exhibited good art room citizenship and creativity to create their designs on real wood decks.

The focus of this project is on layering different color value shapes to create depth and experimenting with positive and negative shapes to create interesting layered symmetrical designs.

The inspiration for the project comes from works by 3 different artists- Eva Zeisel, Patrick Hruby, and Shepard Fairey. I share images by these artists with the classes at the beginning of the lesson. We look at how they each create symmetry with shape and how each uses a balance between positive and negative shapes to create an interesting design. We also look at how the designs are different in terms of shape usage. I ask students to think about which of the designs is most interesting to them, so they can reflect on the work at the end of the lesson.

 Eva Zeisel

 Patrick Hruby

Shepard Fairey

The first project I did with the 5ths took 2 full class sessions, plus 20 more minutes for a total of 3 hours. I wanted this project to be completed in one class session. Most kids are hitting that mark. There was a lot of planning involved with their Boa Mistura public art drawings. This activity is much more spontaneous and each layer is a visual response to the preceding layer or layers.

Students could select white or gray paper for the deck color. They could then select from a variety of light colors for their background. I modeled folding the paper vertically, horizontally, or both ways to create a line or lines of symmetry and drawing simple shapes to cut out that would become negative shapes in that color. 

Students could then pick a medium color for their middleground. With this layer, I asked students to add more detail. To make their negative shapes a little bigger to allow their first layer to show through in places.

Students used a dark color paper for their foreground. Ideally, this is the most detailed layer. It has the biggest negative shapes.

As students laid their layers on top of each other I asked them to think about if enough of their middle and back showed through. If not, they could refold the layers on top and remove more paper.

The last step is to round of the top and bottom of the large rectangle to make the design into more of a skate deck shape.

Students are reflecting on the process and inspiration at the end of the lesson in writing.

I am really loving the visual variety in the final designs!

The 3rd graders paid a visit to Foster's Home for Imaginary Friends last week, so they could see how shape and value could be used to make 3d space in an image.

I love both the humor and style of that cartoon. The style aspect was shaped by animation and background designer Carol Wyatt. I love her color palette and use of implied lines throughout these images.

To start the lesson, I introduced foreground, middleground, and background and the kids and I defined them together- front, middle, and back. We then look closely at the setting below and determine what is in the front... and why. What is in the back... and why. The kids notice that the foreground in big and bold while things in the middle and back get lighter and smaller. One other element kids pick up on is that the front is more detailed then the other 2 layers.

We then look at another image from Foster's and we use this as the inspiration for the hands on portion of the lesson.

It's always fun to use contemporary art as a focus and it's even more fun and engaging for the kids when you can use pop culture elements. They look at cartoons all the time, but they don't look at them closely and analyze how the scenes are put together to get them to focus on certain aspects. As educators, we can turn them on to this and they can start to see and appreciate how the skills and concepts they learn about in class are applied by artists that entertain them on a regular basis.

Anywho...

The students created landscapes inspired by Carol's work on Foster's. They used 3 different value papers and different sizes to create 3 layers of space. They started with the background first, then middle, and then foreground.

Students measured 4 fingers down from the top of their paper to start their background layer. The rule was keep it small and simple. They cut that layer out and moved on to the middle. On that sheet, they measured 4 fingers up from the bottom and drew things a little bigger and with more detail. On the foreground layer, they measured 2 fingers up and drew even bigger and with more detail. Once all 3 layers were cut, they assembled them. Before gluing things down, I asked students to look and see if they needed to adjust anything, so that they could create the most interesting composition. If they needed to edit, they could cut parts off along the ground lines and slide them to the left or right.

When I see the classes again after Thanksgiving break, we will reflect on this project in a writing and presentation activity.

 making adjustments.

 adding details to the foreground.

on the road.

The first lesson I did with the 3rd graders focused on line and 3d space. We looked at a print by an artist named Meme.

I talked to the students about the use of contour lines in the image, and how these lines outlined the shapes. We then looked at how Meme had made the drawing look 3d. Students identified that things in the front and things got smaller in the background. They also picked up on the change in value from foreground to background.

We then looked at Meme's use of diagonal lines on the road in the drawing. We identified that the road got smaller as the diagonals got closer and closer. We tried to come up with as many words to describe this difference- wide/narrow, thick/thin, fat/skinny, big/small, etc. This was a simple introduction to the basics of perspective.

My original plan was for students to execute their drawing in just black, white, but changed my mind before meeting with my first class. I'm glad I did. The variety of colors in the drawings makes looking at a large group of them more interesting.

Students drew in pencil first, traced everything but the sides of the road, and then added color with crayon. Students could choose the place their character was heading toward and they could style their character how they wanted as well. When they added color, I emphasized pressing harder in the front and lighter as things went back in space.

This lesson took the full hour, plus an additional 10 to 15 minutes of the next meeting time.

The two images above were done with the student's non-writing hand. She gets her cast off in a week. She can totally draw with both hands now!