Back to School for Teachers

In Michigan its back-to-school for many art teachers as we attend the Michigan Art Education Association's summer workshops at Western Michigan U in Kalamazoo next week. I'm looking forward to a few days of art making with friends. This year I'm trying two new media: photo silkscreen and glass blowing. I recently discovered all the equipment for silkscreen in my cavernous storage closet at school and hope to do some projects with my students this coming school year. Glass blowing is purely for myself - something I've always been interested in, but never had the opportunity to try. Its certainly not a middle school activity!

For the silkscreen class I'll be combining the images shown here to make a two color print. These are pics I took last winter as I watched one house after another fall to the great recession. I wonder about the families and lives that have been destroyed by the greed of others. Processing these thoughts and fears through art has always been my way. It is so insignificant in the face of such troubles.

These early explorations in printmaking eventually led to a series of  house paintings in watercolor. Same ideas, different medium. It has been and is an unsettled time. Making art settles me, but doesn't do much for addressing the larger environmental and societal problems we face.

Shrieking Clown and Grilled Cheese at the Art Institute of Chicago

My daughter and I took a trip on the train to Chicago this week. We each chose an activity. Mine was a visit to the Art Institute. My daughter, the whale lover, chose the Shedd Aquarium. We decided to do the art first and save the 'fun stuff' for the second day.

We started, while energy was high, with a tour of the new contemporary art wing. My daughter was a good sport, for awhile, until we got to the shrieking clown video piece. That sent her over the edge. Time for lunch!

Fortified with grilled cheese and french fries we made our way through the modern galleries. And here I watched my daughter, no art lover, come alive. She loved the landscapes and paintings that 'told stories.' She recognized Picasso's "The Old Guitarist" and told me all about his Blue Period - hurrah for her wonderful art teacher, Mrs. Lampen!

I was amazed at this landscape by Piet Mondrian from 1916. Clearly on a track to abstraction. I loved looking at the actual paint surface, something you can never see in reproductions. Because I grew up near Chicago, I had the opportunity to take many school trips to the museum. My own students have not had this experience. We do not have the funds or parental resources even to go to our local art museum.Our day at the museum over, we took our tired feet to the hotel where we rested up just long enough to gain the energy and appetite to head out for a great meal at an Italian restaurant. Tomorrow - Beluga whales at the Shedd.

Painted Digital Portraits

Here's a fun, easy, summer art project you can do at home with children of all ages. Start by taking a digital photographic portrait and print it out in black and white, or enlarge on a photo copier a portait on 8 x 10 paper. You child's school picture might be just perfect to use for this project!

Use acrylic or tempera paint or keep it simple with colored pencil. Inexpensive acrylic paint is available in small bottles at your local craft store. Be sure to have a variety of brush sizes on hand for large areas and detail work. Choose a palette of complementary colors such as green and red, blue and orange or yellow and purple to create visual contrast. Vary the brush strokes from smooth to bumpy, or impasto, type styles to increase visual interest.

Use the photograph as a guide to begin painting or 'coloring in' a self-portrait. Interesting effects can be obtained by leaving some areas such as the eyes or mouth unpainted so that the photographic information shows through. Reassure your artists at home that the final portrait does not need to be 'realistic.' That's the fun of painting!

A Frame of Reference

To display a digital photographic self-portrait as an end-of-year project students created these simple autobiographical frames with white colored pencil on black construction paper.
I came up with this extension to the self-portrait project as a kind of "down-time" activity to manage the many classroom interruptions we faced the last two weeks as different groups of students left intermittently for end-of-the year events, making direct teaching a challenge! I worried they might find it somewhat tedious.
So, I was quite surprised that students begged to work on this project even when we all were there. I think they enjoyed both the relaxing pace of the activity as well as the challenge of illustrating the 8 'loose' categories I gave them. These included: 1 name, 2 wishes, hopes or dreams, three characteristics about yourself, four places you'd like to visit, five important relationships, six activities you enjoy , seven foods you like to eat, and eight favorite books, movies, songs, bands, and/or plays or musicals. I was also surprised at how much discussion the activity fostered as students shared and compared their interests.
I suppose self-portrait activities in art classes as well as autobiography, memoir projects and journaling in language arts classes are so popular for this age group because, as many teachers know, middle school students are most comfortable with what they think they know best: themselves and their peers. I hope these autobiography projects help them gain self-understanding while also questioning assumptions about others.
For this project I pushed the desks together into large seating groups for 8, so that different social groups had to mix a bit. It was heartwarming to see kids from different groups comment positively on each others' interests and abilities. As a frame of reference understanding one's own skills and interests can help students value the interest and skills of others.

Fantastic Forest

Just two days of class left, then a week of half day exam days, then summer. I will be sad, as I am each year, to say goodbye to students I've worked with for two years. I meet them as awkward 12 year olds, just kids, really, and two short years later, say goodbye to (mostly) confident young adults. An amazing, fascinating metamorphosis.
This morning I asked a group of 8th graders which projects they most enjoyed over the course of the two years. Their answers surprised me. Different students, of course, gave different answers. After all, some love the mucky mess of clay, some don't. Some love to draw, others find it stressful.
However, one project the group agreed was a favorite was a large, acrylic landscape painting they did after studying the work of Henri Rousseau. I was surprised that this was a favorite as it was quite a lot of work. I pushed the students to go beyond a 'coloring in' approach, to experiment with brush strokes and color mixing. And some grumbled at the requirements which included a sleeping figure ala Rousseau's "Gypsy" as well as a collaged magazine critter or two and a strange juxtaposition of objects such as Rousseau's monkey with a back scratcher.

But, in the end, "freedom is moving easy in harness." As my students explained to me this morning, it was a challenging project and sometimes frustrating, but when they were done they thought, "Wow, I didn't know I could do that!" I guess that's what I love about teaching Middle School, watching this transformation take place both because of and in spite of, the strictures and structures of school.
It's corney, I know, but each summer I get to set a new crop of butterflies free. What a job!

Self-Portraits

Looking for a fun end of year art activity? Check out the National Gallery of Art classroom activities. I am fortunate to have a computer lab to take my classes to now and then. Yesterday I prepared my students for the NGA Self-Portrait lesson by playing a youtube slide show of Vincent Van Gogh paintings set to, of course, the Don McLean song, "Starry Night." Then students went to the NGA site and with a worksheet to guide them, learned about Van Gogh and the genre of self-portraiture.

Today students talked excitedly about the digital photographs we will take over the next few days - see the Self-portrait lesson on the NGA site. Because my teaching schedule is interrupted by lots of special end of year activities I needed an easy, self-directed art activity that the student could work on in between field trips, band performances, field days and waiting for access to the digital cameras. I came up with the idea of picture "frames" for the self-portraits.

Students used white colored pencil on black construction paper. They were given a list of 8 items to include in their frame, for instance: Two hopes, wishes or dreams, three personal characteristics, four activities they enjoy, five places they'd like to visit and so on. I told them they could use words, images, designs, symbols, fancy lettering and so on to complete their frames. So far, they're coming out great. Each frame is so different, and since it's basically doodling, the kids are having a great time, talking while they draw, sharing with each other the images and words they've chosen to represent themselves. I'll try to put a photo of some frames up on the blog in a few days, so check back!

Plein Air Painting: Take the Time!

We had just 49 minutes after attendance was taken. Walking to the duck pond was 7 minutes each way at a brisk clip. Two minutes were sucked up by the pond water minus pond muck demonstration. Then a minute each was spent pointing out the park boundaries and reminding students to use all four techniques learned the previous day: ink with watercolor wash, tissue lift for clouds, wet on wet and dry brush for plants and details. Oh, and passing out paint boxes, paper, sharpies, tissue and water cups ate up at least three minutes.
But by 8:27 a.m. we were painting golden spring light, ducks on the pond and lacy new greenery. Laughter echoed across the pond as students dipped cups past green scum to the somewhat clear water beneath. Painting outdoors, as the impressionists knew, was time well spent really seeing the light. There were some muddy jeans and my feet were sore by the end of my fourth class trip, but a good time was had by all.

7th grader, Hannah, makes her initial line drawing with an ultra fine point sharpie (top). To the right is her finished painting.

Learning to Draw: Confidence Plus Effort Equals Success!

On the first day of class, each term, I ask my students to raise their hand if they can draw a stick figure or a happy face. Usually most every hand goes up. I follow this easy question with a harder one: How'd you learn? "I don't know" or a shrug of the shoulders is the typical response. Probing deeper, kids will say they watched someone else, or copied or just figured it out. Great! I tell them, that's how you LEARN to draw anything.
Most middle school students (and lots of adults, too) think that being a good artist means you can just naturally draw well. To relieve the anxiety many middle school students feel about art class and their own assessment of their lack of drawing ability, I start class by insisting that being a good artist isn't about natural drawing skills, that drawing skills can be learned, just like learning to draw a stick figure or write alphabet letters.
During the past week my students learned contour line drawing and gradual tone shading. They learned how to use a valuable art tool, the index finger, to smudge graphite as they shaded, they learned to use an eraser to reveal highlights and most importantly they learned to see with their eyes, not with their mind, so that they could draw the shoe in front of them with all its creases, tears, and scuff marks, not the idea of a shoe in their mind's eye.
The results of these simple drawing lessons amaze the students. Last Friday my second hour class installed our SHOE exhibit in the cafeteria. They hung 72 shoe drawings - one from every student in three classes. Sure, some are "better" or more accurately drawn than others, but each drawing shows amazing growth in the way the individual artist learned to see shape and form, highlights and shadows, and depict this on the 2-D surface of the paper.
Several teachers and a lunch lady commented on what excellent drawing skills this particular group of students has. I nodded my head in agreement, but silently added, EVERY group of students can draw, when they combine a few simple skills with confidence and effort!

Contour Line Drawing with a Twist

It all started with a basic contour line drawing of a shoe followed by a simple challenge: You've drawn it while looking, now close your eyes and try it blind. The results were funny, we laughed and I was ready to move on to the SERIOUS drawing lessons.

But the 7th graders in this class are never predictable and rarely serious. Someone suggested trying it backwards and before I knew it the kids were all up out of their seats practically dislocating their shoulders to draw on the desk behind them. The results were almost as hilarious as watching this room full of contortionists trying to draw a shoe.

Then, Travis, known as DaTravio in the art room, drew a pretty decent shoe with his elbow, so everyone had to try that!
Clearly, when roucous laughter broke out in the corner of the room and shoes were flying off feet instead of being carefully drawn by studious art students, all hope was lost for completing that day's carefully planned lesson. Soon everyone had their shoes off, pencils gripped between toes, drawing shoes on the floor. It was an unpredictably wonderful place for my simple contour line drawing lesson to end up!

What Will They See in an Old Shoe?

My thirteen year old son has enormous feet. They rip through sports shoes in a matter of months. Tripping over one of his castoff, man's size 12 shoes last week gave me an idea for an end of the year art project. At first I thought I'd stumbled over one of the two cats in our house. The shoes are that big and our cats are that fat! It was dark, 5am, I was barely awake. I looked at that shadowy shoe, at its creased and molded shape, it stared back at me, daring me to challenge its right to front stage center on the stair landing: a 3D Rorschach test that NEVER gets put away.
Old shoes do have character which is why the "Draw an Old Shoe" pencil project is a classic that's been around for decades. A nice, quiet, clean end of year project! At first I thought I'd just bring in a few shoes, set up a still life at each table and assign the pencil drawing, but one of the issues I have in teaching drawing and gradual tone shading is that a lot of kids can't get past the colors, logos and details of an object to see the form. They just don't "read" highlights and shadows very well at first.
So, on Wednesday, while students were wrapping up a printmaking project, I got out some old yellow house paint and proceeded to paint a shoe to see if making it monochrome would help reveal highlights and shadows. As expected, it did, but unexpectedly the painted shoe, or rather the act of painting the shoe, was what really caught the students' interest. "Can I do one?" they asked hour after hour as they caught sight of my mustard yellow transformation.
Out the window, like a birthday balloon, went my idea of a quiet end of the year drawing project and in the art room door came boxes and bags of old shoes. The pile grows daily as teachers and parents respond to my email request. Gallons of leftover house paint have joined the swelling, smelly pile of worn out shoes. Eager art students ask me daily, "When're we gonna paint the shoes?"
What will my students see in these shoes? Not the house cat, I'm sure. We're stepping into new territory and we're going to figure this project out together. What I do know is that the pile of shoes has captured their imagination and THAT is one giant step toward a successful end of the year project.
p.s. After we paint the shoes (all 50 or 60, rather than the 5 or 6 I had intended!) I will have them do that ol' stand-by: the pencil drawing. What happens with the shoes after that?...check back and I'll let you know!

"All Thumbs" and a Few Toes Too

Last spring I decided it was time to tackle the large walk-in storage closet adjacent to my art room. The walls are lined with boxes, some of which, judging from the contents, date back at least thirty years- well before my time! Some of the labels match the contents: cat food cans, door knobs, paper towel rolls. Some are mystery boxes.
One such box held a few rolls of plaster cloth of the sort for casting broken bones. Not enough material for all four of my art classes, unless we did something really small.
The idea for this project sprouted along with the seedlings I set under grow lights awaiting the memorial day weekend outdoor planting date. I was thinking about green thumbs and my mind went on from there: all thumbs, thumbs up, thumbing a ride, Thumbelina, thumbs and toes, tip toe, toe to toe, ten little piggies, hang ten, well, you get the idea. It was silly, but that was our theme.
I dragged out the boxes of wood scraps, invited students to plaster a thumb, a toe or in this case two sets of toes and build a sculpture. Some were 'figurative', some were abstract, all were radically different from each other and lots of fun to do!