Artists in 4th grade began their Pop Art inspired printmaking project 2 weeks ago. We began by learning about Pop Art, looking at art work by Roy Lichtenstein, Jasper Johns, Claes Oldenberg and Andy Warhol.
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| Claes Oldenberg, Floor Burger (1962) |
Pop Art was an art movement that began in the 1950's. Artists featured objects and scenes from everyday life and popular culture, borrowing techniques from commercial art and popular illustration, like comics and cartoons. Pop Art did something brand new by exploring popular culture in their artwork, challenging traditional ideas of art.
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| Jasper Johns, 3 Flags (1958) |
We looked at a few examples of screen prints made by Andy Warhol, who made multiple prints of his artwork. A lot of his art featured commercial products that were mass produced, so he chose to mass produce his artwork, as well.
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| Andy Warhol, Campbell's Soup Cans (1962) |
After sharing our observations, we discussed what popular culture means to us today. Each class made a list on the whiteboard, which included things like sports teams, music, video games, social media and Apple products. Then students brainstormed at least four ideas for a print, featuring pop culture that is important or meaningful to them. There were some reference images for inspiration, with sports teams logos, emojis and Spongebob Squarepants, among other things! This helped jump start our ideas.
We selected one image to make larger and turn into a foam printing plate. First, we thought about how to use line, pattern and texture to create an interesting image that could be repeated. Since words would come out backwards when printed, students had to flip them backwards in their drawing.
Students drew out their idea on a 4 x 6 piece of paper and traced over it to make imprints into their foam print plate. A wooden stylus was used to go over their lines to make them deeper so that they will print clearly. Below are some examples of drawings and printing plates.
Next, we will be pulling prints using different color inks, to create our Pop Art inspired prints!
