Imaginary Monster Collages

After listening to Go Away, Big Green Monster! by Ed Emberley, 1st and 2nd grade artists created their own imaginary monster collage. 

We thought about how we could cut a variety of different shapes, both geometric and organic, to create our monsters. We also added details, like sharp teeth, hair, tails and multiple eyes.

Gavin, 1st Grade

Jaylyn, 2nd Grade

Some of our monsters are featured on a bulletin board in the connector hallway, near the music room, so be sure to check them out!

Take A Walk In Our Shoes

This past week, 4th and 5th graders took a closer look at their shoes and drew them from observation. First, we took off one shoe and put it on the table in front of us, so we could look at it as we drew. We focused on getting the shape or contour of the shoe first.

Then looked at all the details in the shoe and thought about how to represent them using lines and shapes.

 

Some of our shoes, especially the athletic sneakers, had a lot of detail, including many different shapes and textures. We also thought about the shadow that the shoe made on the table.

Anita, 4th Grade

Eden, 4th Grade

Jared, 5th Grade

Vincent, 5th Grade

Some of our work is currently featured on one of the bulletin boards outside the art room. Check them out on your way to art class!

Paper Sculptures

This week, PK, Kindergarten and 1st grade artists took their lines and shapes into the third dimension! They created paper sculptures, thinking about different ways to change and manipulate their flat piece of paper to turn it into a 3-D line or shape.

We began by learning about the difference between two-dimensional and three-dimensional objects. We thought about how we could change a piece of paper from 2-D to 3-D, just by using our hands. We came up with a few different techniques, including folding and bending the paper. We learned how to fold it to make a zig-zag line, and how to fold the ends of a curved piece of paper to create feet to help it stand up when glued. 

We experimented with paper before beginning to work on our own 3-D sculptures. Starting with a cardboard base, we added colorful 3-D lines and shapes by changing the paper. We discovered even more ways we could change the paper, and creative ways to connect and add them to our sculptures. We also focused on using the appropriate amount of glue!

As we were building, many of us realized that our sculptures reminded us of playgrounds and amusement parks! Some of our sculptures are on display on the first floor of Hosmer, near the entrance by the Pre-School, so be sure to check them out!

  

   

Gesture Drawing in Action

Earlier this month, 3rd, 4th and 5th grade artists thought about how to use lines to capture movement. We talked about warming up for different activities, like sports, dance and music, and how we could warm up in art. For the first half of class we warmed up through gesture drawing, sketching quickly to capture different poses. We focused on drawing their gesture, rather than adding details.

We took turns posing for each other, which was a lot of fun! We thought about making our gestures active and interesting for people to draw. 

Even though we were all doing quick sketches, without very much detail, we realized that our figures still looked different depending on where we were sitting and our angle.

Printed Lines + Shapes

We have been continuing our exploration of lines in PK, Kindergarten and 1st grade, and are now connecting them to make shapes. We used paint, but this time we did not use a paintbrush or water cups. Instead, we used a new technique: printing!

We learned to make lines and shapes using a cardboard tool. First we dipped it into paint, then pressed it onto our paper and lifted it up to make a mark. Dip, press, lift. We practiced printing for a few minutes before we thought about how we might make a picture using these lines and shapes. 

We noticed that we could connect the lines to make them into shapes, and make different lines by changing the way we put our marks down on our paper. 

In 1st grade, artists created busy cityscapes, with tall skyscrapers, apartment buildings, stores, cars, and even people. 

One student decided to include Fenway in his cityscape!

In second grade, we turned our lines and shapes into robots, using our active imaginations! We thought about how they could have square heads, multiple eyes, wheels on their feet, and springs for hair. One of them is even solar powered!

We had a lot of fun coming up with our own cityscapes and robots, using our printed lines and shapes to inspire our imaginations. The following class, we added color using tempera paint. We thought about how to make our colors bright to fill in our shapes, as well as the background.

Priya, 1st Grade

Lenna, 1st Grade

Alani, 2nd Grade

Line Challenges

To start off the year in art, we have been learning about line across many different grade levels. Lines are a basic element of art, and we noticed that once we started looking, we could see them everywhere around us!

PK, Kindergarten, 1st and 2nd grade artists drew a variety of different lines in their "line challenges," using crayons to draw straight lines, zig zag lines, and even some lines that they invented from their imagination:

During the next class, we explored what happens when we add paint on top of our crayon lines. We realized that we could still see the crayon lines showing through, because the wax-based crayon and water-based paint resist each other:

Dorie, 2nd Grade

Aliana, 2nd Grade

To really see resist in action, first we added lines and shapes to our drawings using white crayon and watched them magically appear when we added paint on top! We will be continuing to explore lines in art this term, using different materials.

Blind Contour Drawing

4th and 5th grader artists have been drawing, and working on building our hand eye coordination, which is actually very important for artists as well as athletes!

We did some warm up activities, including blind contour drawing. We put on blind folds and tried to draw the object (a plastic sea creature toy) that was placed in our hand. We thought about how we could feel the shapes and contours of the object and represent it using lines and shapes.

Then we took off the blind folds to draw our objects from observation, or close looking. We were surprised to see what our blind drawings looked like!

Some of us enjoyed the blind contour drawing better, because it was freeing and also challenging. Others preferred being able to draw from observation, so we could add details.