Delicious Desserts, Inspired by Wayne Thiebaud

After exploring color mixing by creating new colors and naming them, 3rd grade artists looked at and discussed the work of American painter Wayne Thiebaud. Thiebaud (pronounced "tee-bow") is known for his paintings of everyday objects, like food, and is still alive and making art today! 

Wayne Thiebaud, Four Ice Cream Cones (1964)

We looked at his paintings of different kinds of desserts and noticed his use of bright colors and dramatic, colorful shadows. Looking at several examples made us hungry! 

To begin our own paintings of desserts, we looked at the geometric shapes and forms that make up a lot of our favorite desserts. We noticed that many desserts are either a cylinder, like a cake or pie; a cone shape, like an ice cream cone; a sphere, like the scoop of ice cream; or a triangular prism, like a slice of cake. We brainstormed and drew a few sketches of our favorite desserts before selecting one to sketch out on larger paper, focusing on the shapes. 

The following class, we used our recent experience with mixing colors to paint our favorite desserts! We thought about how we could mix a variety of colors, thinking about the bright colors that Thiebaud uses in his painting, as well as using white to create lighter tints of a color. 

Students painted their desserts, incorporating tints, and the following week, they added additional details on top, now that the first layer of paint had dried. Students thought about how they could decorate their cakes, ice cream cones, sundaes and doughnuts with creative details like frosting, sprinkles, flowers, candles and hot fudge. 

During the next class, students painted the background, considering the use of a complementary colors and colors that would help their desserts to stand out. Since Thiebaud is also known for his use of strong shadows, we looked at cast shadows and how the shape of the object changes the shape of the shadow. Students added a colorful shadow to their dessert, and many students actually chose to add a window in their background to show a light source. 

For our last class, students participated in a gallery walk to see everyone's artwork and also a turn and talk to share their work with a partner. Here are some colorful examples of our delectable Wayne Thiebaud inspired desserts:

Ditty, 3rd Grade (Fletcher)

Gianna, 3rd Grade (Monfette)

James, 3rd Grade (Donato)

Laisa, 3rd Grade (DeBaie Nickl)

Mane, 3rd Grade (Fletcher)

Mary, 3rd Grade (DeBaie Nickl)

Norah, 3rd Grade (Monfette)

Ruken, 3rd Grade (DeBaie Nickl)

Sean, 3rd Grade (Donato)

Bianca, 3rd Grade (Debaie Nickl)

Duncan, 3rd Grade (Fletcher)

Griffin, 3rd Grade (Fletcher)

Leila, 3rd Grade (Donato)

Mason, 3rd Grade (DeBaie Nickl)

Noa, 3rd Grade (Donato)

Out of this World Outer Space Resists

Recently, 4th grade artists thought about how to use color to make shapes appear less flat and more three dimensional. We noticed that adding shading to a shape, as well as a highlight, helps transform the flat shape into a three dimensional looking form. We applied this concept to our outer space drawings, using oil pastels. 

To begin, students brainstormed a list of things you might see in outer space, including the Earth, sun, planets, stars, asteroids, space stations and more. After sketching out their compositions, students drew their outer space scenes on larger paper and used oil pastel to add color and depth. 

Students were encouraged to use several colors on each object, considering the light source and where there might be shade to help give objects and three dimensional appearance. We used monochromatic colors, or colors within the same color family, as well as analogous colors, or three colors next to each other on the color wheel. 

Students thought about using light, medium and dark colors to use on the same object to create a three dimensional appearance. Students got very creative and imaginative with their details, including aliens, food items, and space junk! 

When they finished drawing with oil pastel, students painted their entire artwork with black watercolor paint. This is called resist, because the oil pastel resists the watercolor paint, and allows the oil pastel outer space objects to stand out. Here are some examples of our out of this world outer space resist paintings! 

Anastasia, 4th Grade (Graves)

Anna, 4th Grade (Doherty)

Ava P., 4th Grade (Mattson)

Brian, 4th Grade (Mattson)

Callan, 4th Grade (Butera Wandicho)

Elizabeth, 4th Grade (Mattson)

Etta, 4th Grade (Graves)

Isabella, 4th Grade (Graves)

Marwa, 4th Grade (Mattson)

Mary, 4th Grade (Graves)

Mera, 4th Grade (Mattson)

Muntaha, 4th Grade (Butera Wandicho)

Sophie, 4th Grade (Mattson)

Willa, 4th Grade (Doherty)

Coleman, 4th Grade (Doherty)

Dylan, 4th Grade (Butera & Wandicho)

Autumn, 4th Grade (Graves)

Viveca, 4th Grade (Doherty)

Kalleby, 4th Grade (Mattson)

Thank You for Coming to the Art Show Reception!

Thank you to all the students, families and staff that came to the Art Show reception last night! We had a great turn out and it was so great to see everyone there enjoying the artwork and supporting our artists! Artwork will be on display at the Watertown Mall, until Thursday, April 11, so go check it out if you haven’t yet.