Day Two at Home Learning

Hello my wonderful artists and welcome to the second official learn at home day! I have another video to share with you about today's activities.

Today's focus is drawing. According to the chart, you have three choices; 

Look closely at a family member and draw his or her portrait 

OR 

Look in a mirror and draw your self-portrait 

OR

Find three items around your house and arrange them together. Draw what you see.

Many jobs, including doctors, scientists, detectives, and artists, require us to look closely at objects or people. Today, as you are drawing, remember to use your detective eyes and look closely at the objects or people you are drawing. Take your time when you look and walk your eyes back and forth over the surface like you were a tiny ant so you see everything.

One of my favorite portrait artists is Vincent Van Gogh. He is most famous for his self-portraits. He used self-portraits as a way of practicing portraits without having to pay models to sit for him. If you wish to learn more about Vincent Van Gogh, watch the following videos below.

If you wish to practice your skills in observation, the Tate Kids website has an online quiz "Spot the Difference". This is a fun way to practice using your detective eyes by examining famous works of art and spotting the differences.

www.tate.org.uk/kids/games-quizzes/spot-difference

At the end of your art making, reflect and tell me if you had any problems today while drawing from observation. You can share your reflection in Artsonia when you type your artist statement within the app.

Have fun creating and using your skills in OBSERVATION!

Art Resources:

www.Artsonia.com

www.tate.org.uk/kids/make/paint-draw/create-art-van-gogh

www.tate.org.uk/kids/games-quizzes/spot-difference

Wassily Kandinsky

Wassily Kandinsky was born on December 4, 1866, in Moscow, Russia. The young Kandinsky drew, wrote poems, and played the piano and cello. After graduating from school, he became a law teacher. Kandinsky began painting at the age of 30. He felt that painting possessed the same power as music and that sign, line, and color ought to correspond to the vibrations of the human soul. Many art historians believe that Kandinsky had a form of synesthesia, where sounds were linked to colors. Essentially, he could hear color and see music. The kindergarten students listened to "The Noisy Paint Box" written by Barb Rosenstock and illustrated by Mary Grandpre'. In the book, the author tells the fascinating story of Kandinsky and how he experienced colors as sounds.

Wassily Kandinsky, Bright Picture, 1913

During art class, students pretended to by Kandinsky and listened to three composers introduced throughout the year during Mrs. Meirose's music class; Johann Sebastian Bach, Camille Saint-Saens, and John Philip Sousa. By listening to the sounds and rhythm of the music, each student determined how that sound should look in his/her drawing/painting as if they could also see the music and hear the colors like Kandinsky. For more information about Kandinsky and synesthesia, visit the following websites: www.Guggenheim.org, www.wassilykandinsky.net, and www.pbs.org.

“I saw all the colors in my mind; they stood before my eyes. Wild, almost crazy lines were sketched in front of me.” 

-Wassily Kandinsky  

Norman Rockwell: Artist of the Quarter

Norman Rockwell is an amazing illustrator, an artist who tells stories using images.  The artist was introduced to students through an examination of his "Triple Self Portrait" using VTS strategies.

"Triple Self Portrait" by Norman Rockwell

Visual Thinking Strategies (VTS) allows each child to share what they see or find in a piece of art and connect their findings to visual evidence within the painting. Through VTS' rigorous group 'problem-solving' process, students cultivate a willingness and ability to present their own ideas, while respecting and learning from the perspectives of their peers.  Common questions asked during a VTS discussion include: 

What's going on in this picture?

What do you see that makes you say that?

What more can we find?

To learn more about Norman Rockwell and his life, Kindergarten and First Grade students listened to the story "Norman Rockwell" written and illustrated by Mike Venezia from the "Getting to Know the World's Greatest Artists" Series.

A selection of books from our public library about Norman Rockwell.

After learning more about Norman Rockwell and his life, Kindergarten students worked as a class to develop a fictional story.  Students have already started illustrating their book pages. Each kindergarten class section has written a book and currently, each student is assigned a page from the book to illustrate. Today, students will be adding more details to their drawings with pencil and adding color with crayons. Students may need help reading the words on their assigned page as to remember what their assigned page says and illustrate accordingly. Students were also asked to help each other brainstorm ideas or details to add to their illustrations to make them better and to make sure the picture or illustration is “telling a story” like our artist Norman Rockwell.

First and Second grade students discovered an interesting comic on the front of the "Norman Rockwell" book written and illustrated by Mike Venezia.

"Hey Mr. Rockwell! Why don't you paint some cool modern stuff like us?"

I wanted to make sure students understood why this quote was so important, so we examined other art created around the same time of Norman Rockwell's illustrations and made notes using a Venn Diagram.  I think the category that was most difficult for students was finding words to describe what was similar between Norman Rockwell's illustrations and the modern abstract artwork that was created at the same time.

Working together in groups of 3-4, students compare art using a Venn Diagram.

First and Second grade students also designed a cover for "The Saturday Evening Post". This lesson puts the student in the role of illustrator with the assignment of designing a cover for “The Post”. Students were shown examples of Post covers by Norman Rockwell from the books in the above photo. Students were reminded that Norman Rockwell felt that the idea of a cover must be readily evident, the viewer should be able to understand the situation in about thirty seconds for the cover to have the desired impact. Grades K-3: Remember that the drawings may be only somewhat representational. Continue to be supportive of the efforts and open to spontaneous or unrealistic use of color. Next week, students will be creating Norman Rockwell inspired artwork of their own!

"The Saturday Evening Post" Cover Design

SD Visual Arts Standards

Anchor Standard 8: Interpret intent and meaning in artistic work.

K.VA.Re.8.1.a. Describe what an image represents.

1.VA.Re.8.1.a. Compare images that represent the same subject.

2.VA.Re.8.1.a. Categorize images based on expressive properties.

It's Raining Origami Cats and Dogs!

I love introducing Kindergarten and first grade students to the art of origami. It not only exposes them to many folds, such as side to side and corner to corner, but introduces the class to a diverse culture and country and a great discussion on shape characteristics, such as a square having four corners and four sides while a triangle only has three corners and three sides. As tradition holds in my building, kindergarten students learn step by step how to fold a simple origami cat, which is also the exact same steps for the origami dog. The first day of class we discuss that the art of origami originates in Japan and locate Japan on the map in our classroom. I show the students the steps at the demonstration table. I then hand one square origami paper to each child and we walk through the steps together as a class. I walk around and check progress through each step. Lastly, I let each child pick their own color of origami paper and try it on their own. If they need help, they only need to raise their hands. Next class, students will choose which cat or dog head is the best and take the other one home. The origami cat or dog head kept in the classroom will be glued to a 12" x 18" drawing paper and students will add the body, legs, tail and any other details necessary for their cat or dog with pencil first, then oil pastel contour lines, and finally tempera paint cakes (similar to a watercolor resist) to fill. Here are the directions below for the origami cat and dog, if you would like to try it at home.  Look to Artsonia to see gallery examples from 2013.

Start with a square paper.

Fold diagonally from corner to corner and crease.

Sometimes this fold is difficult, so I tell students to pinch the corner with one
hand and use the other hand to flatten the fold from the corner down.

Fold in half again from corner to corner and crease.

Open last fold and notice line dividing triangle in half.
Turn the paper so that it acts as an arrow and points to the belly.

To prevent over folding, I tell students to place one finger
at the top of the line and use the other to grab the top right corner.

Pull the top right corner down to the belly
leaving a nice triangle shape the ear and cheek.

Repeat on the other side. I tell students to notice that
they should now have three arrows pointing towards their belly.

I tell students that dogs or cats do not normally have pointy chins
so we need to fold the bottom point up to leave a flat chin instead.
This is the dog.

To make the cat, simply flip the paper over and upside down.

I found this great video from Ted 2008 by Robert Lang entitled "The Math and Magic of Origami". Although a little advanced for my kindergarten and first grade students, I certainly enjoyed how he uses math and engineering principles to fold mind-blowingly intricate designs that are beautiful and, sometimes, very useful. Check out the video below.

Why is art so important?

I think this is a great video that explains five ideas of why art is so important. I think this video is great for explaining why the final product of contemporary and historical art is so important, but not necessarily how valid and necessary the process of art is to our lives. Arts infancy from thoughts and dreams to process through creation and creativity are just as important as art's final product. Warning: some of the art represented in this video does contain nudity.