Lesson Idea :: Mehndi Hand Sculpture - World Art study

This lesson idea originated from two different sources that I combined into one workable one for the high school art classroom. They are the following...

Dick Blick's very intriguing Mehndi Art Gloves lesson plan for multicultural art studies

A pin from Pinterest that makes the Dick Blick idea three-dimensional and, in turn, more interesting I think. 

I have been wanting to do this project for a good while after initially seeing it on Dick Blick but I couldn't bring myself to do it because I didn't like how the design work was on gloves which would essential leave the finished project flat and deflated. I don't remember when I stumbled upon the possible solution from pinterest (see above) but I was really excited about it because it really seemed to combined Dick Blick's idea with something ensured a (literally) solid product in the end.

Doing some backwards planning and visual deconstruction, I figured that plaster of paris would work very well to fill the glove. The question remained of how I would end up doing it because, based on my experience of working with plaster, I knew it wouldn't just be so easy to just pour wet plaster in and be able to call it done. I did about two trial runs very quickly by myself before I did it in class and took lots of mental notes and then I did an abbreviated demo for the Interactive Art History class. They previously worked with plaster of paris for the cave art project idea so that really helped them to know what to expect with the process required for this project.

Below is a video of the sculpting stage of this project where I was working with the plaster after it was poured into the glove and was starting to set and after the video (scroll down), you can see some picture of the students doing it themselves. Ideally you want to pair them up because four hands work best in order to make one finished sculpted hand. Kind of not totally efficient but... well.... I haven't figured out a better way than this so far.

 

And here is a picture of a sculpted hand that is finished that a student is now applying their mehndi line design onto the glove with Sharpie Ultra-Fine pen...

Because the students are all still working on this project, I don't have any finished work to show you but based on the time schedule that we are keeping, I suspect I can show you some finished work some time next week, so keep checking back to see some finished work!

Tomorrow I will show you the quick follow-up video to the above where I show you how to clean up dried plaster. [Updated: Finished student work can be accessed HERE via this link!]

Hand check

Returned from Spring break but I have so much to do now that I am officially in the fourth and final quarter. Where in the world did the rest of the school year go and how am I at the end of another one?

I have plenty that I know I owe you all in updates and other good stuff but I also need to get my grades in for this week for report cards to go out AND I also have some grad studies work due this weekend so gotta put the blogging on hold even longer! Sorry!!!

The above image is a preview at least of what I have ventured into with the Interactive Art History class. I took a pinterest idea and crossed it with a lesson plan found on Dick Blick for them to be able to study World Art! At some point upon my return, I will share the lesson plan idea as well as some of the tricks and tips (and snafus) that yielded from the endeavor. Probably will see you next week if I'm lucky!

The ROYGBIV Project :: Put a fork in it! :: Pt. 5 of 5

Without further adieu... I present to you The ROYGBIV project in all of it's finished glory!!!!

The installation makes the gallery hallway such a happy place!

Once the students got to the point where they were able to start installing their individual sections of the total installation and they got to see it all come together they were really motivated to get the whole project DONE and it took only a matter of a few days for them to all really pitch in and get things hung up and adjusted no matter what subdivisions they originally volunteered themselves for.

One element that was a final "finishing touch" was hanging painted (with tempera) sheets of acetate sheeting on alternating window panels all the way down the hallway. The hope was that the natural light could shine through the painted sheeting and then cast colored light into the hallway. It didn't work but it did look pretty interesting from the outside and it has served as great encouragement for people to see it across the "quad" and then come walk through the gallery hallway when they otherwise didn't have a reason to venture that way in the first place.

Next  year when we do a different ROYGBIV installation I will allot money in the budget for colorful cellophane.

The sun group had some serious challenges with trying to rig up something that would support the overall structure, girth, and unexpected weight of the finished work. Fishing line did not work after trying it multiple times so the winning solution was to use 14 gauge aluminum sculpture wire that supported the sun from three different points. It doesn't look like a literal interpretation of what the sun looks like but I think it works being abstract the way it is.

The sun is suspended at one end of the hallway where it can hang the highest from the ground.

Obviously a good number of the rainbow drops didn't hold their shape perfectly but I think it's OK. The student artists who worked on them weren't totally disappointed and I was really proud with the way they pushed through to the end even when it was very VERY challenging and discouraging at times. Their perseverance is so commendable and they really pulled things together in the end.

And the clouds group? Well, they had a bit of an unexpected advantage from the get-go because they didn't have to figure things out since they followed some directions found online. *shrug* They did have one of the messiest portions of the whole installation though so they had their fair share of challenge at times. Their original plan was to shade the clouds a little to make them look "stormy" but in the end that wasn't necessary and they simply used some of the natural darkness that was cast from the inside out that derived from the newspaper that they used for the center form of the sculpturing!

For a second try at studying installation art with the 3D Design class, I would say this attempt was successful. So many people - students and faculty/staff alike - have commented really positively on the entire installation and part way through the hanging of everything I already had inspiration come upon me for what will be done for next year's endeavor! If you can believe it it will be much of what you see here PLUS a little bit of some extra that is pure fun and lightheartedness. Hard to believe it can be bigger than this? I guess you'll have to hold me to that and visit me next year to see what it will be all about.

Thanks so much for sticking with me for this week long series! Next week is Spring Break for my school but I will be queuing up some postings that have been waiting around for their chance to be shared in addition to working on graduate school assignments and also (FINALLY!!!) doing some painting at the easel at my home studio.

Have a great weekend! See you next week!

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This installation art study was student-centered and collaboratively designed and constructed (across two classes). It utilized paper sculpting and papier mache, string wrapping, spray painting and brush painting, fiber application in order to create a sun, clouds, and rainbow display suspended from the ceiling of the student art gallery hallway. It was originally presented in a week long series that showed the planning and creative processing, the beginning part of the sculpting/working stage, the point just about when everything was done being sculpted, and then some notes about when things went awry and how those things were dealt with. The final view of it can be found HERE. This project was meant to be a re-imagining of The Ombre Experience project idea.

The ROYGBIV Project :: Making it happen :: Pt. 2 of 5

This stage was the absolute messiest of all of the stages but it also was the one that the students really enjoyed because it allowed them to really explore and experiment with the creative process and truly give life to the ideas that they were tasked with. Here is a little of what each of the groups were attempting to work with...

Sun group

Idea was pretty close to THIS idea that I had originally shown them

• Wanted to paper mache in order to sculpt a single extra-large spherical structure
• Needed an exercise/yoga ball for their form
• Wanted to pull in some texture by adhering muffin/cupcake paper cups to the outside of the structure after it was completely sculpted
• Wanted to use lighting in order to illuminate the structure from the inside out

Clouds group

Idea derived from THIS I found and showed them during the lesson intro

•  Required them to do paper mache to sculpt multiple different but similar structures
• Needed lots of balloons for the form of each structure
• Required cotton batting/stuffing for the texture of the clouds
• Wanted to do at least seven clouds in order to fill out the gallery hallway space

Rainbow group

Idea was inspired by THIS that I found and showed them during the lesson intro

• Required them to use watered down glue mixture to soak string so that it could adhere to individual forms
• Needed lots of balloons for what would be over 100 individual forms suspended from the ceiling
• Required paint in Red, Orange, Yellow, Green, Blue, and Violet

We spent at least a week and a half total of class time doing just the fabrication/sculpting of all of the different elements of the total installation. It was definitely messy and that's not something that all of the students were keen on but with lots of encouragement and redirection from me that this was a GROUP effort and we needed to be unified in order for it to really be successful, it became a rare thing for any of them to sit and be idle for too long. Most all of the students wanted to play an active role because they fully understood that the effort we had to put forth was major and collective. They truly started understanding that if one person didn't invest themselves, the whole of the project would ultimately suffer.

Two groups needed newspaper for papier mache so they banded together to create triangles - because that's the best shape for seamless and smooth coverage - in order to prep the paper.

The sun group gets started on the first of many layers!

The clouds group also got to work but they had an easier time than the sun because there were multiple cloud clusters to work on.

The rainbow group had perhaps the most challenging of all of the elements of the installation to work on both because of the sheer number of items that needed to be sculpted - they were shooting for about 100 total to fill the space we have - and because working with string coated in glue mixture? Well... it's just way messier than papier mache. Surprising that anything could be that way compared to papier mache but it was true! Also, wrapping and layering the string had to be done a little more strategically (read: it was less forgiving than papier mache) so there was a bit of a learning curve for everyone in the sun group.

The sun group discovered it required at least two people to coat the string and then wrap a balloon with the glue coated string. They tried to have at least two stations of this going at once.

One of the balloons that they did as a "prototype" to figure out if it would work, how long it would take to dry, etc.

One of the major challenges from this stage (as with almost every project endeavor I do) is dealing with how to store things when they are in the WiP (work-in-progress) phase. I share the studio art classroom with a part-time faculty member and while it might sometimes seem like I have a pretty cushy set-up (based on what I share on the blog) the room I share with the other teacher is about 2/3 the size of what I know most art classrooms are that are not shared. This always creates problems when it comes to storing supplies or student works on top of the fact that I know my colleague is not usually thrilled with some of my zany endeavors. (They are much more neat and tidy than I am.)

For this project I solved some of the project by storing some of the bags of balloons behind this huge canvas that another student has been trying to work on when they can...

Far from ideal but making the best of what I have is all I can do

Tomorrow I will show you the next phase of the project when we were getting to the stage of finishing up the sculpting and fabrication of the different elements and starting to install it all in the student gallery hallway.

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This installation art study was student-centered and collaboratively designed and constructed (across two classes). It utilized paper sculpting and papier mache, string wrapping, spray painting and brush painting, fiber application in order to create a sun, clouds, and rainbow display suspended from the ceiling of the student art gallery hallway. It was originally presented in a week long series that showed the planning and creative processing, the beginning part of the sculpting/working stage, the point just about when everything was done being sculpted, and then some notes about when things went awry and how those things were dealt with. The final view of it can be found HERE. This project was meant to be a re-imagining of The Ombre Experience project idea.

The ROYGBIV Project :: Sneak Peek of a series!!!

I am so delighted to bring a whole week/full series starting next Monday of a look at the start-to-finish of an installation art study and project I just completed last week with the 3D Design students. Two classes did the project together and it took about a solid month to do it and while collaborative learning can sometimes be a bit of a nightmare for both the teacher and the students involved, this project was a HUGE winner overall. Not one student felt excluded and wasn't whole-heartedly invested and I also didn't feel like I was ever trying to push or shove the efforts of the over 45 students that did the project together.

This project is one not totally different from what I did last year with The Ombre Experience endeavor but it twisted and expanded it some with the intention for it to be totally student-centered in how it established and unfolded itself. It was quite intense and consuming and for that reason I don't feel like I could come close to sharing it and discussing it with you all in just one or even two blog postings so that's why I am stretching it out. Anyway, come back and check in on Monday! That's when I will be kicking everything off. 

Quick Sculpting is AWESOME for Summative assessments

[This is from a while back but it's taken me a bit to get caught up so pardon me.]

 Do you do pre-tests/assessments in visual art?

This is from the very first assignment for the 3D Design class as a way for me to assess where each of them was starting from - skillsets, general understanding of art and design, etc. The inspiration for each of the sculptures was for them to sculpt what it feels like to look at a rainbow. Essentially, they were each sculpting an emotion which was challenging for some but at the same time many of them enjoyed the challenge and really sought to tackle it well. They were only allowed to use paper and simple adhesives like tape and white glue and they were instructed to do their best to make it as clean in construction as possible.

After they spent about three days working on it I had another class (a 2D Design class) critique and visually "read" what the sculpture was attempting to communicate while the 3D Design classes critiqued and read the 2D Design pre-assessments. All of the students were very interested in find out what the other students read from their work and I was able to read where they were in their art understandings and abilities! It was pretty successful overall.

YouTube is the BEST :: Drawing with Anna

How often do you use this youtube? Never? Well... allow me to possibly change you mind about that!

Back up a little bit: Do you ever remember your days in school when you would walk into class and standing at the front of the class where the teacher would be was the coveted and adored A/V cart? (A/V=Audio Visual). You know what I'm talking about, right? The tall metal cart that had a television and VCR (and later DVD/VCR combo) secured to it that basically meant one thing - VIDEO DAY IN CLASS!!!!!!!!!

Well, using Youtube videos are just about the equivalent to having a video day in class for any kid. Seriously. They almost don't even care if the youtube clip is hokey or not. Most of them will watch just about anything you present to them AND enjoy it AND remember it. Which is the BIG kicker!)

For the purposes of visual art instruction, I am a hardcore believer in the power of demonstrations. I mean, what better way to explain something than to SHOW them how and what to do, right? But in all honesty, demos kind of drive me crazy sometimes. For whatever reason, they require an immense amount for me to set up for both my classes and myself to experience together. I mean, I suppose I could just set up the demo and do it and have the kids do nothing but sit and watch but I have found that to be unproductive to a point because they will get side tracked and just generally do their own thing and waste materials. Also, if they need/want me to repeat a certain step after I have gone beyond it? Well... most demos that I do are very prohibitive of that being able to happen.

Enter the Youtube's Drawing with Anna!!!!!

Perhaps you already know Anna very well and I am behind the times but if that's not the case, join me and get with it!!! Drawing with Anna is AWESOME!!!!! She has only a handful of instructional videos but they are very useful and I have recently used two - the Continuous Line Drawing video and the Blind Contour video:

I used both of these videos in the 2D Design class that I am currently teaching and while Anna can be a little hokey for high schoolers - she is honestly pretty sweet, an awful lot like someone's really nice mom, and she does a pretty decent job at teaching the general jist of both Continuous Line drawing and the Blind Contour drawing. It was also nice to be able to have a video that I could stop and start and back up as I needed to in order to specifically speak about different things that are relevant to what I am doing with my students and their project work currently.

So there you have it! I am a fan of Drawing with Anna. And now you can be too!

Lesson Idea :: Cartoons in the Round :: 3D Design

As an art teacher I get bored easily with lesson and project ideas. Does this happen to you?

For this reason, I do my best to not repeat lesson and project ideas if I can help it but if that has to happen, create an iteration of time to happen such that there is at least a semester or even entire school year in between repeats.

That being said? A favorite of the 3D Design class I teach is clay sculpting cartoons. I like to do this with them as a bit of a final/finale project and (in turn) a reward for all that they have learned and hard work they have invested through the whole semester. And while I usually love/hate dealing with clay because I have a shared studio classroom, by the end of the semester I usually have full confidence in the skillsets and individual investments of each student to know that they will not waste any of their time or high quality materials that they are provided.

The last time I did this project was at the end of the Fall semester of 2010. It is such a favorite project that I try to let at least one 3D Design class do it per year but as it ended up happening, it didn't work out last year because of the budget. This year though, I was able to make it happen and it was quite a success. Here are the finished pieces from this year...

This one started out as Bambi but structurally it just wasn't working it out so I helped the student artist to steer it this way.

I had the students do a few different things this year than I have in previous ones. One of the major ones was they were required to make armatures and then cover them with clay in order to ensure that each of their finished pieces were a little more structurally sound and less likely to break apart. Doing this sort of worked in teaching them that the inside part that you don't see is just as important as the outside that you do see but not all of the armatures worked out so well. I attribute this to the fact many of them didn't use clay thick enough to fully encase the armatures and as the clay shrunk when it set, the armatures were popping and pushing out in weird ways.

Some of the things that remained the same though were the fact that we used boneware clay as we always do, we fully utilized clay sculpting boxwood tools that you can buy in a class set for a really reasonable price, and the students were each required to draw a front view, side view, and aerial view of their design ideas in order to help them better visualize what they would eventually have to do and then for me to be able to help them if they had issues rather than relying on their verbal directions that go something like this, "Well... it kind of has this thing that goes around and then comes back again and it's kind of big but not really." o_O  Seriously. I cannot help a student artist who is going to give me that kind of information to go from in order for me to be able to help them.

All of this being said? I continue to very much like this lesson idea to keep using it in years to come.

Lesson Idea: The Deconstructed Book | 3D Design

This lesson idea is actually from my personal archives and is a project that I did my very first year of teaching at my current school but then I did it only one or two more semesters (out of a total of nearly eight that I have worked so far) after I did it the first time. I stumbled upon the original idea on Etsy probably at least five years ago but probably more and (like I always do) I mentally bookmarked it for the purposes of knowing that I would need it again in the future.

When the Lord was finally so gracious to put me in the classroom as an art teacher? Well... I got right to work with it and every student artist of 3D Design I had (of three sections total) did this project and we filled the student gallery hallway with these and it was, in a word? INCREDIBLE. It was like exploding books were simply raining from the sky and without me even realizing it I had essentially facilitated the first installation art exhibit I of my life. In the history of the school where I teach nobody had ever endeavored to hang student work from the ceiling so it was quite a bit of something to behold and (thankfully) I didn't get in trouble for drilling holes in the ceiling. (Sometimes it's better to ask for forgiveness than permission, right?) I wish I had some pictures to share of what it looked like but I don't and to show you what it really looks like we all are just going to have to wait for this coming semester's 3D Design installation exhibit endeavor because I plan to do the idea with them but put a bit of a spin on it. (You'll have to wait for the details of that!)

Still, I wanted to share this with you now because a parent of a student at my school is an art teacher at a local amazing public high school and she sent me an email asking me how I did this project. I started to respond to her email but then I realize that what I was about to respond with to her is something that others might enjoy knowing about as well and why don't I just put it on the blog? So... here I am! And here it goes... this is how I went about teaching my student artists how to do this deconstructed book project.



(My husband was so nice to keep the yelling at bay during the filming of this video. He knew I was going to be doing it and I hardly paid attention to him and the fact that he turned the TV down and kept a lid on the yelling specifically because I was filming the video! He is such a good guy that husband of mine.)

(Also and again, please pardon the ridiculous book that I was forced to use because I didn't have any other book in the house that I otherwise would have wanted to deconstruct. I still cannot figure out where the book came from in the first place and I am completely embarrassed to have it in my house for the language that was used in it alone! I mean, I don't consider myself a type who lacks a sense of humor and there was a stage in my life when I definitely did use some rather colorful language (like that found in the book) but still! Anyway...)

 So that's the deconstructed book art education project and lesson idea! Hope this was helpful to you and if you end up giving this a try, please let me know how it goes because I really love seeing how other people do things differently than I do.

WiPs: Cartoons-in-the-round | 3D Design

Allow me for the lack of presence on the blog lately in the way of student artwork. I give you some works-in-progress from the 3D Design class. It's their last project of the semester!!!

PRIME time with lots of gesso being brushed about (pun definitely intended)

Yesterday and today the 3D class spent time attending to their cartoon sculptures done in the round out of boneware clay. They took about a two weeks of class time drafting up their ideas and then doing the actual sculpting right before we broke for Christmas and NY vacation.

The two weeks that we were out  left just enough time for the pieces to air-dry and set beautifully though some of them did suffer from some hairline fractures and natural separation of different pieces that weren't attached with the blending technique that I pushed them to use. (Hate to be the one to have to say "Told you so" but I absolutely did!!" A combination of gorilla glue, Alene's craft tacky glue, and some plaster tape helped to attend to any of the major issues of the drying out process (in a super cold studio classroom at that!) and it wasn't long until everybody was applying 2-3 good even coats of gesso for them to paint and detail in time for the end of next week when the end of class happens. (Cannot believe the end of classes is coming! Hate this time of year because of this. I ALWAYS hate having to say goodbye to the student artists every time it's time to do so.)

One of the pieces on the mend with some quick setting plaster tape. It was the best I could come up with to fix the very MAJOR crack that resulted from the drying process. This one even had an armature in it. *shrug*

Finding Nemo's Pearl the octopus!! Pretty much every day some one in class would take a turn and say her  infamous phrase, "Awww you guys made me iiiiink!"

A gecko/chameleon from I don't know which animated movie BUT the piece is BEAUTIFULLY sculpted and I know the student artist will do just as beautiful of a job painting and detailing it. Can't wait to see it finished!

One of my faves from this round of student work. It's a minion from Despicable Me!!!! This one also had us quoting Despicable Me at least every other day. It's been so much fun doing this project for everybody!!

There were also two Mike Wazowski's from Monsters Inc. and the dragon from How to train your dragon. There was one Mickey Mouse and one Cookie Monster and then (2?) from Dora the Explorer and one more from Finding Nemo (I think it was Dorie). I can't remember some of the others of the bunch but they are all pretty fun and I will certainly share them finished here on the blog when they are done.

WiPs: "Extra-dimensional" - Creative processing | 3D Design

The 3D Design class is running like an incredibly well-oiled machine these days. This means that even though I am treating this year like I am a first year (but really sixth year) teacher, I am keeping to my self-imposed project and teaching schedules. Basically, I and my students are beautifully on pace.

The students are seriously loving this project and I am loving that! They are fully invested in what they are doing, they are showing sincere investment and intention and purpose in their designs and craftsmanship.

Currently they are in the stages of both Figure out & Focus and Stick or Scrap from the inquiry-based teaching and lesson plan model I am doing that can be found HERE. They are learning how to use drafting and drawing tools and techniques to give their design ideas more depth and dimension and they are not being shy about venturing into uncharted territory like the fact that most of them have limited (to no) experience in the way of optical illusion art and design.

For the beginning of the project (Explore & Experiment) they all tried out ideas on drawing paper to satisfy their own curiosities and now that they are beyond that, each of them is required to complete a 6-block worksheet (because the unassembled cube has six faces) where they need to demonstrate correctly and very precisely drawn patterns as they will be put on the faces of the fully assembled 3D cube - each face is 7"x7" but the worksheet has blocks that are 4"x4". 

I am requiring them to complete the worksheet because it serves as a more refined version of a rough draft as well as giving them one last practice run at correctly and neatly drawing their designs before they get to their final piece. The other thing the worksheet does is that it serves as both a formative assessment as well as a visual guide (almost like a study guide for a test) that can be used in open-notes style and form for when they finally apply their finally decided upon patterns to their large 7"x7" squares.

I have definitely been doing my best to inspire and propel conversations that strongly connect what we are doing with creativity and creating back to scripture and to their personal lives (as faith is informing their walk with Christ). I truly believe that the continued conversations are really helping them to understand the truth that the Lord Jesus Christ does exist apart and aside from time and space and the rules don't apply to Him. This is kind of how it is for optical illusion art - the 2D surface that it exists on breaks the rules that normally apply to a flat surface. The place where Christ breaks apart from optical illusion art is that He is not an illusion and He very much exists to love, save, forgive, and uplift despite what it might appear at any given time.

The other day in the midst of me organizing class materials, I pulled out the stack of disassembled cubes and as I was laying them out it struck me that in their unstructured state they make a perfect cross...

I pointed this out to my students and they were just as tickled and delighted with this fact. I couldn't have asked for a better and more instructive teachable moment than to show them that Christ's image is all over and through the process of this project. Truly what we are doing and learning is anointed and blessing us. If this wasn't a "God-moment" type of thing then I don't know what is!

WiPs: "a place of Grace" - Blueprinting the Visual Composition | 2D Design

In continuing on with my endeavor to attempt to teach the 2D Design students how to paint landscapes from picture/2D image reference, They have officially entered the stage of the creative process that is Figure out & Focus. Most of them have selected their inspiration pictures - found via image searches on the web as well as combing through their own instagram and other personal image archives.

Each of the students is required to bring in their images - whether it is singular or it is a collective in order to create a composite painting - so that they can figure out a strong visual armature for the composition of their individual paintings. I have been running them through exercises every day of looking at masterworks to both read paintings/images as well as how to identify leading lines, forms, and differentiating contrasting values and colors in order to understand how they all relate to one another in order to inform strong and successful composition. For as complicated as it makes my job sound? They are getting it. They are really really getting it!

One thing I am having all of the students do for each of their designs is to make composition blueprints (for lack of better word). What they do is they lay a piece of clean paper on top of their inspiration image and then they have to draw on the clean paper all of the leading lines and simple forms (see above picture). Once they do that they have to identify and label the foreground, middle ground, and background as well as match/lay out basic colors in their blueprints...

I have shown them examples of images where there is a strong foreground, middle ground, and background as well as showing them images where there is just a foreground, subtle middle ground, and obvious background. I have also shown them how leading lines can steer the viewer's gaze to draw it into a picture/painting so that a person can't help but experience the visual depth in addition to perhaps naturally skipping their eyes (with rhythm) from object to object in the image. I have also been using the instructional book Mastering Composition (in e-book format so I can project the pages and visuals from the book onto the white board) to show the eight different types of composition and visual armatures that can be employed to help add more obvious structure and order to a painting.

We haven't discussed how to use color and value as a tool to create depth and space on a 2D surface but I will be showing them how to use complementary colors in order to make elements of a work of art appear as if they are advancing or retreating within the space/surface of the painting to make it appear to have a lot greater and more dynamic depth. 

Pinterest for the Visual Art Education classroom

How do you feel about social networking? What's your favorite avenue for that? Are you a Facebooker? I recently decided not to be for my own personal interests and concerns. I used to be an avid Facebook user but it just seemed like it was counterintuitive and counterproductive to actually connecting people as it supposedly seeks to do. So... I quit it. (Facebook.) Despite what this might suggest, I am not against social networking. I mean, I'm an avid blogger (obviously) and I am questionably addicted to instagram. Another type of social networking I know and love? It's Pinterest!

I have been on Pinterest since it first started. I am blessed enough to be very well networked and so I got one of the earlier invitations that were given out. As Pinterest has grown and more people have discovered it, it has been exciting to sometimes even stumble upon people's pins made from my very own website!!! I know a ton of teachers who use it for lesson planning and classroom organization and I have used it for that very same purpose. Recently though, it occurred to me to use it for something other than just inspiring my curriculum and instruction.

The 2D Design class is starting a new project of painting where they are learning how to paint from/by photo and image reference. This endeavor was NOT planned and I had much different plans but I veered from them about two weeks ago and I have been praying about it and knowing that I need to make it happen for my student artists. Trouble with all of this is that teaching painting is something I am definitely NOT (entirely) confident or properly trained to do. Still... that isn't stopping me. *wink*

Taking notes from my amazing painting professor from the summer course I just took, I am crash coursing my students on understanding how to use visual composition in order to help them intentionally design and thoughtfully create works of high quality and successful visual art. One thing that has really helped me is the book called Mastering Composition. Another thing I am doing? I am looking at a TON of different types of visual art examples (masterworks, pins from people on Pinterest, personal works, etc.) with the students. AND(!) I am encouraging the students to DRAW on them in order to help "unpack" how and why the composition on each piece is either really successful or not so much.

Last week I projected one of my Pinterest boards up for my classes and we went through multiple photographs and I had draw on the white board all of the leading lines, forms, and space that helped to contribute to the successful visual composition. The goal is that by doing this, they will learn to read composition so that they can translate what they read to be strong composition into their own work. 

WiPs: "Extra-dimensional" - OpArt study | 3D Design

Every year I do an Op-art study but normally I keep it to the 2D Design classes. I have had this idea pinned to my art education project board on pinterest for I don't even know how long and this year I felt it was finally time for me to give the multi-dimensional work of optical illusion studies room to expand in the 3D Design studio art class. 

So here are some questions I have been thinking about... when you teach in your classroom... 

1. What do you use to inform your teaching decisions or methodology of how you actually instruct? 

2. Do you ever use visual art and teaching the creative process as the vessel to deliver a lesson/message beyond just teaching students techniques and art appreciation?

One of my goals (always) is to teach my students just as much about visual art as about life. Because I am a follower of Christ, this means that my worldview is shaped by Christ's teachings in the holy gospel. I see my mission field as being my classroom and my school community and it is always my goal to align the hearts and minds and SOULS of my students with belief in and devotion to the Lord's intelligent design and message of salvation and grace.

Now, I understand that I might have already lost a whole lot of my readers already based upon what I just said. (Seriously. They were gone as soon as I made mention that I am a Christian.) I am going to keep talking though to whomever is still here - either because you, too, believe in what I believe, or maybe because you are just curious about what more I could possibly say.

Here's something that you might not expect (that is VERY personal): I am a Christian now and I work at a Christian-school (this means I work in ministry) and I am very VERY vocal about my beliefs and commitment of being a Christian but I have not always been this way. I was not raised in the type of community I now live and work within and I only committed myself to walking and talking in this life of Christian faith almost nine years ago in my 20s. Before that, I led a life of serious debauchery (for lack of any other better word) and it has cost me an immense amount that I have had to make amends in order to find the peace and providence I now have in my life. My life has been a testament of things that include serious abuse, major illness, pushing myself to the brink of death (more than once), and then being delivered from all of it. And the punchline there - the delivery from all of it - came in the form of Christ and my commitment to following His teachings and that is how I came to be a Christian. 

Anyway, perhaps at one point I might share my testimony in greater detail than the very abbreviated version above but that's not the point here. The point is that my own experiences of life and with visual art have taught me that visual art and the creative process can be a really beautiful vessel for sharing some of the serious life (and faith) lessons that I have so far. I regularly use projects and daily conversation with my students during class to "unpack" (as one of my good colleagues like to say) all of the incredible things the Lord has blessed me with in my life. I even mean the blessings that might not seem like blessings because when they were happening and even after they happened they were really very tragic. (That's not an exaggeration by any stretch.)

I am a firm believer that the Lord gave us visual art in order for us to use it to understand Him better and draw nearer to Him. I believe that when we create (even for people who are not believers in Him), it fills us with something that is indescribable because HE is indescribable and when we create as He created (because we were created in His likeness and can imitate Him every and any time we create) - we are only adding into His intelligent design that already exists. 

Earlier today, I ran into my department head and we made an attempt to update each other on current doings and happenings in no less than five minutes. She reminded me of this one thing: "If God brings you to it, He will bring you through it!" How easily I forget such a truth exists especially  in the moments when I need to remember it most.

When I introduced this project idea to my 3D Design students, I certainly did let them know that it was something meant to teach them about Optical Illusion artwork but the overarching theme (that they should push themselves to understand) is that the Lord is multi-dimensional. He exists both within and beyond the boundaries of time and space and sometimes (like optical illusions) what He really looks like is far from what He is. Apart from optical illusion art, He can put a message within a mess, He can take a tragedy and turn it into a triumph, and He can use something broken and transform it into something amazingly and astoundingly beautiful. And the way He does this is through us and with us. This means that despite what we might ever feel or think or see - He is sovereign and almighty and that means there is nothing above or below what He can and will do. It's just a matter of us submitting ourselves to Him and acknowledging the tools He readily offers to us to accomplish His might works.

If you are not a believer and you have made it this far in this posting, I thank you for giving me this opportunity to share this much with you. I know it's not easy to hear this type of thing and be preached to because I honestly was once a disbeliever and a non-believer myself. It kills me sometimes to have to take stock of my own life and realize how much I had to go through in order to finally see and ACCEPT and embrace what real truth is since (in the process) I have lost so much. Still, I can look at the whole picture (the BIG picture) and see that if I had to lose my whole world to gain the amazing grace, always new mercies, and everlasting faithfulness of the Lord, I guess then all of that and even more would make it worth it on any and every given day of the week.

Lesson Idea: Form of the formless - Subtractive sculpting | 3D Design

This lesson idea included some of the following learning objectives:

• Create original works of art using minimalistic style and non-objective forms
• Visually communicate an emotion, idea, thought, suggestion, or experience from a Christian worldview in 3D form that is can be mounted on a pedestal and then be free-standing in presentation
• Learn the creative process required to design and create a non-objective sculpture from start to finish
• Understand and experience the challenges of unique sculpting material (in this case, a large very porous block of foam)
• Successfully utilize techniques such as subtractive sculpting and painting to intentionally create and communicate a specific message

This was only the second project for the 3D Design class and it was very challenging for them. Thankfully, they really rose to the challenge and (I feel) really invested themselves in order to create works of art that are original in nature, thought provoking and compelling, and carefully crafted.

This project was supposed to take a little more than two weeks and it ended up taking nearly a little more than three weeks. The thing that pushed it over the two week limit was the thought processing itself because for at least half of the class, I had to help steer their ideas so that they wouldn't be so obvious when they were fully created. To help them, I modeled (via me talking aloud and then illustrating things on the board in front of the class) a creative thought process I might go through that takes something concrete and turns it into something abstract. Some of the students understood what I was going for after that but plenty others were still lost.

Each of the students had to draft (3) different views of their sculpture idea and they had to tell me their inspiration and thought processes behind their idea. If what they presented to me was too obvious and I could figure it out (based on what I saw) because it was contrived or cliched, I would push them back to the "drawing board" and rework their idea. Some students had to go through this as many as half a dozen times. When the deadlines drew closer for the different stages of the whole project, I would talk with each student 1:1 and attempt to help them cultivate and develop their inspiration into something that would satisfy the requirements of the stage they were in. Here is a posting I did some time ago of the students working on this project.

The students were allowed to paint their pieces any one color they wanted but (for differentiated instruction and learning) if they wanted to use two colors (two was the limit) then those colors needed to be painted and blended in a gradual and seamless fashion to show an almost ombre effect. The pedestals (bases and posts) of the pieces could only be of a neutral color that included black, white, brown, or gray.

I (personally) feel like they did a really outstanding job with this project despite the fact that I really put them through the paces to design and create works of art that took them a week longer than the projected due date to create. Here are some of the completed pieces that the students worked so diligently to create.