4th Grade: Adventures in Sewing

The 4th grade art students have recently completed a sewing project- a first for most! The students worked in their sketchbooks to design a monster and then took part in every step towards bringing them to life.

First, students had to make paper templates for all parts of their monsters (body, arms, legs, accessories). Then, the pieces were cut from fabric and felt. We mostly used donated fabric remnants and recycled men's dress shirts.

Once the pieces were cut out, students turned them right-side-in (with arms and legs tucked in), and sewed the perimeter of the body. The students used a mix of running and whip stitches. Many students also decided to sew on buttons! The best part was turning them right-side-out, stuffing them, and seeing their complete creations!
This was a challenging project- I was extremely impressed with the attention to detail and how the students used the materials so carefully.

The class was SO busy it was hard to take many photos. The students were determined to bring them home for Christmas, so before I knew it, they were out the door! I'm hoping to get the whole gang back together for the Art Show in February :o)

Radial Symmetry Color Wheels

The 5th grade graphic arts students have recently completed their Radial Symmetry Color Wheels. Students were challenged to work in their sketchbook to design one "piece" of the color wheel. They made several thumbnail sketches before settling on a design. The students then used tracing paper to transfer the image to each piece. Finally, the color wheels were painted and the bold lines re-traced.
They came out beautifully!

Gorgeous Graffiti

The graphic arts room has been busy this fall working in their sketchbooks and trying their hand at graffiti drawing. We began the unit by watching a news clip interviewing graffiti artists as well as citizens and building owners. The question posed was "Is graffiti art or vandalism?". The students had a hard time making up their minds definitively which lead to interesting and animated class discussions.
They set to work creating their own "tags". The process included working in sketchbooks to try out different styles and design elements. Grid lines were drawn and decisions on symmetry and line were made. On their final drafts, students made decisions of color and value. Process was the focus as the students used sketchbooks as an inquiry tool to "try before you buy-into" the different elements. It was interesting to hear the vandalism vs art debate grow and change throughout the different stages of the project.
The results were excellent!

Happy International Dot Day!

September 15(ish) is International Dot Day, so we celebrated all week long by discussing the story of The Dot by Peter Reynolds and how, as artist, we are always discovering new ways to be creative and make our marks on the world.

I love talking about The Dot every year because it's a great reminder that we never stop growing and learning. This year, we "made our marks" with an old classic- shrink film!

Aside from very few students, nobody had had the experience of shrink film before. As soon as the students went home, the parents knew exactly what they were talking about- we knew it as Shrinky Dinks!

Each student was given a piece of shrink film to create their own "dot" with scissors and metallic sharpies. Then, we put the dots in the toaster oven to watch the magic of the shrinking happen. Students had the option to punch holes in their dots before shrinking them or add pins to the back. 

  

They came out great!!

Welcome back to Graphic Arts!! We have a great new, bigger classroom that adjoins the computer lab and lots of fun projects on deck!

We began the school year with a collaborative mural. All classes got to join in and add their own artistic flair to our HUGE canvas. The quote, "Creativity is Intelligence Having Fun" is by Albert Einstein. 

Moxie "helping" to prep the canvas over the weekend

Instant mural, just add art students!

The Fun Begins!

We will continue to work on it bit-by-bit as a group over the next few weeks until it's complete and ready to hang!

Impressive Apparal!

I can't express how impressed I am with the students' final project. With all of the excitement and time constraints that come with the end of the year, the students approached this project with so much enthusiasm and creativity! I can't wait to do this again next year (only, DEFINITELY allowing more time)!

The process of our apparel project, like most of our projects this year, included several complex steps. The students were tasked with choosing an item (we had everything from socks to t-shirts to tote bags!) and planning out a customized design.

I began by showing them an example that I had created on one of our classroom aprons:


This was created by cutting a paper snowflake (see our color wheel project) out of this projects secret weapon.... FREEZER PAPER.

Freezer paper is available in the grocery store near the aluminum foil and wax paper. I had gone ahead and purchased a huge roll with a stand from Amazon because of the quantity I knew I'd need for the students. Freezer paper can be used for many things, but it is great for printing on fabric!

The process is to draw or generate a design, trace the design (with a light table) onto the freezer paper, and cut it out with an exacto knife. In the interest of safety, I purchased some excellent, safe, ceramic cutters for my classroom.
These cutters can cut only through one piece of paper at a time with a tiny ceramic blade. They cannot cut skin. Because the blade is so small, it takes a bit of practice to get the angle just right to make a nice, clean cut. I was impressed with the maturity of which the students handled the cutters. Although a challenge to learn, most students became quite capable of making precise cuts with the Slice cutters.

Once the students had cut out their designs, I used an iron to iron them onto the fabric. The plastic backing on the freezer paper is the real trick to this step. The plastic melts slightly under the heat of the iron and adheres to the fabric. The students could then use a sponge to apply acrylic paint over the design without having to hold anything in place or worry about the paint bleeding through. Once the paper is peeled off, the crisp, stenciled design is left behind.

I was able to take a few photos of designs that students printed onto their items. All of the visitors to our classroom over the last couple weeks have raved over the craftsmanship of the items. I have loved the chance to end the year with these artists personalizing items that I know they will have for years to come!

This printing method works well on all colors of fabric (as seen on our cardboard models!) Excuse the haphazard layout of some of these photos as we had to use every available inch of our room to dry them!

Pop Art!

Over the last few weeks we have continued to work with Pain.net creating our own versions of Pop Art. We specifically looked at the artwork of Andy Warhol:

We talked about the various parody's and imitations of his work and set out to create our own! I passed out the various digital cameras I have been collecting over the years (old, used digital camera donations are always welcome!) and the students took photos of eachother to use. Some students preferred not to use their own faces, and instead found their own pictures of characters, animals, objects, and celebrities. 

It takes a lot of steps to edit the photos, change the colors, and layer them onto a single canvas. The students have been extremely successful in learning the complex editing tools, making and resizing digital canvases, and working with layers. 

Here are some early samples of their work! (More to come!)