Art Show Time

Here in my county, we call it the Fine Arts Festival. Every Art teacher from every school comes to a central high school at 3:00 on a Friday afternoon and displays all their students hard work! There are countless hours that go into choosing, organizing, mounting, labeling and then hanging the 100+ pieces of artwork that I bring each year- but I LOVE to showcase my students amazing talents!


Things I've learned along the way:
1. Magnetic Bulldog Clips... In my exhibition space, there is a long row of metal lockers... these things save me an infinite amount of time hanging things. 
2. Roll Paper... I mount almost everything on black roll paper from our school library. I glue each piece down and label it with a students name. I lay all of my pieces of roll paper on top of one another and literally roll it into a big log. It makes for the easiest carry-in ever! When I bring it all back to my school all I have to do is cut each piece of art off and it leaves a nice black mount around the edge :)
3. Bring extra... I bring extra tape, extra scissors, extra labels, extra art if I have some. I never know just how much of whatever I am going to need, so I always over compensate. 
4. Relax.. I am the only one who is going to know that something is a little too far to the left, or that something was mounted a little crooked. People who come to see the art are going to do just that, they are not going to criticize or even notice if something is slightly skewed. 
5. Take pictures... That is the best way to remember how you did things from year to year.

I hope you enjoy "visiting" my space at the art show :)

Murals- Beautifying the School

At my school we have a period called I and E (Intervention and Enrichment) It is only held Tuesday-Friday and is a 30 minute class. We hold ours at the beginning of the day right after first core, which I think is the perfect time of day. 

Teachers can teach whatever kind of class they want. An English teacher can teach crochet, the Band teacher teaches floor hockey, the 6th grade Science teacher teaches jump rope. Its a really open ended project for teachers which is great for the students and teachers alike. 

I have done many different things from altered books to independent art studies to my latest: Magnificent Murals. 

I had 16 students who I hand picked (based off of the students who signed up for the class) and I had them organize themselves into 4 groups: Band room door, Gym mural, Art room, and independent studies. Each group designed and submitted ideas based off of their own creativity and images they found online. **The murals are still a work in progress and I will update the pictures as they get completed. **

The band room door group began by using pencil and then silver sharpies to draw their design on the doors (they were black to start so we used white paint to complete the design) This mural was entirely student designed and executed. It is not finished yet, but I will update with new pics soon!

The Gym mural group was a bit more involved. I did a lot of the prep work. I designed it with student input. I found silhouettes, projected them in my room and traced each on to black paper. I taped them to the wall and students traced around them. I drew the splatters and students did all of the painting. I did a similar process for the lettering. The Ram heads are my original design, that I also projected and traced. They worked really hard and it looks AWESOME!!! 

The art room mural consists of the elements of art: It is the slowest in progress, but that is only because the group of girls working on it are silly and goof off a lot. I will update the pics as it comes along.

Lastly I had some students who chose to do some individual murals. I was blessed with a principal who lets our creativity flow, and is open to allowing us to do amazing things! 

The first wall began as just "Drew Rams" but has since been transformed into a "Wall of Honor" so that we can recognize the Teacher of the Year, Service Employee of the Year and New Teacher of the Year. I again will post updated pics when all is said and done. 

This one is a positive message for all students to see:

This has been a huge undertaking but my independent art students never cease to impress me! 

We used regular acrylic paint to complete these murals.

7th Grade OP Art Painting

Painting skills are something that I find most middle schoolers lack... From not knowing how much paint to put in the palette, to how to hold a paint brush.. their skill set is atrocious. 

I saw a version of this project on Pinterest and decided to give it a try with my 7th graders.

This project (just like all projects) begain with a prezi. Students are required to write down notes (the words which are red) as we go through the presentation. 

http://prezi.com/vhyjfithtlkv/?utm_campaign=share&utm_medium=copy

Next came some practice with Tints and Shades. 

• Students were given white, black and one color of paint. 
• They drew a rectangle in their notebook and divided it into thirds. 
• They had to label the middle one with M, the left with L and the right with D (light, medium and dark)
•  They started with their regular color and painted it in the medium. 
• Next they mixed white with their medium color to create a tint (which required a demonstration as many students tried to mix it on the paper *lacking paint skills*) 
• Lastly, they cleaned their brush (to avoid producing a tone) and mixed black and their medium color to create a shade. 
• I had them do this with all of the 6 colors I offered so they could see which one they liked best. 

Day two we began with a video demonstration :

This is the template I created:

After allowing them to complete that portion, we watched my next demo video:

Lastly before painting, I gave them this handout to help them to understand how to label their painting. 

After reminding them time and time again to paint sloooooowly and carefully.. they were off! A few days later, I have some wonderful paintings for the art show next weekend!