4th Grade Ceramic magic!

Opening up the kiln after a glaze firing in one of those magical moments that never gets old, even after 27 years of teaching art!  4th graders did a wonderful job of constructing their pots with inventive use of coils.  They were REALLY excited when they saw the transformation from chalky looking glaze to fired glaze!

Collage with a Kick!

  

 This 4th grade collage project is based on an owl drawing with human eyes, created by the one and only Pablo Picasso.  Students had a great time dreaming up an object to draw, and giving it human features with magazine pictures they cut and glued on.  The moral of the story: artwork can be funny!

Going for the Gold with Gustav Klimt

 These Klimt inspired trees always turn out beautifully - my 2nd graders are amazing!   After some drawing practice, they created their trees with silver crayon, and had fun using hole punchers to create the gold leaves.  Students also learned about symmetry by printing the background with real leaves and printing ink. Bedazzling the trunks with sequins added that perfect finishing touch!

Fall Color - with salt!

 3rd graders have discovered the wonders of creating texture with watercolors and salt! Warm and cool color schemes were important in making the leaves stand out against the background.  Everyone was excited to see the texture magically appear as the paint/ salt mixture began to dry.  This is one of my all time favorite projects!

Berkshire Museum Visit

Saturday I went to Pittsfield with some art colleagues to see the PaperWorks exhibit at the Berkshire Museum.  It was a fantastic show! It would be appropriate for 3rd, 4th, and 5th graders; it is a nice day trip, made even more special because of the beautiful fall color.  The show runs through October 27th.

 This sculpture was created from book pages.

 We had to look very closely to determine that this book was folded, not cut, to create the word dream.

 This small butterfly was hand cut from one piece of paper.  Amazing!!

 Ocean creatures in silhouette - also hand cut.  This piece was about 20 feet long!

 This was my favorite piece from the show - an incredible collage that contains very interesting, roughly cut paper pieces.  From a distance it blends into a beautiful portrait, much in the same way an impressionist painting does.  LOVE!!

 Wow!

We were baffled by how the artist created these elegant, beautiful curves without ripping the paper.  Amazing!!