West Street Update

We have been busy, busy, busy in the art room. We have just finished up Square 1 Art, which is a fundraiser where you can purchase different items with your child's artwork on them. All proceeds go to the school to help with supplies, field trips, etc. Below are some photos (actually a lot) of different projects the grades at West Street School have been working on.

Kindergarten created color monsters after reading Monsters Love Color by Mike Austin. I put the primary color paints in their hands and they squished their hands together to make the secondary colors. It was a fun,messy way to learn about the primary and secondary colors.

The first graders created color critters after reading Mouse Paint by Ellen Stoll Walsh. They traced three big circles which would be painted with the primary colors and then traced three small circles. The small circles were painted with the secondary colors that the students mixed themselves. Lastly, they added details to turn their circles into critters.

The second graders created assemblages based on the work of Louise Nevelson. She was an American sculptor known for her huge, monochromatic wooden pieces. A lot of the wood in her pieces was found/reclaimed. The students built assemblages out of craft sticks, small wooden pieces, paper craft straws, buttons, corks, and whatever other small objects they found. They were painted all black or all white like Louis Nevelson's sculptures.

 

The third graders learned about the Ndbele people of Southern Africa and how the women create these beautiful geometric designs all over the outside walls of their homes. The students created their own Ndbele inspired paintings using only the traditional colors.

Fall Projects (a lot of pictures)

In Kindergarten, we looked at Indian Corn and did our best to draw it from observation using black pastel and adding color with color sticks.

 

The first graders made soft sculpture pumpkins. They cut and painted two pumpkin sides, learned how to sew the two sides together, and then stuff the pumpkins with newspaper so they were three-dimensional.

 Second graders learned about artist Joan Miro. We discussed how he started his paintings with doodles or scribbles and would then go from there. First students scribbled on their paper with pencil and then painted with watercolors what they saw in their scribbles.

 

Third graders looked at the painting, "House by the Railrod" by Edward Hopper. They had small group discussions about the mood of the painting. Students also looked at and discussed Victorian Architecture. They painted backgrounds in cool colors and then drew houses with characteristics of Victorian Architecture using white pastel on black paper. 

 

Fourth graders learned about color theory. They learned how to mix secondary and tertiary colors from primary colors. They picked a symbol to represent themselves and then divided it into 12 sections, one section for each color on the color wheel. Then they painted their symbol with the 12 colors using only the primary colors to get all 12 colors.

 

Fifth graders learned about Aboriginal Art and how the artwork would tell a dream or act as a way to communicate with the "dreamtime." Students picked a memory to tell using only symbols. If they could, they used Aborigianls symbols and then created their own symbols. Students filled their artwork using dots and patterns like traditional Aboriginal Art.

Sixth graders learned about shades, tints, monochromatic, and value. For their Night Silhouettes, they created value scales for the background, going from white to black using only one color. Their value scales were made to look like the moon shining at night. Once the background was painted, they added a silhouette.