Clay Jack O'Lanterns

Sculpture & Pottery students each made one of these. They turned out great. I let everybody take them home before I realized I hadn't taken any pictures -- except of this one.

Clay Jack O'Lantern
by Mara Tate

Altered Books

I've never made altered books before, but my ninth grade art students and I are learning together. The Waverly Library had several boxes of books that were headed for recycling. We offered to recycle them -- into art! Students have shown a lot of creativity in coming up with their own creative solutions in transforming books into art.

This book is called Doorway to the Galaxy (by Arianna Crawford).
What is an altered book?

An altered book is a form of mixed media artwork that changes a book from its original form into a different form, altering its appearance and/or meaning.

An altered book artist takes a book (old, new, recycled or multiple) and cuts, tears, glues, burns, folds, paints, adds to, collages, rebinds, gold-leafs, creates pop-ups, rubber-stamps, drills, bolts, and/or be-ribbons it. The artist may add pockets and niches to hold tags, rocks, ephemera, or other three-dimensional objects. Some change the shape of the book, or use multiple books in the creation of the finished piece of art.

Altered books may be as simple as adding a drawing or text to a page, or as complex as creating an intricate book sculpture. (Wikipedia, 2010).

Some students are choosing to paint right on the pages, and others are making collages in the book.

If you are interested in seeing a gallery of work by artists who specialize in altared books, visit this website: www.altaredbookartists.com

Balsa Foam Carvings

Our Sculpture & Pottery class created low-relief sculptures from Balsa foam. A relief is a sculptured artwork where a carved or modelled form is raised (or in the case of a sunken relief, lowered) from a plane from which the main elements of the composition project (or sink). Raising or lowering the plane is achieved by removing material not relevant to the image. The objects project from a flat surface, so it is a combination of two-dimensional and three-dimensional art.

Kirsten Colegrove

Brook Larimer

Ashlee Fisher

This one is a close-up of the sculpture below -- "The Temple of Harley".

Harley Cusack

Molly Wolanski

Sarah Slocum

Haley Priester

Mara Tate

Decoupage Boxes

The Sculpture & Pottery class is experimenting with the use of materials to decorate decoupage boxes. This example by Brittany Holmes shows that there are many different materials that can be used to add design to a simple box.

The Principle of Emphasis

The Road

by Basti Sayid

Lightning Strikes

by Sophie Lackner

Art I classes are finishing up colored pencil drawings. Students completed graphic organizers demonstrating their understanding of colored pencil techniques. These exercises are from The Colored Pencil: Key Concepts for Handling the Medium (Borgeson, 1983). We are learning that artists can change three things about a color: hue (a color's name), value (the lightness or darkness of a color) and intensity (purity or brightness of a color).

Wolverine

by Meghan Kelley

For these projects, by the Art I class, we are learning about colored pencil techniques and the Principle of Emphasis. Most works of art have a focal point (a main object or center of interest). We looked at several examples of works of art and how artists can emphasize the main object.

Seven Methods of Leading the Eye to the Center of Interest.

1. Isolation.

One way is to draw attention to the main object is simple: don't draw anything else. This is called Isolation and is the approach used in the portrait of Wolverine above.

Stepping Out
by Danielle Cole

2. Subordination of Accessories. Accessories are what we call the other objects in the composition, other than the main object. We have to depict these in a way that lets the viewer know they are less important. We can do this by making them smaller, or vague, indefinite or sketchy. They should add their contriubtion to the scene but not distract from the main object.

Rainbow Bouquet
by Basti Sayid

3. Organization of Accessories.

4. Arrangement of Line. This is using the prominent lines to lead the eye to the real subject.

5. Adjustment of Values. If the background is dark, the main object may be light in order to emphasize the focal point.

6. Placement. Where we put the main object can make it more noticeable. Often artists place it in the center or slightly off-center.

7. Color Scheme. If the main object is composed of bright warm colors, then the background may be primarily cool colors or neutral colors.

Touchdown

by Teddy Green

Possibilities

by Arianha Crawford

Snacktime

by Samantha Kitchin

For more about the Principle of Emphasis, see Pleasure from Pictures by Henry Turner Bailey (1926).

Creative Color Wheels

Art I students are learning about the color wheel -- a helpful graphic organizer that demonstrates how colors are made and their relationships. For instance, analogous colors (those that are adjacent on the color wheel) create peaceful harmonious color schemes. Complimentary colors (opposite on the color wheel) provide optimal color contrast.

by Meghann Kelley

The assignment was to reinterpret the traditional color wheel using shapes or objects of the students' choosing. They colored them with Prismacolor colored pencils.

by Arianna Crawford

by Sophie Lackner

by Danielle Cole

Mask Project

8th grade art clases made masks out of clay. After we fired them, they had the choice to either paint them or glaze them. After adding color, some added texture and detail by gluing various material to it with a glue gun.

by Ethan Aiosa

by Robyn Calaman

I-pod Face

by Ashley Allington

by Amelia Peterson

by Matthew Bryan

Crazy Cat Comics

Arianna Crawford (9th grade) created this hilarious comic strip.

Anti-Bullying Posters

The masks have been fired. Now they are ready to glaze and paint. As eighth graders have been patiently waiting, they made some great anti-bullying posters to hang in the hallway. Some of these kids really "get it" -- and made some great posters that get the message across, and make us laugh at the same time.