Artists are Self Directed: Art Two

Above: jewelry making

In the traditional art class, the teacher picks the project idea, find and demos any tutorials, and decides on the medium the students will use. That might sound like the role of the teacher... but, it's not. That's the role of an artist.


for this first unit, Artists are Self Directed, I wanted the students (AKA, the artists) to decide what inspires them, to seek out 'how to' information when they weren't sure how to complete something, and to pick the media. After all,  I'm not the artist. They are the artists! Here's a look at what the Art Two artists came up with...

Pastel on wood

Acrylic on canvas

Candle making

Abstract designs drawn with fire and smoke

Mixed media

Mixed media (in progress)

Spray paint

Spray paint

Acrylic on canvas

Artists are Self Directed: in Progress

The first day of the new semester I handed my students paper and colored pencil and said, "We're going to do this tutorial... and we did. When we were done we talked about what my role in the project was. Here were the findings:

I picked the project idea
I found the tutorial
I decided on the medium

That might sound like the role of the teacher. Well, it's not. That's the role of an artist. Artists decide what inspires them, artists seek out 'how to' information when they aren't sure, and the artist always picks the media. So why was I doing it?? I'm not the artist. They are the artists!

First issue was knowing what materials were available. stealing an idea from Jean Barnette, our students went on a material scavenger hunt. They had a list of items to find out about including different papers and different types of paint, they even had to find stuff that they didn't know what it was.

Next, they had to find their own techniques. I encourage them to find a tutorial that they either didn't know how to do or one that improved on a skill they already knew. Then I asked them to do that tutorial.

Finally, we talked a bit about inspiration. What are you concerned about? What are you interested in? What are your passions?

Once they went through all three steps, I asked them to design their first project for my class. They had to decide what to make, they had to learn a new technique or improve on an older skill to make it, and they had to decide what medium to use to best bring their idea to fruition.

The one thing I can say is, I have no idea what's going on! Students are hard at work on something.

They are trying new techniques, new media...

We got everything going on from 3D printing...

To candle making...

To traditional materials like pastels..

To ceramics..

To drawing with fire....

Wait hold up.. drawing with fire! I got go!!!


.

Answering Essential Questions: part 2

Our latest unit, Artists Answer Essential Questions asked our students to first consider a word and then ask questions about the word. Once students developed their questions, they were tasked with responding to their own question by creating a work of art. Media determined by the artists. You can view a other responses to essential questions here.

-------

Above: Banana Corn

"The word i chose was societal standards. Everyone is different, however society likes to put everyone into boxes and label us. We have to know every detail about ourselves, and if they don't fit into the nicely labeled boxes then we have to conceal them in order to fit in. It's like trying to fit a triangle in a square hole. It doesn't work. This poses the question, "How do societal standards effect individuals?" I tried to represent this question by taking multiple of one object and throwing in an object that is clearly different but trying to appear the same as the others." ~ Sarah

 a Target brand crayon box to look like it was Crayola

This image never existed.

The word I chose for this project was temporary, and my question is "Can art truly be temporary if it is captured by photos?" The purpose for the artwork to only last for a short while or only be seen by few people is completely destroyed if that artist keeps a picture of the piece. The medium I used for this piece is a product called Buddha Board which is a surface that turns black when painted on with water. As the water evaporates from the canvas, the image slowly fades- lasting only temporarily. I wanted the concept of ephemerality to reappear in the subject of the piece also, so I drew the life cycle of a monarch butterfly. I grided my drawing of the life cycle and painted each square on the Buddha Board one at a time and then took a photo. Then, I put all the photos together to recreate the original drawing as a collage." ~ Tess

They will never be that exact age ever again...

"For my essential question I came up with, "How is youth captured in photography?". I used water color and pen ink to make the Polaroid camera words and photos. Then I mounted them on a piece on illustration board painted black. I used the baby pictures of multiple people to show how their youth is captured in photographs. And they will never be that exact age ever again except in that photograph." ~Brooke

Change

"The question I chose to use was "What evokes change?". One answer to what evokes change is wanting to fit in and be accepted. To show this, I decided to to use a caterpillar hanging off a branch getting ready to make a chrysalis. This shows the caterpillar getting ready to change. I also chose to put butterflies around the caterpillar to show what influences the caterpillar to change.  Someone said this idea reminded them of the ugly duckling which I agree with." ~ Maddy

No response

"The past couple of months I've been a ball of anxiety and espresso. between school, work, college plans, and planning now two foreign mission trips my to do list has been thoroughly packed and some things just haven't made the cut. one of  those things being art, i didn't put time, energy or the mental capacity aside for doing any art. so when this project was introduced it was another thing i had to do and i disregarded it and put it in the back of the line. 

No i did not have a question to inspire this piece, and i love that. my life and everything i have going on requires questions and/or answers and quite frankly i don't have all of the answers and that stresses me. the reason for this project was to avoid questions, have it clean, simple and organized so the viewer may take it as they perceive it." ~ Rachel

How has beauty evolved?

"For my project, I chose the word "beauty". At first, I wanted to do a portrait of a young, beautiful woman but eventually changed my idea to do something completely different. My question changed to "How has beauty evolved?"; so I decided to do an evolution of makeup from the 1920s to the present day, 2015.

I wanted to do this project because a lot of people underestimate makeup, or cosmetics, to be a kind of art. Many techniques we learn in class can also be applied to the human face; like contouring, shading, value, lines, color, etc. By researching about the different styles of makeup, I applied certain eyeshadow colors, foundation colors, and variations of lines on her face." ~ Poorna

Purpose

"What makes us useless? Are people born useless? Are there objects in life that are useless? The more I thought about it, the more I realized that everything is useless until given a purpose. I thought of different examples like how a seed turns into a flower or how a caterpillar turns into a butterfly and how they were once nothing special, but now something beautiful and purposeful. My favorite idea was how an ugly, fat pig turns into delicious, beautiful bacon." ~ Girl 2

Answering Essential Questions

"And Then What?"

Our latest unit, Artists Answer Essential Questions asked our students to first consider a word and then ask questions about the word. For example, the word "Cute". What are the characteristics that make something cute? When is something not cute? Can something be cute and creepy ant the same time?

Once students developed their questions, they were tasked with responding to their own question by creating a work of art. Media determined by the artists. Here are a few works, some still in progress...

Why Are You Fake?

What Seems so Big Seems so Small?

How it Would Look to Live Meraki?

Can You Hear Me Now?

Can I Face My Fears?

Can Light Create Darkness?

Emphasizing the Elements Part 2

Here are some examples from our first project, Emphasize the Element. Since this was a first piece, we decided to keep it simple. The only requirement was to pick an element to emphasize. Beyond that, the subject and media was open. We did suggest the artists select a media that they were familiar with. 

Emphasis on value, Audry Hepburn in charcoal pencil

Emphasis on color and movement using dance. 

The dancers dipped their hands and feet in paint as they danced

watch the video below

Video projected on the sheet that the dancers created

Color and shape. Cut paint color samples.

Shape with particular interest how spontaneous shapes can resemble representational one.

Line and value using chalk pastels on wood

Color and shape using watercolor

Color and text to emphasize meaning

Originally line but later evolved into using color. Pastel on wood.

Line. Watercolor and pen and ink.

NCMA Teens Inspired

Teens Inspired is an annual contest sponsored by the NC Museum of Art. The contest asks students to explore the museum's permanent exhibit and find a work of art that inspires them. Using this piece, students create their own work that is inspired by, but not necessarily a direct copy of... Theses entries are from our Art One and Art Two students.

----------

"I was inspired by Picasso's painting of the flowers because when I looked at it the theme that popped out to me was sharing v. fighting. We don't know whether Picasso was trying to depict in this painting if somebody was sharing their flowers with someone else, or if that other person was taking the flowers from someone else. In my piece of artwork a girl with no face which is of no real identification is being pulled two different ways by two different significant others. In my mind I think of a child whose parents are going through a divorce and fighting over this girl. In the background her thoughts and feelings are being put out with highlights in different regions of the artwork" ~Riley
 

  ----------

"its not really finished finished but that ok. This is inspired by Judith and Holofernes by Kehinde Wiley. ~Emma

----------

 "I am inspired by this piece Rabble  from the Museum's collection because of its distinct large structure and the medium that is used which is paper origami butterflies. Instead of paper origami butterflies I wanted to make a commemoration to the 9/11 memorial by building two wooden towers like the World Trade Center Twin Towers in New York City.  I then decided to go along with the design of the Rabble by making paper origami airplanes like the two planes that crashed into the Twin Towers as a massive form of terrorism. #NeverForget" ~Andrew

----------

"The piece from the North Carolina Museum of Art that really inspired me was Peruzzi Altarpiece. I saw the Peruzzi Altarpiece on the website and realized that I could replace the religious icons with rap icons. From left to right the rappers that were put into the places were Ghostface Killah, Dr. Dre, 2pac, Snoop Dogg, and The Notorious B.I.G. Once I completed the Photoshop process I decided to mount the finished product on a tri tiered layer of poster board and finally on a piece of wood." ~Zane

----------

"I was inspired by the piece called Beaded Crown from the NCMA's permanent collection. I really liked the texture of the piece and the way the lines were woven together to create texture that was visually pleasing. The woven quality of this piece reminded me of friendship bracelets that I used to make when I was younger, so I decided that I would start making bracelets and create a project out of that. I chose to display the bracelets with a shadow box effect, by ripping off a canvas, and using the wooden frame to display the bracelets. " ~Sadie

----------

"For my piece, I chose a Monet. It is a beautiful painting of his back yard, in these entrancing darks and lights. The main color he used for his piece is blue and I just fell in love with the piece when I saw it. I picked it because it reminded me of calming relaxing days at home. With finals so near and the stress of finals I thought it would be an appropriate twist." ~Abi