Matisse Interiors

Here are a few of our finished Matisse Interior with Window pieces of art.  Students used oil pastel to emulate the bright colors that Henri Matisse used in his paintings.   Each window scene shows something special!

Our last class in this session will be Tuesday, Nov. 27th.   Nov. 27th is also our school's big Grand Opening Ceremony.   I would love to display your student's artwork in our art room for this special event.   I can pass out your child's artwork the next day at school.

On Tuesday, Dec. 4th, Mrs. Fornia and I will be leading the Smart with Art Holiday Workshop.  Students can create decorated glass candy glasses and a Nutcracker frame.  The workshop will be from 3:40-5:40 in the art room.

I would be thrilled to have your children in our next session.....
Reduce, Reuse, Re-­‐Art!
Have you ever looked at your trash and seen items ready to be transformed into pieces of art? NO? Well this session will change that!
Students will focus on creating works of art using recycled materials in purposeful way.
Experiment with the art of stained glass by creating a mobile with recycled CDs.
Explore circus-­‐themed sculpture utilizing repurposed cork and wire.
We will use buttons, magazines, coffee cups, newspaper and other items that will now be reused by artists for their one-­‐of-­‐a-­‐kind masterpieces!
This exciting session incorporates design concepts, historical art content, and our “green” theme.
Students are welcome to participate in collecting materials if they desire; a list will be provided upon
registration. You can register through the Sandburg Enrichment Programs.
Join us on this artful, earth friendly venture!

Matisse Windows

Today we spent some time looking over our Cezanne still life pieces and adding some finishing touches.

We then started our next project...
Henri Matisse: Room with a View We learned about the wonderful use

of color and detail Matisse uses in his paintings.



We discovered that he set up his room to create a beautiful work of art, and many of these works of art included views of windows.

We started by creating a watercolor painting of a view out our window.
Next week, we will be inspired by Matisse to create: depth, line design, pattern and color in the room.

watercolor windows in progress

We had fun learning about Matisse through this interactive website that you might enjoy at home:
http://www.artbma.org/flash/f_conekids.swf

Cezanne Still Life

Today we learned about the Post-Impressionist artist,

Paul Cezanne.
Cezanne was a French Artist. He worked on many still life paintings and used shape to create his forms. We used construction paper and drew shapes to also create forms in order to design our still life collage.
We built our fruit from basic shapes; we then learned how to create shading on each piece of fruit using a blending technique with chalk pastels.
Here are pictures of our pieces in progress.  Students will be adding the finishing touches next week.

Mondrian Boxes

Today we learned about the Dutch artist, Piet Mondrian.

Mondrian loved color and was inspired by the Impressionist painters.
He created bold paintings that incorporated the primary colors, as well as, horizontal and vertical lines.

We learned how to create an asymmetrical design that incorporates the principle of balance.
His work was often an inspiration to product design.
We created boxes (a useable work of art) in the style of Mondrian.

One Point Perspective

I had a fabulous time with your students!  What an amazing group of artists.  I am so sad that this Smart with Art session is over and I look forward to working with them again next year.

We ended our Back to the Drawing Board session with a lesson on one point perspective.

 Our work appears to be 3D.

Students learned about horizon lines and vanishing points to make a piece of art that look realistic.

If your student was absent today (or forgot their artwork), I gave all their artwork to their classroom teachers.

David Hockney Inspired Swimmers

3rd Graders learned about the artist, David Hockney, and his pool paintings.

Students then created their own underwater self-portrait in his style.

Charcoal

 The Friday Smart With Art Class led by Linda Romero-Kirschner learned about drawing with charcoal.

  Charcoal drawings remain an essential skill for budding artists.

Working with charcoal serves the dual purpose of building artistic creation skills and
developing art appreciation skills.

We worked with vine charcoal and used gum erasers and blending stumps to
create a still life.

 We learned the properties of charcoal and how to work with this material.

We discovered that erasing charcoal creates light areas; smudging charcoal
creates value; and drawing lightly with charcoal creates contour lines.

  We also discussed overlapping shapes, and where it exists in a still life set up.
 Students practiced on newsprint and then did a final still life on white charcoal paper.