Inspired work by artist

Recently I have been trying to introduce the students to more working artist.  I don't give a lot of art history, but spend time showing them the artwork and letting them create their own inspired creations, discussing the techniques the artist used and having them really delve into things they notice in the works.

This week, I introduced some of the students to a local artist named Dana Irving.  She describes her work as, "Emily Carr meets Dr. Seuss" and I cannot think of a more perfect way to describe her paintings.  I fell in love with her art and knew the students would really enjoy it also.  It was fun letting the kids discover how working artist today can be inspired by some of the same artist we have studied in the past.

For this project, the students used dyes and collage.  Here is Dana Irvings' website if you are interested in seeing some of the work the kids used for inspiration, www.danairving.com.

10 year old, cherry tree

Another local artist and a wonderful friend, Liane Varnam, does wonderful monoprints (among other things) of animals in very unusual environments. I love her work, which is probably why I have so many pieces in my house!  I brought several of them to the studio for the students to look at before creating their own monoprint.

We used the exact same process Liane does for her own works. Here is a 9 year old take on a couple of owls. Check out Liane's website to see her wonderful work at www.lianevarnam.com

9 year old, "girly owl"  love the purse

9 year old, starry owl

Another class looked at the work of Canadian artist, Lawren Harris. We looked at how his work progressed over the years to very abstract landscapes and then the students could choose how they wanted to interpret a landscape work inspired by the artist.

Here is an abstract landscape created by an 8 year old with acrylic and oil pastel.

8 year old, lava and rocks

And finally one student saw a study I was doing on Australian artist, Brett Whiteley, and wanted to do her own "chaos painting"  Using a piece of scrap wood, acrylic paint and charcoal this 12 year old created an amazing work.  I absolutely love the negative words she added to it to show the viewer how negative thoughts can throw our own lives into chaos.

12 year old

Every day the students leave me breathless with how they take what they see and translate it into an original work.  They come up with things I would of never thought of and usually by the end of class, they have inspired me to go away and try new things.  I always wonder who learns more when class ends, them or me.

Either way, it is fun to spend some time exploring the artwork of artist both past and present and see how it changes our perspective and inspires new ways to share personal visions of the world.

I am so impressed with each and every one of my students and I'm sure all these artist would be too.