So a week ago the teens were all finishing up different projects and one student, who is taking an advance art class in high school, wanted to create a work she could put into her school sketchbook for marks. So after a bit of discussion, we decided to create a work with a focus on the importance of making sure your work contains at least 4 or 5 different values. The best way to do this is working in black and white and so she chose a cat for subject matter and began to create.
To add a little more interest I introduced a very different surface for her to draw upon, acetate. To make it a bit more interesting, I gave her a water soluble pencil also. This particular student likes to control everything about her drawing and I thought the combination of water and acetate would force her to loosen up and try a new style.
By the end of class, she had created this beautiful cat for her sketchbook.
15 year old
And I had a beautiful project I could not wait to share with a few other classes in the coming week.
Starting with the drawing class on Friday! Since Valentine's Day was Sunday, I thought it would be fun for the students to create a drawing they could adhere to cards to give to their parents on the holiday.
7 year old
9 year old
10 year old
Pretty amazing, don't you think? I would be thrilled as a parent to receive these cards. We talked about puns to add with the pictures, "You're so tweet, be my Valentine" or "It'd be a hoot if you'd be my Valentine".
Yea.
They weren't sold on that idea either.
In the end I think each child just signed with a simple, "Happy Valentine's Day"
A couple of the girls finished a bit early and so with pen and ink did simple line drawings of a bird.
7 year old
10 year old
Well I was so pleased with the card drawings created in the hour class, I decided to do the project one more time with the Monday elementary class on a larger scale. And yet again, the work took my breath away.
9 year old
7 year old (close up of coiled snake)
So how is this done? They do an initial drawing with the water soluble pencil and then with a small paint brush dipped in water go over the lines. This will give them a light grey value. Then they just begin to do the drawing over and over again, each time focusing in more and more on the dark. Because the work is on acetate, in the end they can take a semi-dry brush and pull out the white.
If at anytime they want to start over and try again, add water and wipe with a paper towel. You are back to a clean piece of acetate!
9 year old
9 year old
8 year old
By the time they are pulling out the white, most of the water has dried on the acetate. For those kids who put a lot of water on the acetate, I will quickly use the blow dryer on the picture. Then I spray a clear varnish over each picture that dries very quickly and spray mount them onto a heavy stock paper. That's it.
A couple of students again finished a bit early and so this time I asked them to recreate their artworks in scratch art. Same concept, but doing the opposite.
I'm so impressed with how easily they were able to apply what they had learned and create these works in a 20 minute period of time. I love them as much as I do the original project.
8 year old
I am beyond thrilled that this project was challenging and enjoyable to such a wide age group. Each student was so proud at the end of what they had created. Can you blame them? I know each child walked away with an understanding of the importance of light and dark in their works too. It will be easy to now suggest adding more dark or light to future pieces they create without much more explanation needed from me.
Will I present the project again? You bet! I can hardly wait.
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