DIS Mosaic Number 2!!!

I am so excited to announce the Donegal students at the Intermediate school are working on another mosaic with Kevin Lehman. Kevin Lehman is founder and owner of the Lancaster Creative Factory and I highly recommend giving his a visit. With Mr. Lehman the students brainstormed, problem solved, and designed a four seasons mosaic that is due to be finished by the end of April 2016.

Below are some images of our progress so far! As of right now we have the to-scale drawings hanging up where the mosaic will be installed.

Enjoy!!

Drawing wolves for our awesome winter scene! 

Projecting our images to larger paper for the to-scale drawings. 

4th Grade Castles...In Progress!

We have been really busy at DIS! Currently our huge mosaic project is close to being ready to install at the Riverfront Park! The mosaic will be 255 feet long! In between working on cutting tiles, glazing tiles, and firing tiles, 4th graders have been busy learning about form, texture, and shape, as well as how to include these three elements in a castle design drawing challenge. 

4th grade students studied various castles from Germany, Japan, and Spain. Students were then given the design challenge to design their own castle while using Germany, Japan and Spain castles as inspiration. 

Finally before students were able to begin drawing their castles students practiced drawing different individual 3D forms including spheres, triangular prisms, rectangular prisms, cubes, cones, and cylinders. Students were so impressed with themselves when they realized they could successfully creating drawings that appeared to jump off the page-as if they were 3D. ;) 

Below are images of the beginning stages of our castle drawing design challenge. Students will be adding color, as well as creating an atmosphere for their castles using tempera paint. 

3rd Grade Pumpkins

Third grade students have been learning about and reviewing foreground, middle ground, and background. Third grade students also learned how to create two point perspective after studying Gustave Calliebotte's Rainy Day, Paris Street. Students discussed how texture and color changes as objects become further and further away from the foreground and closer to the vanishing points. Finally students reviewed and practiced using chalk pastels along with different blending techniques. 

Enjoy the pictures below! 

6th Grade Charles Demuth Still Life Watercolor

Sixth grade students have been learning about Lancaster native artist, Charles Demuth, and his artwork, specifically Demuth's watercolor still life paintings. Students were required to first complete a blind contour drawing of a section of a large floral still life I set up in the center of the art room. Once students practiced drawing what they saw in front of them, by completing the blind contour drawing, students utilized viewfinders in order to find a composition for their still life painting. 

Students really enjoyed the opportunity to feel like a "real" artist while utilizing the drawing boards to work where they felt best, as well as using the viewfinders and using their pencils to figure out angles throughout the still life. 

Here are some of the beautiful results. Way to go sixth grade! 

5th Grade Radial Symmetry Designs

I wanted to update this post with pictures of some of the finished products/ works in progress! Enjoy the pictures!

Students in fifth grade are beginning to learn about radial symmetry, balance, as well as reviewing our color families, specifically complimentary colors. Students first learned about mandalas. The word mandala originates from the Indian language of Sanskrit. Mandala can can translated to mean circle, which is what mandalas are-circular and beautiful pieces of artwork.

Students learn how to create a a design on one part of the mandala, and then how to transfer the design by "rubbing" the lead from the pencils onto the next part of the mandala. Students watched this video http://wn.com/radial_symmetry before I did a demonstration on folding the mandala paper into even parts, as well as creating a design. I think as much repetition and as much repetition in different forms (video verse live) is great for the students.

Once students have their paper folded and ready to begin creating their radial symmetry mandala designs students can choose what to incorporate into their radial symmetry design. Students may use their names and/or create an abstract design of shapes and lines. Students want to make sure not to create too many small details. Small details do not transfer as well as larger images do.

Below you will find examples of mandalas which I also showed to my students. I will be sure to post pictures of our final mandala results.

Kevin Lehman's First Visit to DIS

Today was a very exciting day in art class for the students at DIS.  Kevin Lehman, our Artist in Residence was with us in school! Kevin Lehman is a very well known local artist who has a lot of knowledge and expertise to share with our students, especially for such a large scale mosaic project.

The students had a lot of questions for Mr. Lehman, but the students were also working hard to take 900+ designs and create one final design to use for the mosaic.

Mr. Lehman first had all of the students' sketches spread out on the tables. Then, Mr. Lehman had the students come up with different categories for the different sketches such as "landscape", "activities", and man-made objects to name a few categories the students were able to come up with.

From the different groups the students came up with even more specific items such as specific trees, specific flowers, and specific animals to include in the final mosaic design. The students will be conducting some research before we move ahead. The students' research will be on finding out about even more specific animals, historic buildings, and plants in order to make sure our mosaic is illustrating our specific area and environment.

Enjoy the pictures below from today's events!

The students really enjoyed working with Mr. Lehman!!

Brainstorming with Mr. Lehman-more specific objects to be put in our mosaic 

Some of the student sketches before they were organized into categories 

More Mosaic Sketches...Enjoy!

Students have been doing a great job illustrating Riverfront Park and their town of Marietta. Enjoy the pictures of student sketches below!