ARTsci-mathalicious-englisociosus: high school student art

September 11, 2017

Reduction Junction What's Your Function?

Examples of student's completed prints.

Exemplary example of student research and sketches prior to creating relief print. I required that students chart their short-term and long-term goals, next create thumbnail sketches, then to increase their skill with reading and measuring with a ruler each created a 1:1 drawing of their composition which would then be transferred onto their substrate.

A developing example of student concept development work.

Typically a relief print is created with wood or linoleum, or that rubbery stuff they sell art teachers for students. In this project each student received a foam sheet, on which they traced their composition. Once that step was completed, they pasted the foam with rubber cement onto cut mat board squares. Then they would cut the recessed areas that would not print on the first pass.
I honestly would not ever suggest this. It sucked up SO MUCH material: foam, rubber cement and mat board. Ridiculous!

Here a student pulls his first prints with the rubbery linoleum substrate (because I ran out of the other supplies). I had approximately 260 Intro students working on this project.

More student prints.

December 16, 2016

Let's Get it Poppin'!

Roy Lichtenstein, Claes Oldenburg, James Rosenquist, and Andy Warhol these are the artists most known for the Pop Art Movement. Emerging in America and in Britain in the late 50s, this art style was impacted by the burgeoning mass culture of a post-war America. My students researched to understand how the politics, economics, and social issues of the mid-century had an impact on the art of the time.

Today's students face just as many societal issues, some that have always been there and others that are polarized due to the widespread access technology. Social Media, political and racial tension, and poverty are increasing. As has been customary, the music of the youth reflects a great deal of their frustrations and aspirations. I asked students to consider Popular Culture today: If they were Andy, Roy or Claes what or who would they paint, print, or sculpt? Most students used the techniques of Lichtenstein and Warhol to create their compositions: projecting the images and tracing lines and shapes in the images. My everyday students really impressed me with their perserverance. This was an end of semester project, where one could really see their learning and progress over that time. Their composition sizes range from 11 x 14" to 18 x 24" and were painted with acrylic on paper, canvas, wood or fabric.