Grade 8 - Mardi Gras

For Arts & Culture this term, the theme for the Grade 8s was "Brazil". Part of their assignment was to make an individual mask, and then in groups come up with a dance inspired by Rio de Janeiro 's Mardi Gras. It was such a fun project, and I will definitely do it again with future grade 8 classes. Here are some pictures of the girls with their masks.

Learner Artwork Reproductions

Earlier this year I proposed to the Art school where I work that we design cards, postcards, magnets and gift tags by reproducing learners artwork in an effort to get our name out into the community more, and to fundraise. The idea was accepted, and I have kind of run with it. The images below so a little of what I have done. If you are interested in seeing more, please contact the school on 046 6224543 or email me at carinusartschool@gmail.com

Projects for Term 3

What we are doing in Art Class this term.
- the Grade 4s are making collages of animals, that are inspired by Eric Carle (author and illustrator - most famous for "The Very Hungry Caterpillar).

(Images:iheartpicturebooks)

- the Grade 5s are making artworks of a close-up gardens, using bold lines, and pieces of colored tissue paper.

- the Grade 6s are working in groups, and are making a painting inspired by Chuck Close (contemporary artist, 1940 - present).

This image is one that we are using for inspiration.

(image: The Brooklyn Rail)

Self-portrait of Chuck Close

(image)

- the Grade 7s are currently creating monochromatic landscape paintings, that give the illusion of depth.

- the Grade 8s are each working on a project that focuses on texture, that consists of 2 drawings and a small sculpture. (In their General Art there theme is Indonesia and they will be making shadow puppets.)

- the Grade 9s theme for the term is Egyptian culture. The term involves many small assignments, including making a poster, and a sarcophagus.

So much for the new year.

The beginning of the new year came and went a long time ago and I am still not even close to being up-to-date with my kids' artworks, and projects. I have however set myself a new goal of trying to get into the habit of  blogging at least once a week. *hold thumbs*

In the last few days I have updated a few projects from last year that you can see in the Galleries. Enjoy!

New Year!

huh!!... so much for me using those last few weeks of term to put up photos on the blog. Didn't even manage to do one. BUT it is a new year; full of adventure and possibilities - its a blank page!!!  Keep checking in at the galleries. I will post some old and new photos, and projects soon. I hope that you have a wonderful year.

End of year.

The school year ends it about 3 weeks time, and I will hopefully get all the rest of my photos of this years work up before then. Its a crazy time at the moment with marking and reports, and the rest of the end of year admin, but should have time in about 10 days to do lots of posting. :)

Grade 5 - Term 2 Sculptures

In an earlier post I showed pictures of this project in process, and explained how they went about making their endangered South African animals.
(Click here to see the older post.)


Here are some examples of the finished products.

Grade 7 - Term 4

This term the Grade 7's made clay objects. The project was designed to teach them about impressing different everyday objects into the clay to create a design. The first part of the project was to create a simple, flat clay tile with any theme to practice the technique. (This is what you can see in the photo.) The next part was to create a Christmas decoration (3d or 2d) but also using the same impressing technique.



If you would like to see more examples please click on the "Gallery: Grade 4 to 7" page.

Art Club Fourth Term - Christmas Trees

For the last term of the year I have had Grades 1-5 for Art Club and decided to do something with a Christmas theme. So together we made Christmas trees. The children splashed, splattered, stamped and blow paint (this is the best part. The kids LOVE it) onto different coloured sheets of card. Once the paint was dry, the children drew their Christmas tree shape on the back, as well as shapes for tree decorations, and then cut it all out and stuck it on black card. To add background they used oil pastels. Great fun :)

To see more examples please click on the Art Club Gallery.

VP School Magazine

As I mentioned earlier in the year, I was asked to work on the art pages for the school magazine. Here they are for 2011.

Exhibition 2011 - Setting up

Here are some photos of the exhibition while it was still being set up.

If you want to see more of the exhibition please log onto Carinus' blog - www.carinusartschool.blogspot.com

Well, its third term and that means that the school's annual art exhibition is coming up soon.

Every year the teachers of both the junior learners (Grade 4 - 9) and the senior learners (Grade 10 -12) choose the best artwork to be displayed in a week long exhibition that is open to the public.

This year the opening night, which by invitation only, is on 21 September and the exhibition is being opened by Mr Keith van Winkel, who is the Director of the Arthur Cotton Center for Design and Technology at St Andrew's College.This year we are also doing something a little different. All the second project throughout the grades were centered around our environment and as artists and designers it is important to be aware of the effect that we have. Therefore this year one of the rooms of the exhibition is going to solely dedicated to environmental awareness - "The Green Room".

Please come and support the school, and all the wonderful work that the learners do.

Grade 6 - Term 2

In Term 2 the Grade 6s made collages using recyclable materials such as plastic, paper, material, wool, cardboard. Some of Henri Matisse's artwork was used as inspiration such as "Blue Nude 2", "Icarus" and " Two Dancers".

Here are some examples of some of the work produced. Look in the gallery for more work.

Grade 5 - Term 2 and 3

The work that the Grade 5's are working on at present is a project that they started last term and are continuing with this term. They had to construct an animal out of recycled materials such as plastic bottles, newspaper, boxes, old pens...basically anything that they could find. When that was done, they then started to Papier Mache over their constructions to give their animals 'skin'. White paint is then painted over that, when it is dry, and then decoration can be added. The children are encouraged to be as imaginative as possible, as long as it is a well thought-out process.

Here are a few pics to show same of the work at the various stages...but, alas, we have not quite reached the decorating stage - that is still to come :)

Grade 6 - Term 1

In the first term of this year the Grade 6 classes learnt about some of the "Elements of Art", including colour, tone, line and space. Some of the loveliest example came out of the learners use of negative space. The names (the positive space) was left white, and they had to fill the background (the negative space) with any kind of design and pictures that they wanted. The whole artwork was done in pencil, and coloured pencil crayons.

School Magazine

With the kind of job that I have I do not only teach at one school, but I do spend the majority of my teaching time at an all girls primary school called Victoria Primary. This term is when the school puts together the annual school magazine and they always put in a couple of pages dedicated specifically to the art that the girls have done through out the year, including both the work that is done in class as well as in Art Club. I have not started on the 2011 one yet but I thought that I would let you have a look at a couple of past ones that I have put together.

2009

2010

It has been a little weird trying to start about my kids art in the middle of the school year. Hopefully (and very soon) I will start to get it all up and running.

Start of a new term.

Well, school started again yesterday. I hope that everyone is ready for a great term. We have some really cool stuff on the calender this term, including the annual Carinus Student Art Exhibition. It is always a highlight of my 3rd term and I hope that you are all looking forward to it. More on that at a later stage.

Welcome!

Hello students and parents. I decided to create this blog as just another way for me to communicate with the learners that I teach and to make sure that they are always up-to-date with information and assignments. Please check regularly for new updates on reminders about homework and other relevant information.