Fine Arts Fair Prep

I have been neglecting my blog this past month because I am getting ready for our Fine Arts Fair in a couple of weeks, as I am sure you are too!  Although, I hope you are less stressed about it than I am.  For some reason, I have this innate desire to out-do myself every year.  So, this year, I am having my students display one 2-D and one 3-D piece of art for the event.  I also planned each and every class to have a separate 2-D and 3-D work of art so there are no classes with the same project.  That's a grand total of 36 different lessons and 600 pieces of artwork that needs to be finished, presentable, and displayed by May 15th.  Whew!! And of course I have left ALL 300 3-D sculptures for the month of April, that's what I do best...wait until the last minute.  So, here are a sampling of the lessons we have been working on this past month.

4th Grade Origami Flowers

The 4th graders have created glue-line relief flower paintings in the style of Georgia O'Keefe, so I thought some flower sculptures would compliment the paintings nicely.  I walked them through the step-by-step process of folding each flower petal and I hot-glued the petals together when they were complete.  I also added a dowel rod for the stems and a wood block so the flowers could stand tall.  I will also have the students paint the stems & base green and add some leaves next class period.  I used a collection of buttons for the center of the flowers.

2nd Grade Ceramic Cloud Mobiles w/ birds

I want to give credit to the Etsy artist who inspired these cloud mobiles.  You can find her work here: almapottery, http://www.etsy.com/listing/49331222/sale-price-adjusted-rain-cloud.

We started out with a slab of clay and I had my students roll the slab until they had even consistency.  Next, they cut out the cloud shape and saved their scraps of clay to make the birds.  They poked three holes in the bottom of the clay and one at the top for the strings.  The next class period (after the clay has been fired), I helped them hot glue the beads along their strings and they painted the clouds and the birds.  I had to spend a lot of my free-time attaching the birds to the strings and attaching a wire at the top of the clouds so they can hang.  But, I think they turned out pretty well!

3rd Grade Stamped Ceramic Pendent Necklaces

This was a really fun project to do with 3rd graders!  I showed them how to pinch off a small piece of clay, flatten it out into a round disk, and stamp the bottom of their shoe on the clay to get the texture.  This was neat because everyone's shoes had different patterns on the bottom.  Some even had the name brand stamped on like the one above.  After they were fired, I had the students paint them using acrylics and I helped them hot glue the string to the pendent and attach the beads. 

2nd Grade Q-Tip Colorful Dandelions

I was inspired by an Anthropologie photo that I saw on Pinterest using q-tips to make dandelions.  Of course, I couldn't leave the q-tips white!  All you need are enough styrofoam balls for each person and q-tips cut in half.  I thought 1,000 q-tip halves would be enough for one class, but I definitely could have used more!  Again, I used dowel rods and wood blocks.  Maybe we'll make some leaves for these, too?

Ceramic Leaves

These beautiful ceramic leaves have been hanging in our foyer for the past several weeks.  I finally decided I should photograph them and share them with you.  First of all, I have done this project for the past several years, but never have they turned out this beautifully...and I have to admit it was by pure accident.  My sixth graders made these leaves one day in art by pressing a real leaf into their clay to create the texture.  They cut out the shape of the leaf while it was pressed into the clay.  After they dried, I bisque-fired them and had them ready for the surface treatment.  In the past, I have used black glaze to fill in the veins and the texture with a colored glaze on top.  But, with budget cuts, I am in short supply of glazes this year.  So, I had the students use black acrylic paint to fill in the veins and wipe off the surface with a damp sponge so the paint only goes into the texture.  Next, I had the students use watercolor paint to add color.  This is where the "happy accident" comes in.  When the watercolor was first applied, it looked nice...a suggestion of color...not too vibrant.  But, when it dried, it looked like mud!  Chalky-mud!  So, I was going to have the students repaint them until I tried putting a gold glaze on top of the watercolors.  And, voila!  It made the color come to life while adding a shimmer of gold.  Perfect!!!