Contemporary Art Curriculum

Places for an Imaginary Creature: Inventing Colors Project

2012-03-02T21:08:00.000-08:00

Paint mythical creature in landscape where it was born or died

Paint own muse – self as mythical creature (semihuman), express part of self

View self in mirror and imagine muse

Demonstration-Lecture

Write about what inspires – What/who is your muse? What mystical powers? What would your weaknesses be?

Mingle and discuss

Distribute pens, brushes, ink, images of mythical African/Native Am. creatures

Students-at-Work

“Imagine where your creature came from and create a landscape for the creature” (greenhouse, pot, windowsill, crack in sidewalk)

“Create an imaginary landscape that tells a narrative”

“Envision where the light is coming from in the landscape” (day/night, time of day, kind of light, foggy, bright)

“Determine where on the page a new color could be used”

“Envision variations of a color” (you have red, yellow, orange, how many oranges can you get?)

“Think of how to make color translucent and layered”

Mingle and press students to explain

“How would this be you? What part of this character would be you looking in the mirror? How’s it going to be you? Tell me about it… Do you really want to be this character? So this is you plus what? So did you just use a brush? How did you get this detail? Tell me about those ears.”

Reflection

Envision new colors out of primaries

Envision a mythical creature that in some way represents self

Student work is more interesting when they invent

Have students answer their own questions for 10 minutes

“Have students keep journals in which they write about process on a daily basis”

Hetland, L., Winner, E., Veenema S., & Sheridan, K. M. (2007). Studio Thinking: The Real Benefits of Visual Arts Education. New York: Teachers College Press, Columbia University.

Making Connections, Making Art

2012-02-21T20:22:00.000-08:00

Big Idea: Connections

Related Topic: Collaboration

Essential Questions: How can we learn about others and ourselves in creating a collaborative artwork? How can art create connections?

The students came up with a variety of words that described what working in a group might look like in searching for a word that could become the foundation of our collaborative art piece. Even though the pre-kindergartners were more involved the second year, I realize now that this was still not a fully collaborative exercise, as the eighth-graders made most of the decisions.

The eighth-graders came up with the word "helpful" as a symbol of working as a collaborative group. They also decided to paint each letter of the word separately in teams, one pre-kindergarten student and one eighth-grade student. Each pair painted a letter and background on their canvas and then created a colorful design to add to the letters with glitter paint. The eighth-graders also decided to add their chosen asset words in letterpress, through a rubbing technique, to provide an easy medium for the younger students to use.

As the project neared completion, the eighth-grade students decided to create a poem to include with the paintings. Each painting had a letter of the word "HELPFUL" and also included a line of their poem. The poem stated: Honored to share; Eager to help; Loving others; Playful with friends; Fun to be with; Uplifts one another; Loved as yourself. The eighth graders learned to be helpful as they collaborated with the younger students, and the students all learned to brainstorm and make changes to the original plan as they went along.

Lessons 1 and 2: Introduction to Project

Introduce service-learning and personal assets by discussing how students might evaluate the strengths of themselves and their younger partners. Eighth graders choose a word to represent the experience.

Discussion. What are your expectations in working with the pre-kindergarten students? What do you think will be most difficult/enjoyable about this project? What do you think you might learn from this project? Is there anything that you are nervous about in working with the younger students?

Emotion Word Logo. Students design a feeling word based on its meaning and implications.

Lesson 3: Introduction to Service-Learning Partners

Eighth grade students ask their younger partners questions such as:

What do you like to do at home? Did you do anything fun this summer? What is your favorite thing about school?

Painting the Background. Each student pair receives a square canvas, paints the background in a color chosen by the pre-kindergarten students, and paints a letter of the chosen word.

Lesson 4: Personal Asset Inventory (Recognizing personal strengths)

Asset Collage. Without the youth partners, eighth graders look for images and words that describe t he ir strengths in printed materials and create a collage re presenting their positive traits.

Lesson S: Partner's Asset Inventory (Recognizing strengths of others)

Adding Younger Students' Assets. One eighth grader reads aloud City Green by DyAnne DiSalvo-Ryan. The eighth graders work with their younger partners to identify a word to describe the pre-kindergartner. The pairs use rub-off letters to imprint t he identified word onto their canvas and share with the class.

Lesson 6: In-Progress Reflection

Journal Prompts. What was your reaction to your pre-kindergarten student as you started working with them? Choose a word that describes how you felt as you worked with your partner. What was easy/difficult while you worked with your partner?

Lesson 7: Finishing Collaborative Art Piece

The pairs use g litter and other supplies to decorate the canvas. One eighth grader reads aloud Alligator Arrived With Apples: A Potluck Alphabet Feast by Crescent Dragonwagon.

Journal Prompts. What will we do when problems arise? How do we negotiate strategies together?

Lesson 8: Reflection, Make-up Day

Journal Prompts. How was t his past week's interaction different or the same as other interactions you have had with your partner? How did you solve problems that arose? How did you feel when problems occurred? How are you feeling now that the project is almost done?

Lesson 9: Recognition

Students recognized for their work in school-wide assembly. Local newspaper and televised news programs should be invited to participate.

Lesson 10: Final Reflection

Journal Prompts. How d id you feel about working with the pre-kindergarten students? How did you feel when you saw your work being recognized 7 How do you think the pre- kindergarten students felt?

Hutzel, K., Russell, R. & Gross, J. (2010). Eight graders as role models: A service-learning art collaboration for social and emotional learning. Art Education, 63(4), pp. 12-18.

Building Form: Repeating Units project

2012-02-19T20:32:00.000-08:00

Learn to plan in a responsive way
Create unit, then repeat to build larger form
o Demonstration-Lecture

Discuss examples from nature (pine cone, wasp nest) from life (brick wall) and art world (sculpture of bottles)

Today experiment with models of ideas

Think about how units will be joined (piled, stacked, compressed, glued)

“Experiment with a range of different forms”

“Experiment with techniques for making and joining units”

“Think conditionally and experiment with what they can do” – what it?

“Invent some different tools”

“Take advantage of accidents and let things just happen”

“Experiment with different versions”
o Reflection

“The final product will emerge. Thinking about the what the end result was going to be limits her.”

Hetland, L., Winner, E., Veenema S., & Sheridan, K. M. (2007). Studio Thinking: The Real Benefits of Visual Arts Education. New York: Teachers College Press, Columbia University.

Images from: http://www.artatheart.co.uk/artatheart/2010/03/heather-knight-ceramic-sculpture.html

Picturing Peace

2012-02-14T21:10:00.000-08:00

Key Ideas

Peace is a feeling and a value, an individual state, a social concept and a cultural movement.

To feel peaceful is to be quiet, calm and tranquil and free of trouble.

Peace is a state or condition: formerly at war, we are in a state of peace.

As a value, peace implies a positive disposition of being peaceable and avoiding conflict.

As a motive, the concept of peace materializes in the role of the peacemaker, one who helps others reconcile when the peace is breached.

Used as an interjection, “Peace!” with hand raised, means “I come in peace.”

Social dimensions of peace include the solidarity implied by friendship and community and acceptance of diversity.

Peace is often characterized by particular sensory conditions: light, particularly in a spiritual sense implies peace; quiet or silence suggests peaceful conditions and places; and tactual closeness implies peace as togetherness.

As an institutional cultural form peace is manifest through peace protests and movements.

The visual language of marches and protest signs indicates the intentions of peace advocates.

Finally, peace may be represented as a spatial abstraction, such as through the geometric forms of openness, balance and harmony.

Essential Questions

How is peace a feeling?

What leads to peace between people?

Can places be peaceful?

Why should people be peacemakers?

Metaphor

We used three strategies for supporting students' development of metaphors of peace: (1) brainstorming in a “language game”; (2) practice in photographic genres; (3) set up photography to organize dramatic scenes of peace situations.

1. Language Game

Students brainstormed words they associated with peace in whole class discussion. This created multiple verbal metaphors such as: PEACE IS NATURE; PEACE IS SOLITUDE; PEACE IS FRIENDSHIP, etc. The ensemble of verbal metaphors created by students resulted in a set of “family resemblances” of the concept of peace. These verbal metaphors were used, ultimately, as part of the scaffolding for the vehicle to create photographic metaphors, that is, pictures of nature, solitude, friendship, etc.

2. Practice –

Discuss the meaning of three photography genres: Portraits, Landscapes, Abstracts.

Combine the ideas from the language game and the genres.

Student photographers chose to make portraits, for example, of peace concepts like diversity and community; and, they took landscape photographs of concepts like nature and solitude. Abstract photographs were made to communicate sensory and geometric dimensions of peace, such as, light, balance, and openness.

3. Dramatic Scenes –

Students were asked, subsequently, to use staged setup photography to organize dramatic situations in the studio or exterior locations that might communicate peace. In these situations, the photographer (taking turns) assumed a role in which he or she was to direct other students to communicate peaceful feelings, motives and impressions through taking positions, posing, and otherwise acting out scenes signifying peace. The photographers also directed the organization of the various paraphernalia of the scene including costumes, props, backdrops and lighting, to communicate different aspects of peace. Some photographers created abstract assemblages and collages of natural materials such as flowers, stones, and leaves and placed them in landscape settings. By experimentally constructing and photographing dramatic scenes of peace in which different social positions and gestures were organized at both human and miniature scale, students immersed themselves in the creation of multiple meanings of peace.

Beck, R. J. (2009). The Cultivation of Students’ Metaphoric Imagination of Peace in a Creative Photography Program. International Journal of Education & the Arts, 10(18), pp. 1-28.

Invention and Packaging

2012-02-13T19:18:00.000-08:00

The Invention and Packaging Art Project

Phase One: Name

Identifying the problem or the subject of

the art investigation is phase one. In a classroom, this is the assignment-the teacher-directed piece that serves as a launching pad for the more student-directed inquiry that follows. This phase begins the preparation stage of the process. To facilitate this stage, it is critical to make the assignment clear. However, it is also important to give learner-artists freedom within the parameters of the assignment to follow their own ideas or interests creatively.

In this initial phase, we introduced the

central idea behind the project: inventing a tool. We also explained the follow-up activity: constructing a container for that tool and writing instructions for it. To make the project clear, we showed a prototype of an imaginary tool, a remote control that magically produces parking spaces, and discussed how its design is based on real tools.

Phase Two: Distill

Distillation entails focusing in on the problem and grasping the essence of it. The primary mode of thinking and learning in distillation is analysis. Distillation also calls for exploring many facets of the topic to be addressed. To facilitate distillation, it is crucial to ask questions that challenge learner-artists to think deeply about the topic and the assignment.

In our project, this meant brainstorming problems and listing them in categories on the blackboard. Problems suggested by students ranged from social and environmental concerns such as global warming, racism and world hunger, to more personal challenges such as doing homework, improving one's physical appearance or dealing with parents and peers. To probe further, we asked students to think about problems they were addressing and do some research about them. It was at this time that Eric and Sally began listing and thinking about problems to solve. Eric was partiClIlady interested in the challenge of learning under pressure that all high school students face. Sally looked at social issues such as global warming and pollution.

Probing for solutions was the next step in distillation. Here we explored and listed solutions to the problems that had turned up in the brainstorming session. We then introduced the idea of inventing imaginary tools to help us solve those problems. We asked questions such as, "What does it mean to solve a social or personal problem?" "What kind of tools do we need?" At this point, both Sally and Eric began thinking about how their particular problem could be solved. Sally decided that each person needs his/her own personal garbage disposer. Eric figured students need a way to get knowledge in an easy no-hassle way.

Phase Three: Hunt, Gather and Collect

Although every step in a creative art investigation is considered a piece of the inquiry, this stage is the one in which the more conventional notions of research are practiced and highlighted. This stage is where we spread the nets wide; we brainstorm, research on the Web or in books, explore the environment, and/or interview informants. In standard research, this process involves gathering information, facts, and data. In art inquiry, it can also entail collecting imagery to work from and critiquing visual attributes of these images. Personal feelings, memories, thoughts and fantasies are equally legitimate "knowledge" to tap (Cropley, 1992). Thinking

that takes place here is both analytical, in judging what avenue to pursue, and associative, in following the trail of an idea or in branching out to related ideas. Facilitating this stage entails encouraging these research strategies.

Exploration in our project began with a slide presentation of real, practical inventions that we use everyday to help us with ordinary tasks. These tools ranged from carpentry and repair tools to household appliances and electronic devices such as cell phones, TVs, and computers. Afterward, students perused the Web and explored their homes, their school, and neighborhood stores to locate tool models and ideas. At this stage, Eric looked around for tools that convey something from one container to another such as conveyer belts and pipes. Sally explored different kinds of trash collectors and compactors, paying close attention to their design.

Phase Four: Mine and Extract

In this last preparation phase, the collected ideas and concepts are investigated and analyzed to unearth underlying ideas and potential for the art works. This step calls for analytical thinking in picking apart ideas, and associative thinking in connecting those ideas to related ideas. Facilitating the mining phase requires asking questions that challenge students to look deeply into the ideas and imagery they have collected in the hunting/gathering phase. We asked questions about what tools students researched, what function the tools have and what physical characteristics those tools need to perform their functions. We also asked about tool design and what designers do to make tools both functional and beautiful. Mining and extracting in this way prepared students for the conceptual play and improvisation that followed.

At this stage Sally thought about the way trash compactors are designed and realized they need big openings in order to take in lots of trash. She also decided that in order to make her invention more popular, it must visually resemble something desirable and collectable like a work of art. Likewise, Eric analyzed how pipes and belts convey materials. He surmised that his tool needed to have a pipe that went into the head. It also would need to be strapped on or worn and, therefore, should be cool and masculine with a science fiction-inspired design. For inspiration, he looked at space suit designs from the1950s, which he found on the Internet.

Phase Five: Connect, Synthesize and/or Juxtapose

Phase five is playful and exploratory, and correlates with Wllas' incubation stage. In it, the ideas culled and analyzed in the mining/extraction stage are combined and recombined to create new ideas or concepts. Facilitating this part of the process entails asking questions that challenge students to think through their ideas and connect them up with other ideas. These are questions such as, "What is this like?" or "If this is like that, then what does that mean?"

In our project, students connected processes with similar processes. After looking at many possibilities, Eric connected learning to absorption. He surmised that a material must be the proper consistency in order to be absorbed. To be the right consistency, it must be pulverized. This combination of ideas added pulverizing books to the list of the E-Machine's functions. Adding this function sent Eric back to the "hunting" phase to look for models of tools that chop things up. For her part, Sally connected trash collecting with hunger and eating. She realized she needed to make a collectable art piece that was a voracious eater.

Phase Six: Cast or Frame

Casting/framing is another playful exploratory step that is associated with Wallas' incubation stage. In this phase, artist-learners manipulate ideas; they cast and recast them as different entities. In art practice, casting and framing often is performed in a concrete way with materials. In the cast/frame stage, an instructor should encourage play with both materials and ideas by providing many supplies and encouraging multiple interpretations. It is also critical to encourage students to think analogously or metaphorically. An instructor can do this by asking students what their idea reminds them of in its form, qualities, characteristics, and/or function.

Our students played with materials, which compelled them to substitute one thing for another and translate ideas into different forms. For example, a plastic bottle top became an on/off button, a bottle cap seal turned into a viewfinder, and a funnel became a miniature satellite dish. The cast/ frame phase also entails more conceptual analogies. For instance, Eric thought of the analogy between the chopping function of his E-Machine and that of a paper shredder. He then based the top part of the E-Machine on that model. In looking through the materials, he found a plastic bowl the size of a head. This inspired him to make the bottom of his E-Machine a helmet (Figure 3).

In a similar vein, Sally decided her World Saver needed to be a mouth-shaped creature. In looking through the materials in the classroom, she found plastic globes and shiny beads, buttons and stickers. These materials reminded her of plastic figurines and inspired her to cast her trash compactor as a mascot. Mascots are plastic toy-like characters that are a popular, cartoon-inspired form of art (Budnitz, 2006). This sent Sally back to the "hunting" phase to look at the world of mascots. Making her World Saver into a mascot gave Sunny the status of art.

Phase Seven: Project and Extend

Phase seven also falls in the Wallas' incubation stage and is associated with play. This phase involves taking the ideas from the recasting/reframing process and extending them further to new applications and possibilities. To help learner-artists extend or project their ideas, an instructor can ask questions such as, "How could you expand or extend that?" "How could you vary that or make it more extreme?" Eric, for example, extended his E-Machine by decorating it with plastic buttons and stickers to give it that science fiction look and make it a fashion statement. For inspiration, Eric looked at artwork by Maywa Denki, two Japanese artists who create futuristic contraptions with utopian functions (Yamaguchi, 2007).

Also, ideas for expansion can come from existing models. For instance, Sally, inspired by Dunnys, a form of mascot she found in her research, decided to extend her one World Saver (Sunny) into a series of World Savers. Dunnys are small plastic bunny-like figures that come in multiples. Each Dunny, although identical in form to other Dunnys, is a uniquely decorated commissioned artwork (Budnitz, 2006). Sally's extension of her one World Saver into a series opened up possibilities for new versions of it, each with its own name, identifying color scheme, accoutrements, and package.

Phase Eight: Construct

The construction step brings the ideas into the physical form. For Wallas, this is the illumination stage. This phase is identified here as a separate step. However, like the other phases in the creative process, the construction phase often overlaps or occurs simultaneously with other phases, especially the incubatory stages. Indeed, artists often make associations and extend their ideas as they manually construct an artwork. According to the action theory of creativity (Sawyer, 2006), creative invention requires interaction and crafting with materials. In our project, construction overlapped the other stages. Both Sally and Eric made many adjustments, inquiries, and discoveries as they put their ideas into physical form.

Phase Nine: Reflect

In the ninth phase, the notion of creative process as inquiry and learning is accentuated. In the Wallas' model, this step fits under verification because, in it, we critique or analyze the work. Because this is an art investigation, our critique addresses three important factors: the physical attributes of the artwork as an aesthetic object, the meaning of the artwork, and the learning that took place in the process of creating it. To access that learning, instructors can Simply ask:

"What did you learn?" The answers to this question lie not only in learner-artists' new understandings of the topic or content of the investigation, but also in their new knowledge about materials, techniques, the aesthetics of design, and themselves as artists (Figure 4).

"How did you learn?" is the follow-up question. Giving attention to the how of learning generates metacognition, or knowing how one learns, which is essential to ongoing learning and understanding (Bransford, Brown & Cocking, 2000). Because knowing and doing in creativity are inextricable, metacognition in creativity entails knowing what one is doing and is critical to successful creative production (Cropley, 1992). Because creativity includes venturing into the unknown, knowing what one is doing may seem antithetical to creativity. However, knowing that one is venturing and how one is going about it facilitates this process. Therefore, reflection on how one learns through creative processes not only makes an art investigation a true learning experience, but also promotes creativity.

We asked students what and how they learned during this project. For the most part, learning through artmaking was not a new prospect for them. Generally, they agreed that they learned about tools, about the problems they researched, and about how to put things together to make an artwork. Students also conveyed a new appreciation for the aesthetics of tool design. They expressed how excited they were about generating and designing their own inventions and playing with materials.

Phase Ten: Elaborate and Extend Further

This last step involves revisiting the learning and ideas gleaned from the artwork and art making process and extending or elaborating on them. Here, instructors can revisit the project, examine the artworks and then develop a follow-up investigation/lesson that calls attention to the important aspects of the artwork and that either creatively investigates or elaborates on it.

In our project, elaboration and extension occurred in the second part of the project: the design and construction of the package and the writing of the instructions for the tools. In this phase, we began with naming the problem again and distilling it down. Students analyzed their inventions in their final forms to prepare for making boxes. For the package distillation, we asked questions such as "What does your tool do?" "How can we tell a potential user what your tool does?" "What kind of package design, symbols, or imagery does your tool inspire?" The package making proceeded with students considering how best to market and explain their inventions. For inspiration, we presented a slide show of package designs and discussed the aesthetics and purposes of them. Students then went into the "hunting/gathering" phase; they looked at packaging in stores. With this preparation, students were ready to design and construct their boxes and embellish them with explanatory texts and images.

At this time, Eric thought about his E-Machine and decided that the package should be colorful and dynamic with the inventive, practical aspects of the E-Machine highlighted and explained. He also decided to make the display window in the shape of an "E" to stand for E-Machine and for Eric. With the E-window, the package became Eric's signature (Figure 5).

Sally realized that since she had created Sunny and Sky, a series of two mascots, she should make similar boxes that were color-coordinated with each tool (Figure 6). Also, the series aspect of World Savers: Sunny and Sky inspired Sally to make portraits on both boxes of all the other mascots in Sally's proposed series. This, she surmised, would inspire art enthusiasts to collect all of them (Figure 7).

Marshall, J. (2010) Thinking Outside the Box. Art Education, 63(2), pp. 16-23.

Hated Body Parts

2012-02-11T21:32:00.000-08:00

Hated body parts is a sculpture project developed because we recognize that, although self-portraiture and drawing the human figure are both included in most art curricula, the two are seldom joined. Students often portray their faces but almost never their bodies. Relentless media attention to dieting and eating disorders suggests that the body is an important concern in contemporary culture. Body image is a major issue for many teens, and much contemporary art challenges the naturalness of today's standards of physical beauty.

To complete this project, the students chose body parts about which they had obsessed or felt special concern. After drawing and writing about these parts of their bodies, the students created plaster carvings of their "problem areas" - an amusing variation of the tradition of copying "perfect" body parts. The resulting sculptures gave interesting insights into how students related to their own abodies. Many pieces were funny, some ironic, and some quite poignant. The final piece was a collaborative instillation of bas-relief sculptures and texts in which students created a safe space to discuss feelings about their bodies.

Gude, O. (2000). Investigating the Culture of Curriculum. In D.E. Fehr, K. Fehr, & K. Keifer-Boyd (Eds.), Real-World Readings in Art Education: Things Your Professor Never Told You (pp.75-81). New York, NY: Flamer Press.