Art Space
Prep
SELF-PORTRAIT DRAWING – Oil Pastels & Vegetable Dye
Students created individual self-portraits to celebrate the notion of diversity at Burwood Heights. Students used oil pastels and a vegetable dye wash to create these wonderfully vibrant and exciting portraits. Prep students experimented with the use of the oil pastel and the effects of applying a water based wash over their oil pastel rendering. This technique is called the resist wash method.
Grade 1/2
SCULPTURE
Students created robots made out of recycled items from home. The focus for students was firstly to imagine their robots and sketch ideas for their sculpture. This part of the project involved brainstorming the materials that could be used and how they intended to put the parts together. We call this the ‘Design Development’ part of the project. Next students collected various items from home to use to construct their robot – various methods of construction were used including star cuts, slotting and various adhesives. To complete the project students painted their sculptures in metallic paint and collaged aluminium foil to the surface of the robot. There was a constant buzz of activity, experimentation, sharing of recycling, questioning and enthusiasm throughout this project and a joy of making and creating!
Grade 3/4
CRAZY FOR KANDINSKY
In term 4 Level 3 students were engaged in exploring and responding to an artist’s style. Students’ looked at the art work of the Russian artist Wassily Kandinsky and explored the concept of Abstract Art using his paintings as inspiration.
Students started their artwork by using an assortment of geometric shapes used as templates. Students overlapped and repeated shapes within their composition and were encouraged to utilize their whole page.
The next step was to apply colour – Students considered the bold use of colour by Kandinsky and with this as inspiration created their own colour scheme in oil pastels. After completing the application of colour, students then used a graphite pencil to work over the oil pastel and create strong design lines in their compositions.
Finally the students applied a vegetable dye wash to enhance the final artwork. Students very much enjoyed the experience of using this resist method where the oil pastel resists the wash, but where there was white paper absorbed the dye colour.
The resulting work is wonderful to see – bright, lively, colourful, expressive and unique. Congratulations Level 3!
PINCH POTS – Ceramics/Sculpture
Students created pinch pots using terracotta clay. With an emphasis on Three Dimensional form and shape students created small vessels and containers. Students then focused on the surface decoration of their pinch pots creating different textures and patterns using a range of tools including a wooden stylus, various brushes, forks, paddle pop sticks – basically anything that could make interesting patterns and marks on their pots. Lots of fun was had exploring the nature of clay and its characteristics.
TIM BURTON PAINTING – Poster Paints, Pencil & Oil Pastel
Inspired by the work of the filmmaker, animator and artist; Tim Burton, students created these wonderfully scary and spooky images. Many of the Art Elements were incorporated in the works including line, shape, tone, and texture. Light and shadow was used to create a sense of foreboding together with the elongation and distortion of figures.
SELF-PORTRAIT DRAWING ‘Tattoo You’ – Coloured Pencils
Students created individual self-portraits to celebrate the notion of the individual. The focus of this project was to create a self-portrait based on personal symbols rather than a realistic drawing of themselves. Students used line, pattern, repetition and colour in combination to create these unique images based on themselves.
PRIMITIVE MASKS
Students explored the role and uses of masks in tribal cultures and created their own.
STILL LIFE DRAWING – Graphite Pencils
Students created realistic drawings using graphite pencils of everyday items; the subject matter was ‘still life’. Students studied the effects of light and shadow on still life objects and used light and dark tone to render objects to create the illusion of three dimensions.
Grade 5/6
IT'S A DOGS LIFE - Modroc Sculpture
Students created three dimensional dog characters with various poses and expressions to represent the character of the dog. Students experienced the challenge of creating a sculpture firstly by making a frame using armature wire, then attaching newspaper to the frame to ‘bulk’ up the sculpture and lastly applying Modroc, (plaster embedded in gauze) to make the outer shell. Students have then painted and decorated the surface of their dog to complete the sculpture. During the project students referenced the dog characters from Hairy Maclary as one point of inspiration.
PAPUA NEW GUINEA INSPRIRED MASKS
Students engaged in creating masks inspired by traditional masks from Papua New Guinea.
SELF-PORTRAIT DRAWING – Coloured Pencils
Students created individual self-portraits to celebrate the notion of diversity at BHPS with the theme of respect. This was a whole school project with each level given a colour scheme to represent the colours of the rainbow – part of this project is currently displayed outside the art room. Students could choose to represent themselves in a realistic or comic style, some students choosing to combine both.
NED KELLY PAINTING – Acrylic Paints
Students were inspired by the iconic Ned Kelly painting series by Australian artist Sidney Nolan. During this unit of work students explored the notion of what was a typical Australian bush landscape, the division of space to represent sky and land, textural effects to create landscape elements such as clouds, trees, hills, and bushes. Students were supplied with just the primary colours red, blue and yellow plus black and white and were required to mix their colours to achieve browns, greens and purples. Students experimented with layering paint to achieve texture and depth in their landscape paintings and observations such as the sky grading from light blue at the horizon to dark blue at the full height of the painting. Lastly students developed and painted their own interpretation of the iconic Kelly symbol so widely recognised in Australian folklore and culture.
