Day 1 of Contemporary Art Series Camp: Chuck Close Fingerprint Paintings

Chuck Close is one of my favorite Contemporary artists! I wanted to be able to show the summer session 2 kids artworks that varied in medium and technique so what better way to showcase these skills than by using Chuck Close's fingerprint portraits. My original idea was to have students create self-portraits of themselves and then using black ink, go back over different areas of their face using their fingerprints. Though, I think I was thinking way too big for a group of 4 - 8 year olds who all have completely different skill sets. So, instead, we opted to do more of an abstracted image of a flower and vase. 

Before we began the art lesson, I introduced the students to the artist of the day. I exclaimed to them who Chuck Close was and what kind of art he did. The kids seemed to enjoy looking at his finger print portraits. In fact, most couldn't even tell that it was a painting because it looked so much like a photograph! This is when we started talking about photo realism and how photo illusions come into play from this type of art style. The students even seemed to enjoy that the artist was still living and still creating artwork, despite his disability. To even help students remember this artist, I explained to them how Chuck Close created works that were very large in size so he would have to sit in front of his paintings and *CLOSELY* paint his artworks. Chuck Close painted CLOSE up. :-) 

The kids were excited to paint in the vase of flowers using simple colors. It was really easy for them to start this process since the shapes were very much abstracted and simple enough for them to paint in. 

Next, we gave the students a variety of colors and demonstrated how to appropriately dip in their pointer fingers into the paint and *DAB* their fingers all throughout their painting. This process was interesting to watch because you could tell which students were the more neat and meticulous ones and who were the messier ones. The boys seemed to be the more messy, in this case. Some students chose to create their fingerprint marks in a very fast manner using a lot of paint to the point where their fingerprints were hard to see. In these instances, we had to come over and demonstrate to them how to dip their fingers. 

Once we were done with our masterpieces, we examined our works. I explained to the students how the flower vase was hard to see up close because the fingerprints cast an unusual illusion up close. However, once students backed up from their works they could see a hint of the flower vase! This is what photo realism is all about. 

All in all, it was a good day to study Chuck Close!

Final Thoughts On Summer Art Camp Session I

Is there a way to precisely describe my feelings after teaching 18 kids different forms of art for 4 hours a day for 5 days? Yes, there is a way to describe it. Here, my feelings can best be described using Caravaggio's Medusa:

Art teachers do a lot. My past week teaching art classes has taught me just that. There was even a point in time in which I pondered to myself, "how many calories does an art teacher burn during a full day's work...." (I later googled this question yet, the search drive didn't give me any precise answers). Regardless, no many how many times I wanted to scream at my kids, yank a paintbrush out of their hands, or even just walk out of the classroom, I kept my cool. I had to think to myself, "patience, Steph... patience." But it's hard. And anyone who says that teaching is an easy job can just spend a day in my shoes. Because, I have been of those people who has thought it was all easy.

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Here are some things I learned from Session 1- Mini Masters Series:

1. Learn names!!! It makes a huge difference when you're talking one on one with a student about their artwork and calling them by their name after every, "good job, nice work, way to go, etc." form of praise to them. It's personal and makes them feel special. After all, that's how I feel when someone ends a praise using my name. "Good job, Stephanie", makes me feel special and will make your students feel special too.

2. Don't yank art materials out of students' hands. I see my head art teacher doing this over and over again and it makes me CRINGE. I guess you could do this if you were running out of time and needed a child to focus on another area of a painting/drawing. Regardless, always ask. In my opinion, "Can I help you here?" goes a long way rather than grabbing art materials out of a child's hand.

3. Create lesson plans where the students' creativity can really show through in each work. For me, it's a little sad to look at the students' works at the end of the day and then realize that everything looks the same. Instead, opt for lessons where kids can experiment with designs and other materials. I don't think that buildings will burn down and the world will explode if you let a child do a couple of polkadots in the background of a painting.

4. If you must re-work or "touch up" a child's work, don't do it when they are in the room. You'll have to deal with the student watching you paint over their master pieces and then come up with an explanation as to what you're doing. That can get awkward and can easily make an art teacher feel guilty and... a little sad. In all honesty, I am against re-working a child's art. Just avoid re-working at all costs, honestly.

5. Most youngsters don't know how to work with paint...adjust lesson plans accordingly. Though 3rd graders + are usually good about working with paints, it's easy to forget that younger students don't have the dexterity skills or the knowledge to handle paints.. especially acrylic or tempera. I think it's okay to substitute collage pieces for works that use paints. If a student gets finished with a collage piece faster than other students who are working on paintings, then they can create multiple collage pieces...which is where the creativity can happen!

I'm sure there's countless other things that are important for art educators to know when they are teaching a new art project for their students but, for now, I'd like to just let these 5 things marinate with myself and any other art teacher who might be grappling with the task of making art fun, yet educational for students.

Edvard Munch's "The Scream"

Work in progress. That is how we were able to justify and send home our incomplete Munch-inspired drawings today because we ran out of time. I guess it happens sometimes during art camp. I suppose it can happen any time when you're struggling to complete another art project as well. For us, that's exactly what was happening today. 

Not only were the art teachers trying to touch up the last bit of projects and organizing each child's work of art so they could take them all home in their portfolios, but we also wanted them to finish up another art project that they had been working on throughout the week: 

The "magic sticks" were designed to be a project that students could work on in between art pieces if they finished early or to wrap up the day's work! We started designing our magic sticks on Tuesday but found that they bamboo sticks would look better if they were all painted. So, we had to paint 18 long bamboo sticks different colors so the children could add on their own designs to the sticks. 

Today, we ended up spending more time on the magic sticks than the actual art project. As if this wasn't enough, the poor kids were tired of sitting in their chairs all day long! It had been a rainy Friday afternoon so we couldn't let the kids go out on the playground and release energy, like we normally do. So, combine restlessness + 2 art projects = some tired kiddos!

We ended up starting the Munch project an hour before kids were scheduled to be picked up. All 3 of us art teachers struggled to pass out materials, get everyone settled down and ready to lesson, all while trying to keep our cool.

I started off with my usual routine: explaining the artist, art style, and art project. This time, the art history only lasted maybe about 5 minutes because I could sense how fidgety the kids were getting. 

The head teacher took over the lesson and started passing out materials, but..I could tell she was starting to get fed up with kids running around the classroom and the loudness of the classroom. I hated doing this, but I had to yell at the kids. I hate yelling. I hate yelling at kids. I even hate yelling at kids during an art lesson, but.. it just had to happen. The amount of noise and disruption was just not appropriate for us to begin the art lesson. 

Unfortunately, the students only made it through the sky and the mountains in the background before the clock struck 12:30 and the teachers had all decided it was time to get everything organized before the parents arrived. We all hated sending home and unfinished work, but.. as usual, the teachers outlined the major forms of the drawing using black colored pencil so the students could go over these marks at home and on their own. 

Claude Monet's "Lily Pads"

Ever had a bad day in art class and realize that the project you thought would turn out beautiful and would go exactly as planned just ended up being the total opposite and really brought you down for the rest of the day? Yeah, that's me. Right now.

Like the Henri Matisse project from yesterday, I was also reluctant to start on a project that was very trite and... a little boring. I've seen hundreds of Lily Pads projects inspired by Monet and they all look the same! Especially in the summer internship position I took on this year, I know for a fact that kids had done this same project once (or maybe even twice before). So, I had to think of a lesson plan that would still be able to get the kids excited about the project, but also learn about Claude Monet. I wanted to find a lesson that would be able to use the same techniques found in his works (layering colors, using cool colors with a hint of warm colors to evoke a sense of light and reflections, and also being able to show movement, for example), but refraining from using paint. Don't get me wrong- I love paints, I love painting, and I love teaching painting classes! But, after yesterday's sorta disastrous painting lesson in which us teachers found ourselves cleaning up paintings in order to make them "look more beautiful", I was ready to let the kids experiment with techniques and to not rely on paints. However, it didn't look like that would happen....

In this lesson plan I had created for the day, students would be using tissue paper to collage different layers on top of each other to create the water lilies on top of the water. Pretty simple and most importantly, something that the students would all be able to work on due to the fact that they know how to cut (or strip off) pieces of tissue paper and glue them on a board. Well, it didn't look like that would be happening for the kids today.

I had sent the head teacher these lesson plans a week before classes started and so, she did have ample time to review everything first before we started the lessons. However, the day before she had mentioned to me that she was scared the Monet lesson would look too much like our earlier Homer piece because students would be using collage materials. Well, of course I noticed this similarity before hand but I had devised this lesson plan for a reason.

The head teacher has worked with many of these same students, either in her pre-k classes during the school year or in the after school program she has been teaching through this same summer art camp series. I knew for a fact that she had done a Monet-inspired piece with the students because I have seen pictures of them on social media. That's why I chose to do a collage piece inspired by this artist...to avoid any overlapping. However, she felt like we had to change the lesson plan because so many of the kids in this summer art camp class had also taken classes with her. I swallowed my words and agreed to do it her way because, not only is she my boss, but she does understand the importance of our clientele. We wanted to make the parents happy and in awe of the variety of works we had created in summer art camp, after all!

After I did the art history lesson with the students, it was time to bring out the bristol paper and oil pastels. Students were restricted to blues, yellows, pinks, and a brown. No dark colors allowed in this lily pad painting! Next, the head teacher began the lesson as usual. With an already drawn out depiction of a bridge over water using white pastels, kids began following her directions and filling in the appropriate colors. However, after about 2 steps in, she instructed me that I could continue a different Monet-inspired lesson with 2 kiddos in the class since they had already done this same exact artwork with the teacher in their after school classes.

Well, the tissue paper was nowhere to be found, folks. And, frankly, I was on a time crunch and had to just improvise.

The two students both had blank sheets of bristol paper. I saw some construction paper on one table and pastels on the other. My mind worked quick as I decided that me and my two students would be doing a close-up depiction of the lily pads instead of doing the usual bridge drawing that the head teacher was doing with the other 16 kids. Oh yeah, keep in mind I am working at one table with 2 other students who are attempting to follow directions from the head teacher as I instruct my 2 students to follow my directions. It was crazy, y'all!!!!

I began drawing large semicircles on the paper for the 2 students. These would be the lily pads. They totally look like lily pads, I thought. I instructed the kids (1 who was 5 and the other who was 4) to fill in their 5-6 lily pads using brown, green, and pink. "It's okay to color over each color using a new one!" I kept telling them as I awkwardly grinned and pretended to know WHAT I was doing. Next, it was time to add color in the background! AKA, in the areas that were left white. I handed the students a blue crayon and told them to color in this large area, making sure that there weren't any white that was showing through. After about one minute, literally ONE minute, the kids were ready for the next step. I had to step back and look at their works and try to figure out how I could make them look more Impressionist-inspired....especially more Monet-inspired. That's when I found the holy construction paper. Oh man. If it wasn't for that beloved construction paper... I don't know what I would've done.

I'm starting to learn how tiny the attention spans of children are everyday in art camps. Because of this, I knew I had to keep the kids involved with their Monet works as much as possible. Thank goodness Impressionists like to layer on colors on top of each other!

So, I instructed the kids to keep on layer lime greens, soft pinks, and dark blues on their "water areas" (the "non-lily pad areas", as I called them). As they were occupied with this task, I cut up the brown, pink, yellow, and green pieces of construction paper into circles that would layer over the students' already drawn out lily pads. Contrast, I thought.

After each different sized circle was cut out from the construction paper, the kids got to glue them on top of their lily pads. This whole entire process took about 45 minutes. All while other things were happening in the classroom. I'm proud of my 2 kiddos for following my directions and paying attention to me instead of their fellow students and their different works. But, I wish I had been able to think of other ways to re-create this work in a manner that looked less boring and more vivacious...like the Impressionists had done themselves!

All in all, I wasn't as impressed with the way I taught this lesson plan. :-(

4 down, 1 more to go!

Henri Matisse's "Purple Robe With Anemones"

I try really really really really really really hard not to let my biases get in the way of my lesson plans and what I am teaching in class. But with this lesson, that didn't seem to happen. :( 

I did not want to teach a lesson on Matisse. I, personally, don't care for Fauvism or Matisse and never did as a kid. Sure, the colors are pretty but, I preferred the vivacious brush marks of Impressionisms over the flatness of Fauvism. However, the art camp I am working for this summer had advertised that Matisse would be included in this Mini-Masters series this week so I reluctantly included this project.

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I am sure there are a lot of art teachers out there who can flawlessly teach Fauvism and Henri Matisse-inspired lessons in their classes, but I am not one of those educators.. at least not yet. :) My issue with teaching Fauvism to elementary school kids is that I personally believe that the only real thing that the students are learning from this art style is that these artists use bright colors and a lot of shapes. Of course, this wasn't all Fauvism was about. However, these are the main things that the kids are getting out of the lessons. Not to mention, recreating a work that already looks a bit childish will then create a mediocre project that students take home and don't really recall any true methods in creating that said art piece. Sure, it's fun to paint, but what are we really getting out of this project? 

Now, I know my above statement has a lot of my art historian criticism coming out, but I've witnessed these effects over and over again, not only through my internship this summer, but also in previous teaching positions I've held in the past. 

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I searched high and low for a lesson plan that would be something fun, creative, and different for the students to truly learn about Matisse and Fauvism. Eventually, I settled on re-creating his "Purple Robe With Anemones" using acrylic paint. Hello messy art day #2.

We started off the project as usual. I took over the beginning of the lesson by devoting 5-10 minutes talking about Matisse's life as an artist and discussing Fauvism with the students. We looked through about 5 different works of art that he created during his lifetime. I explained how Matisse (and other Fauves like him) used bright colors and also flat brushstrokes. I could see the look of wonderment on some students' faces as they stared at the paintings I projected on the screen. Some students were interested in his work, that's for sure. Others, however, were getting a bit antsy during this art history lesson. Though, one restless student was able to relate to Matisse by explaining how he had a dog named Henry at home who just so happened to be a Maltese breed. Hey, if there's any way a student can relate to the artist of the day by using their actual experiences, I'll take it.

After the art history lesson, the head teacher took over and began the actual art making process. Beforehand, she had drawn out the entire image of the lady in a purple robe using pencil. Because she thought that the details would be a lot for the kids to take on by themselves, she had also colored in using crayons the different areas of the canvas so that students knew which areas were certain colors. Looking back, I'm glad she had this idea because, had we not done this, the art lesson would've been messier and confusing for students, especially for the younger ones.

The head teacher began dividing up the lesson by doing each shape first and doing the next using different colors. This way, the students would be able to stay on the same page as everyone else while also giving us teachers the ability to walk around and examine each step.

Once students had filled in every inch of their canvas with the corresponding colors of paints, it was time to end the lesson. I had imagined the lesson would take an hour and in actuality, we went over by 15 minutes. And it wasn't hard to tell that the kids were getting tired and needed a break. Try telling a 5 year old to finish up a project and you're in for a rude (literally rude and bratty awakening).

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At the end of the day, the lesson seemed a bit mediocre for my taste. I loved how the students got a chance to work with acrylic paint and experiment different ways that they can use the paint brushes to fill in various forms in their works. But, the final product wasn't really their own work.

Take a look at this painting:

Beautiful, right? Fauvism-inspired, yes? But, did a 5 year old make this painting in it's entirety, though? Not so much....

Me and my fellow teaching artist were asked by our head art teacher to finish up the students' paintings while the kids were on a recess break. At first, the head art teacher asked me to simply outline the major shapes (the woman, the robe, the vase, the flowers, etc.) using black paint. Reluctantly, I agreed. She then asked me to clean up the shapes and "add definition" by going into the sold areas using the black paint. So, I added in a few lines here, some lines over there... I even outlined the children's designs in the background as well. Throughout all of this, I felt horrible. I felt guilty. As I stood over the rows of Matisse-inspired paintings each student had done, I just thought to myself, "everything looks the same."

And with this, I think I have begun to discover what my issue is with teaching summer art camps. More shall be explained later....

3 down, 2 more to go...

Gustav Klimt's "The Tree of Life"

After yesterday's successful project, I was eager to start on this new one. The original lesson plan I laid out for the teachers involved using metallic and gold markers on black paper with the kids drawing out the tree of life but the head teacher proposed a different approach, since we had an abundance of kids from different age ranges who lacked certain art skills. 

As soon as the head teacher brought out the canvases and acrylic paint I thought to myself, "uh oh...". I just envisioned paint getting everywhere, the canvases turning out messy, and kids using too much color and shapes in their trees.

Before kids got to camp, the head teacher and I drew out the trees on the canvases first with pencils. We both thought that it may be too hard for a lot of the students to draw out the swirls of the branches on their own. Next, we handed out the canvases to the students and instructed them to CAREFULLY paint in the tree (branches and all) with the dark brown paint. I thought that a lot of the students may have a hard time with this step since it required a lot of precision but, the kids proved me wrong....again! Many of the students took their time to fill in all of the branches and to paint in the trunk. There was even a student who was doing interesting mark making with her brush:

Our next step was to add in the orange (or gold, as a lot of kids remembered from the artist slideshow earlier in the day). This gold served as a background for the tree and would make it pop out even more, as I explained to the kids. This, by far, was the most challenging part for the students and if I could, I would go back and change up this step. 

Since there were small areas in between the branches that needed the gold, a lot of kids had a hard time precisely painting in the gold and to refrain from getting it all over the branches. Looking back, starting off this painting with a gold background first may be the one huge alteration I would make to this lesson. Though, luckily, my two other teachers helped the students who were struggling to paint in the smaller (harder) areas. 

After, we filled in the ground by using blue paint. This was easy for everyone in the classroom since that particular area was big enough for the students to fill in with paint. 

After we had every inch of our canvas filled in with color, the final (and most enjoyable) step was to go back into the tree using reds, yellows, whites, and greens to paint different shapes and forms inside the areas. During this step, I referred back to Klimt's artworks on the projector to give students inspiration for the shapes that they may want to do. This step was hard because many of the students wanted to fill in every inch of the tree with some sort of shape or they wanted to completely go over the brown with other colors. 

After an hour, which was about how long I predicted the lesson would take, I had to stop the project and just take the canvases away. It wasn't because the kids were being bad and not handling the materials properly, but they were getting soooo into it, that it got to a point where everyone in the class was over-working their projects and going overboard with the paint. Not to self: once the colors on the canvas turn muddy (and especially when and if the art doesn't call for muddy colors) end the project.

Overall, the end result with this project turned out fabulous. Even though,we had to use black paint and outline everything in the painting to clean them up a bit, I was happy with the overall results. In fact, the head teacher was so pleased with the final product, she decided to use the lesson in her next curriculum project for the kids during a new session. 

2 lessons down, 3 more to go!

Day 1: Winslow Homer's "The Fog Warning"

Alas, Day 1 is here! After 3 cups of black tea, I was ready to start the day with 16 kiddos, a bunch of glue and watercolors, and with our artist of the day, Winslow Homer. I had no idea what to expect. Would the kids enjoy working on this project? Would they be able to learn anything about art? And, what would they leave today's class session better understanding? These are all questions I had circulating inside my head for the past week. 

We started the day off with the first 30 minutes devoted to decorating the students' artist portfolios that they would collect all of their artwork in and take home at the end of the week. This was the head teacher's idea to begin class with as some parents may be running late dropping off their kids. It ended up working out great because it was a way for students to talk with each other and introduce themselves as they shared art materials at their tables. In addition, it also allowed the teachers to engage with the students and to introduce ourselves to kids as we learned their names/ages/schools they go to, etc. 

Once 9:30 rolled around, the kids took a bathroom break and played outside for a few minutes to release some energy. Next, they had a snack and pretty soon after- it was time to start the lesson! 

While the head teacher and my fellow teaching artist set up materials to each table, I gathered the kids and we all sat in one corner of the room..thank goodness we had a pretty spacious classroom. Since the TV monitor wasn't working, I couldn't set up my slideshow so we all huddled together in the corner of my room and viewed my presentation from my laptop. I was nervous that the kids' short attention spans would dwindle as I talked about each of Homer's artworks but to my surprise, they loved hearing about his work. I spoke about the artist as if he were a character in a story book.We looked at his illustrations from his early career and I would even ask the students questions to keep them engaged such as: Homer would go to the beach to paint scenes of the ocean.. Who here has been to the ocean? Does anyone know where Boston is ? etc. etc. After I showed the students a collection of the seven artworks, we landed on the one that we would be studying today- "The Fog Warning". After talking about the piece, we were ready to begin our lesson.

We started off the lesson by first using the drawing paper to paint on variations of blues and greens with water color. I emphasized the importance of the students using long and linear brush marks because these colors served as our waves that we would later tear off. After, students set aside their watercolor waves paper and began painting plain blue on their watercolor paper. This would serve as the background for the work. Once we had our plain blue drawing watercolor paper and our variations of blue/green on the drawing paper, we were ready to start tearing the blue/green paper. As  I had suspected, the boys seemed to be very into the tearing of the paper. Many students struggled to tear off long pieces, but once I demonstrated how to get longer strips, they regained their confidence and started tearing. I instructed the students to adhere the strips of paper onto different parts of their blue water color paper. After the students were satisfied with their waves, we started passing out their sailboats (which we designed and cut out before hand since many of the students were too little to use scissors and cut out the boats from templates). We also gave the students different shapes and colors of construction paper to design their boats with. The kids all got really into this process as some used a variety of colors while others only stuck with a few colors on their boats. The variety of pieces turned out interesting. 

Overall, the first day's project turned out to be a success. I hypothesized that the lesson would take 45 minutes to complete but, to my surprise, we got done in a little over an hour. The kids had so much fun ripping up the drawing paper and recreating their own waves. Even though it wasn't an exact replica of Winslow Homer's work, I was still satisfied with how I envisioned the piece to be "kid friendly" as well as a good variation to add in their portfolios.

1 lesson down, 4 more to go!